You Are Enough (A Letter to My Autistic Son on his 15th Birthday)

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Dear Jack,

Over the past several months, you and mom have been working at the kitchen table with your communication device. Since spoken words are still so tricky for you, we’re exploring this other way of talking. You touch the screen and choose between picture icons, common words, and a qwerty keyboard. When you find what you want, you string the words together, and the iPad says them aloud: “I want pizza.”

We’re not sure whether this will, in time, become your preferred way of talking. After all, you can tell us with your lips that you want pizza. You do that kind of thing all the time. But something different has started to happen with this new way. You’ve started making observations.

“Can you tell me something about this picture?” Mom will ask, sometimes with the help of the teachers on Zoom. It’s usually a picture of something you know: Mike Wazowski, or Kermit the Frog, or maybe even a real frog. This time, it was Moana.

I think the request didn’t make sense to you at first. Why would we want to know what you see in the picture? Can’t we see it ourselves? But they kept asking you, and you started to play along.

“Moana is pretty,” you said with the device.

Well then. Yes. Yes, she is. I’m not at all surprised you noticed that. You’re turning fifteen, after all. I was younger than you are now when Beauty and the Beast came out, and I noticed the same thing about Belle. Part of me is still a little bit in love with her, I think. So no, I wasn’t surprised at all. But we were all still excited to know it simply because you thought it.

And what about Maui? What did you notice in the picture of the gargantuan demi-god? The teacher asked the question, and you thought about it. You searched for available answers under the “S” listing. Mom thinks you were looking for “strong.” But it wasn’t there. So you backed out and found another word, which featured a stick man lifting weights with one hand. You clicked on it.

“Easy,” the device said.

Easy. Of course. He’s so strong, he can pick up boats and trees and probably mountains without breaking a sweat. Everything Maui does is easy.

“Jack, that’s so smart,” mom said. And she meant it. You gave a great insight. You saw a picture everyone else saw, and you shared your own, personal, Jack-thought. And it was a cool observation.

Maybe this doesn’t seem like a big deal to you, son, but it is to us. Your thoughts matter to us. Your thoughts are important. Your thoughts tell us more about you, and we want to know you as much as we possibly can. This is why we spend time working on the device even though it’s hard. It’s also why I often say things like, “what are you thinking about, bud?”

I’m explaining this because I am afraid we might sometimes give you the wrong idea. We might be accidentally hurting your feelings. Moms and dads do this kind of thing without ever knowing it, and then when their kids grow up and tell them, everyone feels bad. And one of the biggest ways this happens is when kids feel like they have to perform for their parents’ affection.

Some boys, for example, feel like they have to play football or basketball really well so their dads will be proud of them. Some girls feel like they have to get good grades and be perfect so their moms will think they’re valuable. And others—kids who have autism and have a hard time communicating—might feel like they have to talk to prove their worth. I hope and pray you don’t feel this way, but I know the pressure might be there sometimes.

Remember when we stayed at the cabin last summer? You loved it. We could see it all over your face. Maybe it was the way the lake was nestled into mountains, or how the sun hit the dock in the afternoon. I was sitting with you on the dock one of those afternoons, and you wore a serene smile. I asked you, “What do you like most about this place, Jack?”

You looked at me, and your mouth was open just a little bit. It seemed like you were considering the question and wanted to answer. And for just a moment, I thought you might do it. I thought you might say, “I like the color of the water,” or, “I like having Leeli here.”

Could you tell how much I was hoping for that to happen? And did it make you sad when you couldn’t do it? Did I accidentally put pressure on you to perform?

My dear boy, we have shared fifteen years of life, and of all the things I have spoken to you, this might be the most important: you are enough.

That’s it. You’re enough.

I love it when you can tell us what you think. I love it when you can communicate what you want. But you do not have to do those things to earn our affection. You never did. And if I’ve ever—even for a moment—made you think otherwise, I pray you can forgive me. Because there is a difference between what a boy can do and who a boy is.

Remember the “Jack and Daddy video” on the beach? I told you then that you were “a piece of God’s own daydreams.” I meant it. That is who you are. You are the flesh-and-bone dream of the Creator Himself. You carry His image, and our image, too. You are priceless to us, not because of anything you can accomplish, but because you are our son. You don’t have to talk about the lake or about Moana to prove it. You don’t have to do anything to prove it.

Work time isn’t going away, I’m afraid. It’s part of growing up. Sometimes I don’t like it very much, either. But we are so proud of the way you face the challenges. We know you’re not Maui. We don’t expect you to be like him. None of this stuff is easy. It’s hard, and yet you keep at it.

We’ve told you we want to hear your thoughts, son. Well, it seems like you’re starting to believe us. And now, I am asking you to believe this: we adore you, even when the words don’t come.

Happy Birthday,

Dad

For Who She Is Right Now

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She used to stand on top of a box, frozen in the rapturous potential of her wardrobe. I don’t know how we accumulated so many princess dresses, but she loved them all, and choosing one took time. At first I would hurry her. Getting dressed shouldn’t take all day, I was sure of it. But over time, I learned to give her space to make her decision. She would emerge twenty minutes with a tiara, a vain smile, and a dress of sky-blue silk.

And an hour later, she’d be wearing a yellow one.

It was a hilarious, adorable phase. I didn’t want it to end. But as every Cinderella knows, the magic only lasts so long. Soon, she discovered dirt and bugs and adventures. When she was five, she argued with her buddy Natiq about their shared future. He wanted to be a fireman, but she wanted to be fashionable. They decided on a compromise: they would be firemen who wore pink.

Jenna turns sixteen today, and I can’t help but think of all those costumes she used to wear. All of us try on costumes as we grow, I think. We adopt new postures, new moods, new outlooks. We look for original preferences. We seek personas that will make us stand out, or blend in. We climb and climb in search of that elusive identity that will last not just for today, but for always.

Someday… Someday we’ll learn who we really are.

We take personality tests, and discover we are a list of letters and traits and strange descriptors. We are INTP with top strengths of ideation and adaptability; we are fours with a five wing, who speak love with quality time. We are choleric sanguins with a dash of steadiness.

At least, we are those things until tomorrow, when we retake the tests without being so hangry.

Someday… Someday we’ll learn who we really are.

