Posted by Rebecca Black on Friday, December 9, 2016,
Everyone piles into the car to get hot chocolate at Dunkies. It's a family tradition -- as soon as our lights are up, we go out to look at everyone else's. In years past, this would mean at least one time through
Millis Wonderland at the Meehan's (and often two or three times around -- yes if you live in Millis, we ARE those people who go around several times every year!) but not this year because this year they are shut down.
I grew up in a house with a Mom who has incredible Southern taste a...
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Posted by Rebecca Black on Friday, March 4, 2016,
While it might not seem that to start this with a quote from a Harry Potter book is a very scholarly approach , JK Rowling certainly got it right in this regard: fear of naming something increases the fear of the thing itself.
Never is this more true than in the white liberal Church. Notice I say church with a large "C" here because I don't want to give the impression that I am picking on a parish . But the institutional white liberal Church at large has a great deal of difficulty being inte...
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Posted by Rebecca Black on Saturday, February 27, 2016,
I am a person with a disability. And despite my passion for
advocating for other people with disabilities, I frequently don’t extend the
same understanding, accommodation, and sensitivity to myself that I would as a
matter of course extend to others.
I don’t have numbers of friends,
although I adore almost all the people I know. I am the one who maybe talks a
little too much, forgets things, loses things, and is very sensitive to your
criticism. I struggle daily to get my time organize...
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Posted by Rebecca Black on Tuesday, March 17, 2015,
In :
God
God won't leave you alone. I think about this sometimes,
and the different ways in which it can come true in your life. God's
won't leave you alone. God will not leave you in the lurch, I know this
to be true. God will not abandon you. God will not throw you under the
bus, betray you, hang you out to dry, or vanish from your life. God will
hang in there during all the roughest time.
At the same
time, God will not leave you alone. God will be at you and at you and at
you when there is so...
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Posted by Rebecca Black on Tuesday, March 10, 2015,
In :
God
In his book, "Dune," Frank Herbert puts a litany against fear into
the mouth of his character Paul Atreides. It is part of Paul's training
to be able to master his fear by allowing it to wash over and through
him. It is a warrior idea, suitable for a messiah story about a warrior
king.
- "I must not fear.
- Fear is the mind-killer.
- Fear is the little-death that brings total obliteration.
- I will face my fear.
- I will permit it to pass over me and through me.
- And when it has gone past I will...
Posted by Rebecca Black on Tuesday, February 3, 2015,
Record-breaking snow in the northeast, kids out of school. Locked up inside with each other. Craziness ensues.
It begins with a discourse by Navioot on films currently being released, as well as Academy Award nominations. After four hours, Middle-School-Girl has had enough. "I don't care", she screams. Navioot's feelings are hurt, and so withdraws into room, like a turtle into its shell.
Middle-School-Girl commences the whining. "I want to go somewhere. I want to do something." Retreats into h...
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We had an emotional breakdown last night. It happened like this:
She-Who-Hates-To-Be-Named asked me to slice her some strawberries for her favorite dessert--straberries and whipped cream (heavy on the whipped cream.) I sliced, she sugared, and when they were ready, she hunked on a generous helping of whipped cream. He-Who-Laughs walked through the kitchen, observed her pile of whipped cream, scooped up half, and kept walking with the comment, "There's too much whipped cream on that."
World War ...
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Posted by Rebecca Black on Tuesday, June 10, 2014,
In :
Wellness
I have had a lot of chaffy thoughts this week. You know, those completely unproductive, unrelated bits of gunky thought that float around in your cranium and make it hard to sleep at night?
Oh, my chaffy thoughts aren't of great consequence. For instance, I've had a horrible cold-sinus-cough thing going on for over a week. I've done all the things one does for this -- antibiotics, sudafed, water, rest -- but its sparked an inordinate amount of thought about my.... eustachion tubes. Right now, ...
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Posted by Rebecca Black on Tuesday, May 27, 2014,
In :
Children
I have been reading some fascinating materials on generations -- sparked by and reacting to Millenials Rising by Strauss & Howe. If you are not familiar with these archetypes,
Wikipedia actually offers a pretty comprehensive (even though basic) overview.
I could expound at length about the implications for the Church's approach to Youth Ministry, where Baby Boomers and Gen-Xers are designing programs for Millenials, but I will refrain.
A more personal musing for me has been on the differences i...
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Posted by Rebecca Black on Wednesday, January 29, 2014,
In :
Autism Spectrum
My oldest child started college today. It sounds like an ordinary sentence, an ordinary occurrence. But here's what you need to know...
My oldest child is on the Autism Spectrum. You may think you know what that means but I assure you, you do not. For instance, here are some of the character traits of this child. Which one of these sounds like Autism to you?
extreme intelligence
highly developed empathy for those wounded by injustice
deeply involved in becoming a change agent to right wrongs
highl...
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Posted by Rebecca Black on Sunday, January 19, 2014,
In :
Righteousness
Begone Spirit of Rage! You've taken up more than your share of time in my head today. Yes, things were said that I wish I could counter, What was said was unjust. It was unfair. It was wrong. But no great social ill will be righted by this feeling of angry vengeance. Its time is past. I cannot go back in time to redo the conversation. However witty, caustic and RIGHT are the comments I now wish I had made, they cannot be made now. All the eloquently angry and sweeping speeches I wish I had ma...