Growing up is hard enough when you think there’s a finish line. But I am forty, and I still haven’t arrived. My floor is littered with the worn out costumes; the embarrassing remnants of images attempted and discarded.

But what if there is no finish line to get to? What if there is no plateau? Change is already woven into our world; what if it’s woven into ourselves as well? If that’s true, we owe ourselves some grace on the quest toward self-discovery. And we owe our children even more.

I look at my daughter today, and I wonder if she would have ever become who she is today–the coffee-sipping artist; the patient, protective, sister; the theater nerd who just wants to know everybody’s having a good time–if not for other clothes she tried on in her journey. And that makes me thankful for each one of them: the princess phase, the fireman phase, even the phase where she thought she loved professional golfer Phil Mickelson! Every era brought its own charm; its own delight.

In five years, will she still love theater? Will she still be an ardent student of Michael Scott and Dwight K. Schrute? Will she retain her irrepressible quirkiness?

Perhaps she won’t. Maybe one day, I’ll drop a quote from The Office, and she won’t remember it. Maybe she’ll put down her paint brush. Maybe she’ll pass on the espresso.

If that happens, I’ll miss these golden days in the same way I miss the princess dresses.

But I don’t ever want to mourn them. No. I’d rather give her time to try on the new dress. I’d rather live with her in the middle of those changes. I’d rather enjoy the ride. Because we only get one chance to watch our children grow.

So today, I watch her. She is tall and lovely and full of winsome grace. For some reason, God has placed her in my charge for just a little while longer. I’ll continue to watch her and love her not only for who she is becoming, but for who she is right now.

From the Other Side of 40 (A Strongly Worded Letter to my 20 Year Old Self)

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In a shocking turn of events, I turned forty yesterday. And when a writer turns forty, he has an obligation to do one of those “letters to my younger self” articles. Those letters, however, are usually kind and gentle. My younger self needs a stern talking to. So here is my “strongly worded letter” to my twenty year old self.

Jason,

I’ve got three things to say, and you will listen. I don’t know whether it will change anything. We haven’t established the rules of time travel in this particular fiction, but I’m going to try, and it’s going to sting. Let it sting. Invite the sting. The sting is your friend.

#1. Your dreams are over-rated. Stop believing in them.

No, I’m serious. You think you know what you’re about right now, but you don’t. You have created a version of yourself who you plan to parade into courtrooms and, eventually, political races. You picture him gliding before the jury, evidence in hand and soliloquies on his tongue. His words are irresistible, his logic irrefutable. He is gong to do all of the big, noble things. He will change the world. There is only one problem: that man doesn’t exist. You made him up.


I’m not saying your dreams don’t matter; just that they’re not really yours. You borrowed them. You saw other people living them out (mostly on television), and you mistook them as your own. But I assure you, you were not built for such visions. You would be a terrible lawyer, and a worse politician.

Listen: everyone will tell you to follow your dreams and let your heart guide you, but that’s nonsense. Your heart will constantly deceive you, and your dreams will change. Let them change. Some things seem so urgent now, and you’ll soon forget all about them. That’s okay. You’ll have new dreams as you get older. Better ones, I dare say. Because your heart itself will grow. Let that happen. Trust that process. Don’t take yourself so seriously.

(A quick aside here about your political obsession: It’s stupid. Politics takes up far too much real estate in your mind. It makes you anxious, and it keeps you from trusting people. You get one vote ever two years. That’s it. So stop pretending your rants carry so much weight and wisdom. They don’t. Invest your energies in learning to love your neighbor. You’re not going to gain any wisdom until you start listening to people anyway.)

#2. Beauty will save you

Ah, you hate this one, I know. You hate it because you’re so self-sufficient and assured, and this sounds like it belongs in the domain of artsy feelers. But hear me: you’re going to take some lumps soon, and those lumps are going to change you. They’re going to disorient you. You’re going to hurt like hell, and you’re going to want to dodge it all.

Don’t dodge it. Invite the pain. Invite the softening. Don’t fight it. Embrace it.

Over time, you’ll learn to tear up in books and in movies. That’s okay. That’s just you becoming a real live boy. When Mr. Fredrickson sees his wife’s additions to the adventure book, let the tears come. When Shasta finds the mountain pass and meets the lion, don’t fight it. When Lee says, “timshel,” choose to feel the weight of his words. When Orual presents her real book of accusations against the gods, pull that scene deep into your heart. Art will nourish you if you will let it. Beauty will preserve your soul. It will bring empathy–a deep softening that will benefit you and those you love. And if you need any motivation here, which I know you do, consider this: you will never be able to write anything good until you learn to cry.

#3. You need other people more than you can possibly imagine

You know that girl you’re about to marry? You don’t deserve her. The narrative of your life together will take shocking turns. You’ll have your beautiful children, but things will be different. So much different than what you planned. You will ache together. You will take turns being strong for each other. But she will take the longer turn. She will carry you, and you need to be grateful.

Seventeen years from now, something small will happen. You’re going to develop a nickel allergy, making you allergic to your wedding ring. So you’ll go without one for a few years. Then, out of the blue, a man will hear you preach, and he’ll offer to make you a new one that you can actually wear. But instead of gold, he’ll inlay it with redwood.

There’s this thing about redwood trees you will know by then: despite their immensity, their roots are shallow. Very shallow. And yet they stand and grow tall even through pounding rains and heavy winds. How do they do it? They grow in crude circles and tie their roots together. Beneath the ground, they become intertwined and inseparable.


Your new ring, then, will tell the story of your marriage. Your family. Your life. It’s a simple story: the winds came, but you did not fall. Despite your weakness, you stayed standing because she was next to you, holding on for dear life. Others held you up, too. Your daughters, your friends, your community. They are all strangers now, but they will be family someday. Tall, tall trees.

So stop believing in yourself. You’re not strong enough to warrant that kind of trust. The math doesn’t work out. You need other people. Embrace that fact. The sooner you come to terms with your own smallness and your tendency to selfishness, the sooner you can take your place in the broken circles of linking souls.

Please, don’t misunderstand me. You’ll have a wonderful marriage. You’ll have amazing children, a nice home, dear friends, and a great job. You’ll even write books like you hoped you would. You’ll discover meaning in blessing others.

I’m not saying life won’t be good; I’m saying you won’t be in control of any of it. So decide ahead of time to let go. Don’t wait. Learn to trust God. Learn what it feels like to have other people’s arms holding yours high. Then, when you turn forty and you discover how much growing up you still have to do, you can face it all with the confidence of one who knows he’s not alone.

A shout out to my friend Dan of the 511 Workshop. He’s the artist who made my new wedding ring. He does phenomenal, custom work. Check out his website and Facebook page. This is the ring he made for me.

A Letter to my Autistic Son on his 12th Birthday

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Dear Jack,

You’re turning twelve today, and that brings me all kinds of feelings. It brings happiness, because you’re growing taller and stronger; not as cute but more handsome. It brings sadness, for all the same reasons. And it brings fear, because we have lots of questions about your future. Last month, though, you showed me something that made me a little less afraid.

Remember your hospital visit in January? Of course you do. It was a pretty big deal. You had a messed up blood vessel that was pushing up against your brain, and that was restricting the movements of your muscles. Over the past year, you had stopped running and riding your bike, stopped writing on paper, and your mouth had stopped forming some of the words you used to say. We think it was all the blood vessel’s fault.

After the doctor told us you should have surgery or else risk losing more muscle control, your mom and I didn’t want to talk about it very much. “Brain” and “surgery” are two very uncomfortable words when you put them together. But you needed to know about it, so we told you plainly what was going to happen. We told you we were taking you to the big hospital in Portland. We said that they would put you to sleep while they cut the back of your head open to fix a problem. And while we told you, you sat in silence, taking it all in.

That’s what you do. You take things in.

You know, son, when you were little, I didn’t try to talk to you very much at all. I didn’t think you were really listening. Mom would talk to you all the time, and I thought she was being silly. I thought she was fooling herself into believing you were able to do more things than you really could. Grown-ups call that denial.

But I was wrong. Mom wasn’t in denial. I was just afraid to believe that you might, in fact, be a lot more capable than I had given you credit for; afraid to think you might tougher and more resilient than I ever expected. I didn’t want to believe those things, because I thought I might find out I was wrong.

Eventually, though, I got over that, and we all started talking to you as if you understood everything. And when we told you about the surgery, I know you heard us. I know because after we opened all of our Christmas presents, you surprised us with three words, clear and perfect: “Go to Portland?” It was a week before the surgery date, but there you were, ready to charge in.

Son, you know in The Good Dinosaur, how Arlo is anxious about everything, and his dad has to tell him, “You’ve got to face your fears”? I think when you watch that part, you think the dad is talking to you. But that’s backwards. You always face your fears, son. If anything, it’s your father who still needs help facing his own.

The fact is, you are one of the bravest people I’ve ever met.

When I was twelve (or was it thirteen?), I visited a foreign country called Romania, where the culture was different, and the language was different, and nobody understood anything I was saying. It was fun, but it was also hard and sometimes confusing.

Is this what it feels like for you all the time? The world around you must seem so strange. You live in a culture that is hard to understand. We laugh so loudly, and we talk so quickly, but we aren’t very good at waiting to listen. You must live your whole life feeling like a foreigner. An outsider.

And yet, you walk toward it. You get through it. You march in like you did at the hospital, and you face your fears like a dinosaur on his way home to Clawtooth Mountain.

Maybe you don’t think you are brave because you feel afraid. But courage isn’t about what you feel son; it’s about doing the hard thing despite what you feel. It’s about coming to Wednesday Night even though there are lots of kids making lots of noise. It’s about getting in the car and going to school even though everything inside you craves the safety and peace of your living room. It’s about walking into a hospital waiting room even though you know the pokes are coming.

This is what you showed us so clearly last month, son. It’s what you show us every day.

Next year, you’ll be a teenager. We’re about to walk into a brand new wilderness. Both of us. But if you can face your fears, then I think I can face my own. We can face them together.

Happy birthday, little Arlo. And I’m proud of you.

Dad

Here he is in the waiting room, smiling and ready.

And here he is afterward in his happy place. Arlo in the book, and Arlo on the iPad.

Click here to read the next birthday letter.

And if you liked this post, check out my book, Aching Joy!

When Your Daughter Turns Sixteen, and You’re Not Ready

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I remember the light from our closet, and Sara rustling around inside. It was early. Too early.

“You okay?” I asked.

“My water broke,” she said. We were just twenty-three. Babies, it seems now, having babies.

I tried to help get her ready but there was nothing much I could do. Her bags were packed and she was ready to go, but she insisted she didn’t want to go yet, so all I could do was pace. Finally, I turned on my Sega Dreamcast, and played a frantic and frenetic game of Crazy Taxi. For at least an hour, I skidded and smashed my way through the virtual streets of San Francisco. I was antsy, barely in control of my yellow cab, and barely aware of where I was supposed to be going.

Eight hours later, a nurse slid my pink and screaming daughter into my awkward, shaking arms, and I was undone.

Sara and I always tell new parents they can’t be ready when the first child comes. Not really ready.  There are too many eventualities, too many blinding surprises–both good and bad–that will re-route even the best made predictions about what parenting will be like. And even if those detours are rare, you’ll never know the feelings you feel until you actually feel them. You can’t be ready.

But I never knew that such advice was evergreen, or that it was actually for me. Parents can’t be ready for their daughters to turn sixteen. Not really ready.

Since the day Emily was born, we have skidded and smashed our way through grade school, middle school, and middle adolescents; through four states and four siblings, and a thousand iterations of “I’m sorry.” And we’ve been antsy, barely in control, with only a vague impression of where we were going.

Part of me is a little ashamed, because I thought I’d have figured it out by now. I thought understand this thing called “fatherhood,” and how to graciously adapt as our children adapt. But instead, I’ve incurred massive debts to my kids as they’ve grown. All five have had so much to forgive, and I fear they may have to forgive more, because I’m such a slow learner.

And yet, miracle of miracles, here she is. Our prototype. She’s a strawberry blond wordsmith whose mind runs on fairy tales and hot tea. She stands there with her poet soul somehow intact, and her ever-breaking, ever-healing heart softened and ever-turned toward her family. You should see the patience she gives to her brothers, how she cheers on her sister and mother, and how she continues to overlook her father’s ineptitude. We did well to give her the middle name “Grace,” for that is what she breathes.

Even today, she exhales it. While the family should be dancing the day away in honor of this milestone, her autistic  brother Jack is about to undergo a major medical procedure two hours away. That means we’re leaving on her birthday, and the party has to wait. It’s so typical of her childhood. So many interruptions. So many hours borrowed. But in her eyes, so much compassion.

And now’s happening, but I’m not ready. My girl is poised to take her steps toward full adulthood, and I am still undone. There are a million books about parenting, but not a single one on how to usher this particular girl into adulthood. All I can do is buckle up once more, clutch my wife’s hand, pray to God for safety, and thank Him for this extravagant and beautiful gift: my Emily.

When we Just Want Someone to Understand

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“So, what’s the story with these pictures?” That’s one of the first questions people ask when they step into our living room, and for good reason. Variations of this image line our bookshelves. They belong to Jack, of course, my eleven year old with severe autism. They are screenshots of his iTunes movie library, his most prized possession. The only thing Jack wants in life is to sit in the living room all day long and watch these movies, or to watch these pictures of his favorite movies.

The library image varies depending on what device Jack is using, and sometimes, when he gets tired of a movie, he’ll hide it, and the configuration changes. When he’s satisfied, he’ll take a picture of it on the iPad and ask us to print it out. We’ve done this, I’d wager, well over two hundred times.

But there’s more. These images have their own names. He might call one “White Turbo Eight,” and another one, “Black How to Train Your Dragon five.” It took us a while to decipher that code, but we got it. The color is all about the background. The number is the order in which the movie appears.

I confess, I don’t see the internal logic of these images, but that’s not the point. It matters to me because it matters to Jack.

These pictures, and especially this one (“White Good Dinosaur One”), seem to supply Jack with the predictability he hungers for. And when times get tense, he wants our reassurance: yes, son, if there’s one thing you can count on in this moment, it’s that “Good Dinosaur” is in the first position.

Last night, Jack melted down after his little brother started crying. It was pretty bad. Worse than we’ve seen in a while. And when the dust settled, he had lost his movie privilege.

Nevertheless, he crawled in our bed in the wee hours, still a little worked up from last night, I think, and squealed, “Good Dinosaur!”

I hate seeing this boy so weighed down with panic. Anxiety is the most severe and the most troubling of all the comorbid conditions that come with his brand of autism.

I want to make it all go away. The boy needs peace.

“No movies today,” I whispered, pulling him close. “But it’s okay, we’re not mad. You can watch movies tomorrow.”

He relaxed for a few minutes. Then it flared up again.

“One Good Dinosaur!” That, I knew, wasn’t a plea for the movie but for the screenshot. He didn’t want to look at it just then. Rather, he wanted to make sure I knew the order of the movies on the screenshot.

Fortunately, I did.

“One Good Dinosaur,” I began. And already, he was whispering the words with me. “Two Dragon One. Three Dragon Two. Four Inside Out. Five Wonderful Life.” (No seriously, he loves George Bailey.) “Six Monsters University. Seven Monsters Inc. Eight Planes. Nine Planes Two. Ten Turbo. Eleven Up.”

At that, he breathed a little easier, and nestled his head into my shoulder.

Look, I don’t know how it works. I just know sometimes, all we need is someone who understands what’s important to us, even if they can’t understand why it’s important.

Try as I might, I cannot interpret the internal fires that burn inside my boy’s bones, and I can only guess at why this little sequence cools them. I just know that it does cool them.

And all of it makes me wonder whether our general appetite to be understood is ultimately misguided. How can anyone truly sympathize with our achings? We’ll never really be able to walk about in another person’s skin as Atticus Fitch suggested. Our experiences, our histories and capabilities are far too diverse. When we are hurting, we have no ability to share the our precise pains. We can, however, receive the loving consolation of a family’s embrace.

In this way, as in so many others, Jack isn’t all that different than the rest of us. He wants us to feel what he’s feeling, but he settles for a whispered assurance that we see him. He wants somebody to understand him. But gracious as he is, he settles for me.

When we Can’t Carry them In Anymore

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Our church’s special needs classroom used to be a safe haven for my autistic son, Jack. It was a respite for him; a twenty-third Psalm reprieve from the throng of kind, caffeinated congregants hoping to win a “good morning” from him, or at least a hi-five. Not anymore. Six months ago, we moved his beloved “Open Heavens Room” to a larger classroom across the hall. Our boy doesn’t like change, and this change pushed all of his OCD panic buttons. It spooked him.

He refuses to step foot in there now, so he sits with the adults through both the singing and the sermon, eyes glued to a visual timer on his mother’s iPhone.

It’s not a bad trade, in one way. Sara and I would prefer our son to join the congregation and be with his peers, but the arrangement has complicated all of our lives. We work at church, but the whole place makes him antsy now. Someone always has to sit with him through the service in case he tries to bolt without warning, or randomly yells “Syndrome’s remote!” from the Incredibles. Both have happened.

When Jack was little, this kind of thing wasn’t a big deal. We would take the same approach as we would with any of our other kids: we would simply pick him up and carry him into the room against his will. Because he would be fine. Kids get over things quickly, right?

Well, maybe, but he is eleven now, and he’s getting stronger from all that sock flapping. He’s almost as tall as his sisters, and his will has only hardened in his growth spurt. It’s no use trying to force him to do anything he doesn’t want to do. More to the point: it is counter-productive.

The “pick him up and make him go in” phase of parenting is supposed to be short.

Small children are too young to understand why they must brush their teeth every night, or why they have to fasten their seat belts, or why they have to go to class. As parents who do understand, we sometimes have to make those decisions for them. They are growing, however, and soon, they will have to choose on their own. We won’t be able to carry them in anymore.

How do we prepare for that eventuality? By ceding control in small increments. We phase out coercive parenting little by little, and begin to lead instead through influence. We begin to regularly offer them choices, and we explain why some choices are inherently better than others. And while we do all of this, we hope and pray that our children’s comprehension will grow apace with their stature.

But there’s the rub. This hasn’t happened with Jack. In many cases, his understanding (as far as we can tell) hasn’t kept up with his limbs. Sometimes he is just being stubborn like any other eleven year old, sometimes he is overstimulated and overwhelmed, but many times, it seems like he truly doesn’t get it.

My boy is growing, and it’s exciting and wonderful and scary and endlessly complicated.

So how do we lead him? Certainly not by authoritarian measures. Coercion is a last resort now. Jack’s will has begun to blossom, and our tactics have necessarily changed. We have had to stop pushing and start leading.

I suppose in this way, my son is not any different than the rest of us. In order to lead him, you have to invest in him. You have to walk beside him. You have to show him you care about him. You have to build trust, and trust-building takes time.

In our current struggle, I am grateful to have friends who live this principle. Isaac and Lori, who often work with Jack on Sunday mornings and Wednesday nights, are playing the long game, opting to guide him gently. They’ve sat with him. They’ve talked with him. They’ve taken walks past the big, scary door to the Open Heavens Room, and have assured him that everything is going to be okay.

This is what real leadership looks like, and it’s beginning to pay off.

Jack is starting to come around now. He even took a couple steps through the door last week. He kept his eyes shut, but he did it. You can see it in Isaac’s video below.

It will take more time, though, and that’s okay. This is our life now. We don’t rush things anymore. The days of causation and coercion are coming to a close. This is the age of coaxing and calling; of hand-holding and shoulder squeezing; of “take a deep breath, son” and, “you can do this, buddy. I know you can.”

And he will. Just wait and see.

(Many thanks to Isaac for the video and for the patience. We are fortunate to have you in our lives.)
Feature photo by Anne Nunn Photographers

Autism and the Gift of a Metaphor

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There were fingerprints all over the screen, and the NBA Finals game was about to start. I tried to scrub them off, but they were sticky.

“Jack, this is gross. You’ve got to stop touching the screen, especially after you eat those cookie balls.”

He wouldn’t acknowledge me, except to parrot back a few words as if to mollify my frustration.

Our television is raised up fairly high, and Jack, my eleven year old autistic son, has been secretly smuggling chairs into the living room in order to get high enough to touch the top of it. Part of that, I suspect, is an attempt to mimic Arlo from Pixar’s The Good Dinosaur, who reaches up high with his foot and says, “I’m gonna make my mark.”

But there’s more to the mystery than that. The fact is, our boy has been bringing a little extra OCD to the autism party as of late. He refuses to enter the special needs room at church. He gets frantic, kicking and screaming with a “there’s-a-great-white-shark-in-the-room” kind of terror. And at home, he melts down at our gentlest prodding to go on a bike ride, or to do anything, really, that he doesn’t want to do. The screaming that follows the words “back yard” must raise eyebrows in the neighborhood from time to time. He won’t touch my phone (he’s scared of that, too), and now he won’t even touch some of his treasured laminated pictures that literally line our bookshelves. Yet he will touch the TV screen. Often. Just another puzzle…

Seasons like these can be draining, because the boy won’t give an inch. He would fight every battle if we let him. We have to pick where to aim our energies. It can be a bit depressing. The world requires flexibility of its citizens, and he is more inflexible today than he’s ever been. What will all this mean for his future?

But then, these seasons contain reassuring moments, too. Case in point: on Friday, I came home with my daughters in the late afternoon, and Jack and Sara were alone in the house. The soundtrack from The Good Dinosaur was filling the house, and Jack was curled up beneath his favorite blanket with his new penguin book. He was in his happiest place, and his face showed it. When he saw me, he beamed as if to say, “Dad you’re home! Now I have everything I will ever need.” And it made me think of the first penguin book and the moment three years ago when everything changed. He wore the same smile.

I saw something else the next day, too. Through open door in my bedroom, I could see Jack sneaking the chair beneath the tv, and climbing on it. There was no movie playing, only various pictures floating slowly upward. Our AppleTV screensaver was set to National Geographic wildlife images. Jack reached up with one finger. The screen distorted to purple around the spot he touched. Irritation flashed in me. He’s going to ruin that screen, I thought, sitting up.

Then I saw it. A penguin. He was touching all the penguin pictures.

I sat back down and closed my mouth. In a season of such sticky obsessions and meltdowns, the boy still draws strength and peace from his penguins. It started with the original Jack and Daddy book. He remembers it as well as I do. It’s why he has been keeping this new book close to him, and why he’s asking to watch the penguin documentaries on Netflix. We are a story family, and penguins were Jack’s very first metaphor. They stand for me and him. For us, together. More broadly, penguins represent family.

I’m writing about this today to remind myself how much it all matters. I am speaking to my own soul. True, right now, the horizon doesn’t look especially bright. Jack is eleven. Soon he will be a teenager. His intensifying behaviors are going to complicate his transition into adolescence. All our concerns about his future feel more solid than ever.

And yet, our greatest concern has been assuaged once and for all: Jack is not oblivious to his family’s affection. Rather, he is still captivated by it. He loves us and we love him. He may not be able to tell us in sentences, but he can show us with a picture.

So there goes my son now, pushing his chair further into the living room and deeper into life. We don’t know what storms this season might bring, but our boy is not alone. He is armed with the power of a metaphor, and with it, he will find a way to stand tall. He will make his mark.

 

Feature image courtesy of the always awesome Anne Nunn Photographers.

On Learning to Love a Tow Truck

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If you’ve read anything I’ve written this year, you know that Jack, my autistic eleven year old, loves the movie Cars 2, and I don’t. I’m a grown man and a Pixar apologist (there should be a badge for people like me), but I cannot abide the studio’s version of The Fast and The Furious. The story is jumbled and lame, the noise is loud and unrelenting, and the rusty protagonist drives me backwards insane.

I grew up in East Texas, so you’d think I had some appreciation for Mater the Tow Truck, but so help me, the man who voices him, Larry the Cable Guy, strikes me as decidedly unfunny. This character grates on me from the beginning, and he does not let up for the entire ninety minutes. It’s exhausting.

But oh, my dear son . . . he disagrees. Jack adores Mater, and he has watched his bumbling heroics hundreds of times without ever tiring of it.

The English writer G.K. Chesterton maintained that, “Part of God’s infinity is manifested in a little child’s propensity to exalt in the monotonous.”

A child glories for weeks in his only two knock-knock jokes. He gets tossed in the air and laughs and says, “do it again!” God, too, makes the sun rise and says, “do it again!”

Adults though? Dad, especially? Monotony is hard for us. It is the opposite of adventure. There are no twists, no surprises, no opportunity for Keizer Soze’s hand to un-cripple itself or for Jack Buck to call, “I don’t believe what I just saw!” Monotony is wonder-less.

Except there they are: our children, especially our children on the spectrum. There they are, watching the same tow truck bumble his way around the world as the same accidental spy, and get the same inexplicable knighthood in the end. And even after the five-hundredth viewing, there is fairy-tale affection in their eyes.

Why do our children delight? Is it that their young minds are so limited and their tastes so unrefined? Are they just bored and don’t even realize it?

Or maybe we are the problem. Maybe our culture is simply addicted to novelty.

Maybe we get bored so easily because our imaginations have become petulant tyrants, suspicious of routine, and demanding newness all the time.

I’ll be honest, even the word “routine” sucks the imagination right out of me. And that, friends, is my problem, not my son’s.

For Jack, routine is more than a necessity. It is a comfort. For my son, repetition is not the droning, looping script that I hear, but a room of friendly voices, casting the the place in warm tones, classic jokes, and action sequences that never stop being awesome.

Parents, hear me: we need to slow down and get younger. We need to let our children teach us from time to time. They still believe in pixie dust, in spy cars, and in houses that fly, and the main reason we don’t is we’re too easily exasperated. My old headmaster used to say, “if you’re bored, it’s because you’re boring.” I think he was right. And just because we’re boring and cynical doesn’t mean ours is the better way.

There are treasures in slowness. There is beauty in the retellings. There is wonder even in predictability.

I’m trying to learn it. I’m trying to make peace with Jack’s looping obsessions. I’m even trying to like Cars 2. Really. And you know what I’ve discovered? The Italian racer, Francesco, is actually quite hilarious. And even Mater . . . well, there was this one moment when he asks about a drink for McQueen, and he misunderstands Guido, and . . . I laughed.

I’m never going to be a big fan of this movie, or of this character. He will never rank next to Sheriff Woody or Mr. Incredible or Remi the Rat or Carl Frederickson. But through repeated viewings, I am starting to at least see what Jack sees in him, if only just a little. The awkward misfit just wants to do what’s right; to have fun, and be a hero.

If Mater’s antics serve to reinforce those ideals, I can live with that. If monotonous viewings of a mediocre film cause my son’s mind to explode with possibility, then I will sit next to him and squint my eyes to find the wonder. I will never have the infinite patience of God Himself, but I think I can re-learn some measure of child-likeness. And that is appropriate, for as we know, the kingdom of heaven does not belong to the most refined among us, but to the wide-eyed and hopeful. To children.

Dear Perfection (A Letter on Valentine’s Day)

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Dear Perfection,

It’s an honor, first of all. I mean, there are so many of us who are online begging for your attention, so it means a lot that you would read this. I’m talking about the Valentine pictures, friendaversary videos, and those filtered collages of vacations we actually hated. You know what the good book says, right? “Instagram filters covereth a multitude of sins.”

But more to my point, there are millions of parents out there who are looking for your stamp of approval, and that’s really why I’m bothering you. I see what you’re doing, and we both know it’s not right.

When I think of you, Perfection, I think of Thomas Kinkade paintings. Kinkade is at once maligned and envied.  We mock him for his idyllic cottages by the sea with their pristine puffs of chimney smoke. We roll our eyes and say, “life isn’t like that!”

But then, in the next breath, there we are sharing our own cobblestone collages of our adoring and adorable children. There is no dirt here. There are no pudding hands. There is no perimeter of poorly aimed urine caked to the bathroom floor. Neither are there flashes of cutting sarcasm about half-empty cocoa mugs strewn across the living room, because we would never resort to such measures even if our kids ever forgot anything… assuming of course they drank such unhealthy concoctions. We don’t. They don’t. Because we’re all perfect. Just check out our timelines if you don’t believe us.

Of course you don’t believe us. We don’t believe us, either.

We know the truth about ourselves and our shortcomings. We know the truth about our own parenting: we are all imperfect.

But Perfection, you sly dog, you’ve done something sneaky to stay relevant. You’ve told us everything is yours. You’ve said it’s all perfect: the dirt and the pudding, the receding hairlines, the addictions, the insecurities and all the fears. And it such is a lovely sentiment, like those DOVE commercials where none of the women wants to walk under the “pretty” sign because they don’t think they’re beautiful enough, because they don’t realize that everyone is equally beautiful. Life comes in many shapes and sizes and ages and neurologies and pre-existing conditions and character flaws and temperaments. Some have jobs that bring home more bacon and earn more sacred ‘attaboys. “But none of it matters,” you assure us. “You are, all of you, perfect.”

There is, however, a sinkhole beneath that beachside cottage: You are implying that we must have you, Perfection, in order to have value.

You say we must make ourselves worthy of love. God help us, but it is a lie.

Still, we have chased your impossible standards with abandon. We ache for true validation and affection. We offer humble brags about our achievements and we edit our selfies to prove to the world-—and to ourselves-—that we are unblemished enough, even though we know it’s no use. There are unmistakable wrinkles in our foreheads. There is too much sadness in our brows. We know what failures lie behind our acned skin. Calling it perfection leaves us even more empty.

You are the carrot on the string; always before us, but never attained. You tempt but never satisfy.

One day, we’ll all awake to an older, deeper truth that will finally unseat you: there is value already baked inside us. There is a construct of worth that precedes success or failure, youth or atrophy, the flawless and the marred, and that construct cannot be removed by mere human inadequacies. There are fingerprints in our cells—Divine fingerprints—that no amount of brokenness can erase.

On the day of waking, we will remember we are loved.

We are flawed, and yet we are loved.

We are going gray, and we are loved.

We fail hard, and still we are loved.

Our kids sometimes sass us and we sometimes sass them back. We are immature parents, often petty, usually desperate, and almost always clueless. We fall a hundred miles short of your standard, but never short of the worth bestowed upon us by our Father.

I admit, I’m worse than imperfect. I am hopelessly broken and thoroughly incapable of putting myself back together.  That is the plain truth. But I am also fearlessly, eternally, unconditionally embraced. Fully known and fully loved. This is a wonder beyond Kinkadian fantasy; it is true perfection.

So Happy Valentines Day I guess, but we don’t need you anymore.

Regards,

Jason

To Be Worthy of Your Trust (A Letter to Jack)

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Dear Jack,

Up until now, I’ve only written you letters on your birthdays, but I’m going to change that, because you might look back on days like yesterday and wonder, “what was that even about?” Well, I’ll tell you.

Mom woke you up at midnight and wouldn’t let you go back to sleep. She pulled you out of bed and led you into the living room where Winnie the Pooh and Tigger entertained you all through night. It was still dark when the three of us got in the van. We didn’t make you put your shirt on, of course, because the van is just as much home as your own bedroom. And when you feel like you’re home, you go shirtless. It’s your thing.

Mom sat next to you in the back in order to keep you awake, but soon she fell asleep. I watched you both in the mirror. Your eyes were open, and your head rested on her shoulder.

You both looked so beautiful. So full of peace.

We drove two hours to that big hospital on the hill. You know the one. When we got inside, a nurse took us into a little exam room and scratched your head with a q-tip and cream that felt like sandpaper. You screamed and kicked and we tried to restrain you. Your eyes were frightened, and your lips were offended. I took your chin in my hands and said, “look at me, son. Look at me. It’s okay. It will only take a minute.”

Your eyes met mine for a moment, and you stopped fighting. You took a breath. You understood me, and you chose to trust us. We have lots of these moments, now. You seem to understand so much of what we say, and even though you can’t respond in kind, you choose to go along with us. It is a pure, sweet faith, but it is weighty, too. It pulls our shoulders low, and makes us remember our naked need for wisdom from beyond.

The nurse put a bunch of sticky nodes all over your head, then you laid down next to mom. She wrapped you in her soft arms under your soft blanket. We told you you could sleep without a shirt, but you said no. I brought out your little blue-glowing pyramid that puffs out sleepy-time smells, then hit repeat on the Monsters University audio story. All the other lights went out.

You were confused. This was not “orange home,” and the hour was not bedtime. We tried to explain it all to you, and I think you might have understood, but just in case, I’ll try again:

The doctors think there might be something going on inside your brain, son.

Something that shouldn’t be going on. They think there must be a reason why your your words have gone away so drastically this year, and why your legs won’t peddle your bike anymore, and… there are just lots of things. Of course, you have autism, but this seems to us like something more.

img_1085-copyThat’s why we keep coming to the hospital. That’s why we put those sticky nodes on your head. We are trying to learn. We are trying to help you. But even the smartest brain doctors aren’t sure where to start, or how many tests to do. It’s easy for a parent to talk big and say, “we’ll do whatever we can to get to the bottom of this,” but the truth is, you’re the one that has to get poked and scratched made to wait in rooms that make you panic. And your mom and I don’t know how far to push with our investigations. How many pokes are too many?

Your bedtime story looped again and again, and you tossed and turned in that blue-soaked room. We prayed with you. We whispered in your ear. You took my hand and pressed it against your eyes, but you would not rest. And I kept wishing you would just take your shirt off, but you wouldn’t do it.

Finally I sat in the rocking chair and prayed silently for God to give you peace. Mom put some lavender on your blanket, and at last, your body went still in her embrace.

I realized then what a wise and healthy thing you had done in keeping your shirt on. You hadn’t felt settled enough to strip it off, because the hospital is not your home. And it should never feel like your home. These tests are not part of your routine.

You are our son, not our science experiment.

I wish I could say there won’t be anymore tests. There will. But if you ever start to feel as comfortable in an exam room as you do in your bedroom, we will have gone too far. I hope you will find a way to say so. I hope you will find the perfect movie quote to alert us to our overwrought efforts. We want to build you a future, son, but not at the expense of your joy. If we are to be worthy of your sacred trust, we will need that wisdom from beyond.

For now, I will tell you what you told yourself when the lights came back on and the test was over: “Well done, Mister Wazowski.” We are proud of you, kid.

 

-Dad

well-done

To Preserve Their Innocence

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It’s a crisp evening in small-town Oregon, and the boys and girls of summer are out early, crowding the metal bench in  numerical order from the white numbers on the backs of their navy blue jerseys. Aligned like this, they look like too many birds on a wire. They are first and second graders, and the game is coach-pitch baseball. There is no score-keeping, except the mental tallies running inside the heads of most of the players.

The golden-haired number three–that’s Sam. He’s mine. You can hear his voice above the others, leading the cheer for his comrade at bat: “Let’s go Ezra, let’s go! Let’s go Ezra, let’s go!” They’ll go on like that for every batter, unfettered by the grown up notions of monotony and self-awareness. Their voices sweeten the breeze. You can’t help but smile. When a kid gets a hit, they “Woo-hoo!” If he strikes out, they “Awww. Good try,” and raise up the chant for the next batter.

“I love how they cheer for each other,” I tell Gonzalo, my friend and fellow dad.

“It won’t be like this forever,” he says.

I sigh. He is right. Soon, these innocents will discover the ugly sides of humanity, and even baseball will look different. They will taste betrayal and mockery. They will feel the stings of their own failures. They will find that they do not measure up to anyone’s standards, least of all their own. And then, they will be tempted by jadedness. The ugliness of experience will pollute the evening breeze, and cheering will all die down.

As a dad, my first inclination is to keep my son here on this field of simplicity. I don’t want him to taste the temptations to vanity and lust. Not yet. I don’t want him to learn of the horrors of Auschwitz. Not yet. I don’t want him to find out he is more Clark Kent than Superman, made from the same deformed flesh as the father he still considers indestructible. Not yet.

I swallow, thinking of his sisters. In a month, they will both be teenagers, eyes already wide to humanity. I feel a pang of embarrassment the more they learn. “Yes, this is the world we have all prepared for you. We should have done better. I’m so sorry.” They take it all in, accepting. Knowing. Not as surprised as I would have hoped. The depravity of this world began its desensitizing magic long ago.

If a father’s job is to shield his children, we have all failed already. Their jerseys will be soiled by spots of blood and the stench of regret.

But what if a father’s job is not to prevent brokenness, but to show our children how to be mended? How to admit where life hurts, and to receive the balm of forgiveness and grace? What if a father’s job is to model the process of restoration?

I cannot prevent their hearts from aching, but I can point them toward true healing. I can let them hear my own regrets, and show them my own scars. I can model the words, “please forgive me.” I can teach them prayers of confession, for I am not strong enough or pure enough to overcome the world. There is only One who is. And He waits for them.

I am being mended. If my children will let themselves be mended too, we can all–with gloves in our hands, crutches under our arms, and ice packs at our ankles–limp back out to the diamond, laughing the laugh of the redeemed.

***

Sam is all shoulders at the plate. He swings awkwardly, prompting the coach’s wife to come out and adjust his stance. A little closer to the plate. Bat a little higher. There. He hears his name chanted from the bench, but misses again. The coach has one more ball at his feet. He tosses it. Sam swings.

The ball dribbles down the first base line. He takes off running and kicks up dirt all the way to first base. He is safe. For now. Today is a gift that will not last forever, so I breath in the innocent air and say a prayer about tomorrow.

That Time I Had Coffee with My Two Selves

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I like to write early in the morning, provided I can get past my snooze button. As a positive incentive, I started setting my coffee timer to 4:55 AM, because a fresh cup is at least 8.5 times as wonderful as a stale cup. I smelled it when my alarm went off this morning, then dragged myself to the kitchen, filled up my trusty Allan Bros mug (not realizing the pot was already half-empty), and tiptoed into the living room. When I switched the light on, I saw at once that I was not alone. There were two men sitting on the couch, waiting for me. I almost let out a scream until I recognized them. They both looked just like me.

“It’s a good brew,” one of them says. He wears a thin beard, jeans, and an earthy flannel. “But we’re out of half & half.”

The other one shakes his head and takes a sip from his own mug. “Nope, he’s just blind. Sara just picked some up yesterday.” This one’s hair almost looks combed, and he wears khaki pants with a nice blue sweater.

I gape. “Who… what is…”

“Come on, you know us,” Flannel Jay says. “We’re you. The different sides of you. And by the way, I freaking LOVED your last blog post. The letter to Jack? You really put yourself out there.”

I sit down, feeling a bit less panicked. “Okay. Uh, yeah, thanks. I don’t know…” I look over at Sweater Jason and see he is biting his lip. “What did you think?” I ask.

He takes another sip and looks up at the ceiling. Is he unsure of what to say? No, he is just being diplomatic. He has an opinion. He always does.

“I don’t know,” he begins.

Flannel Jay interrupts him. “Don’t say that. You do know. Spit it out.”

Sweater Jason shrugs. “I think you over-shared.”

I nod. “I knew it! I agree with you. I feel like I’ve written about the whole ‘I have trouble with hope’ thing already. Several times, probably. And this last time, it’s like I told the whole world that I still suck in that area.”

“Dude?” Sweater Jason raises an eyebrow.

“Sorry, I shouldn’t say ‘suck’ in a blog post, should I…”

I hear a snort to the left. Flannel Jay has a mouthful of coffee and is trying not to spit it out in laughter. He lifts a finger, swallows, and opens his mouth. “Sorry, but nobody is offended by ‘sucks’ anymore. And even if they are, you’re just being real, dude. People need to connect with… realness.”

“Transparency?” I offer.

“Exactly, but not in a cliché kind of way,” he says.

Sweater Jay slaps his knee. “‘Transparency’ is a cliché whether or not you say ‘not in a cliché kind of way.’ That’s like using the phrase “just saying’” to get social acceptance for a rude comment.” He stands up and starts to pace. I hate it when he gets angsty like this. “Transparency in and of itself is not a good thing.”

“It’s not a bad thing, either,” Flannel Jay counters.

“Right. It’s not. But in that post, you,” and he points to me, “got transparent and even vulnerable about something you’ve supposedly beaten at least three times already. In front of a ton of people. Many of whom are in the congregation where you serve as one of the leaders.”

I slump in my chair. “I know. I know.”

“And you teach on hope all the time. You always used to quote Hebrews 11 about faith being the assurance of things hoped for, and then you say ‘if you don’t have hope, then you can’t have faith.’ You see what I’m getting at?”

Flannel Jay waves his hand. “He gets it. Give him a break.”

But Sweater Jay presses on. “You are called to build up peoples’ faith. But if you are telling them that you yourself don’t have any hope, then…”

“I get it!” I start to yell before Flannel Jay shushes me. We all get quiet for a moment. Then, I hear Jack in the next room. I can tell he’s wide awake and stimming. Specifically, he’s flapping his sun-glasses and duct tape while scripting something. A piece of dialogue from Kung-Fu Panda, I think, but I can’t tell which scene.

“Just admit it,” Flannel Jay whispers at last to his companion. “You want him to write posts about rainbows and butterflies, and how he’s got the joy, joy, joy, joy down in his heart even when he doesn’t. Well, there are real people who read this blog, and they are struggling, too. Some with autism issues, and some with… well anything. And being real is the only way to encourage them.”

“Encouraged?” Sweater Jason asks, looking baffled. “By the fact that he, a pastor, can feel every bit as weak as everyone else? What does that do?”

I’m getting nervous now. The two of them are whispering, but they are clearly upset with each other. I want to diffuse the argument.

“Who wants a bowel of generic Cinnamon Toast Crunch?” I ask.

“Don’t do that! Your wife hates it when you evade conflict with banter,” Flannel Jay says. He’s right. I feel ashamed. “I’ve been defending you here, but you actually need to answer this question. Not for anyone else, maybe, but for you: How does ‘being transparent’ show the hope of the Gospel?”

I put my head in my hands and close my eyes. My companions both fall silent. All I can hear is the sound of my son’s flapping, and a muddy voice that sounds vaguely like Dustin Hoffman as Master Shifu.

And in that moment, I remember the words of Jesus: “Blessed are the poor in Spirit, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven.”

I take a breath, then speak. “If I have stressed my own poverty instead the Hope of the Kingdom–the beauty of Christ Himself–then I am truly sorry. Sometimes I get stuck in my head, and that’s a bad thing, because the answers aren’t in my head.

“But I’m still going to be honest, because He meets me in the honest places. That’s where I find myself being reborn. If I can point people to their own honest places, well… maybe they’ll find Christ there, too. Because that’s where He waits.”

When I open my eyes, my guests are gone. I take another sip of coffee and in a moment, my son runs into the room. He is wearing only his sagging green pajama bottoms and a hyperactive grin: “Daddy tickle me?” he says. It is not really a question.

I pull him into my arms instead, and thank my Father for new beginnings.