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Posted by Rebecca Black on Thursday, September 5, 2013,
I am finding more and more that I need to edit myself when people meet my children for the first time. I know many parents struggle with this, not just those of us with Aspies or children with special needs. My Aspie son is 16 - almost 17 - and I find myself still wanting to "explain" him to other parents.
I know that what other people see is not what we (his family) know about my son Ken. They may only see his unwillingness to look them in the eye. Or his tendency to answer them in monosyllab...
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Posted by Rebecca Black on Tuesday, April 30, 2013,
or
Why are Immature Adults so Annoying?
I can’t stop using this phrase in my head—Grown Up Babies.
Do you know some? The adults who behave as if they are still on an elementary
school playground? The ones who perfected manipulation in Middle School and
still practice?
The Snark-About: You have two friends. They don’t like each
other. The Snark-About is the one who tries to win you over to their point of
view about this other friend. Failing that, they become best buddies with the
ot...
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Posted by Rebecca Black on Saturday, November 10, 2012,
In :
Autism Spectrum
The VERY long race for the Presidency is over. On election day, I posted on Twitter a simple truth about how I decided who to vote for.
I voted for the 1 in 88. Speak up for what you care about. Vote, Please vote.
Surprisingly, it was picked up and retweeted all over the place! It took me a bit to figure out why, but here's what I think:
I think we've forgotten how powerful we actually are. Think about this: 1 in 88 people in the U.S. are diagnosed as being on the Autism Spectrum -- approximate... Continue reading ...
Posted by Rebecca Black on Wednesday, June 6, 2012,
If you've been reading along for a while, this story may be familiar. It's the story of my daughter's first encounter with prejudice and the ways in which it affected her.
I wrote this in June 2011:My daughter is a dancer. She loves to sing, she loves to act--but above all these--she loves to dance. She has been dancing almost every minute of her life. She dances to the bus stop in the morning. She dances in hallways and on the playground. She turns flips and cartwheels from the bus to our do... Continue reading ...
This has been ringing in my mind for a month or so. Its a quote from one of my favorite movies - CLUE, starring Tim Curry, Martin Mull, Madeline Kahn and a host of other brilliant comic actors. Yes, it is a movie based on the board game. The line comes from Madeline Kahn's character, Mrs. White. It is revealed that she has had several husbands, all of whom have died under suspicious circumstances. When she is asked, "What was your husband like?", she replies: "He was always a stup... Continue reading ...
Posted by Rebecca Black on Monday, March 12, 2012,
In :
small town
Its a simple question, but much like Robert Fulghum, I can't stop myself from playing with simple questions. Robert Fulghum devoted almost an entire chapter to answers to the question, "What do you do?"
But my favorite is "Where do you live?"
#1 answer : In God's Presence. Its what I try to remember daily, although I often forget. I live in God's presence. That's my address, that's the ground of being, that's the background. I can't do anything apart from God. Not just because of my vocation, ... Continue reading ...
Posted by Rebecca Black on Tuesday, February 28, 2012,
In :
Dance Moms
My Aspie Son... Those three words begin so many conversations in my head, in my work, in my writing. My oldest child, my teenager, my boy. The one who only started sleeping all night by himself THIS YEAR at age 15. The one who still needs my complete attention every morning just to get him dressed and out the door.
My Aspie Son... If I say it, and you know anything at all about Autism and the Spectrum, you probably already have a vision of him. You may be way off in many ways, but you probably... Continue reading ...
Posted by Rebecca Black on Monday, February 13, 2012,
In :
Children
Three
Its's a Magic Number
We have THREE in our family and that's a magic number.You may be chuckling if you remember that song from "SchoolHouse Rock." It's true for my family though--we are three and that's our magic number.We are a triangle family -- Mom and Valerie and Kenneth -- one at each point of the triangle. Sometimes we are EQUILATERAL -- all three of us occupying an equal amount of space and effort and time in the family.But that's pretty rare.
It feels pretty good when we get here. ... Continue reading ...
Posted by Rebecca Black on Monday, January 23, 2012,
Who will inherit the Kingdom of God? In the beatitudes, Jesus said the blessed meek would do so. Strictly speaking, this means trouble for my son.As an Aspie, my son would really never be described as meek.
meek
adjective, -er, -est.
1. humbly patient or docile, as under provocation from others.
2. overly submissive or compliant; spiritless; tame.
I thought the following article* explained him quite well:
There are both positive and negative aspects to the personality of Asperger's indivi... Continue reading ...
Posted by Rebecca Black on Tuesday, January 17, 2012,
You'll never know what I wrote ten minutes ago. Ten minutes ago, I wrote a lovely and very long blog about how having ADD effected my early childhood and teen years. It was insightful and profound. As I pushed "save," my computer flashed a screen to say, "We are rebuilding your blog app. Save your work and post in a few minutes." I did so. And now its gone.It led me to the same impulse, the same thought that prompted my blog about having ADD. As I get older, I am getting more organized and le... Continue reading ...
Posted by Rebecca Black on Thursday, October 6, 2011,
Recently, my Aspie son and I watched all the X-Men movies in order. We frequently do this--take a series of movies, watch them in order, then critique the nuances. As an aspiring filmmaker, my son likes to look for hidden themes and "memes" the director may have included.
In case you don't know the story of X-Men, it involves mutated humans who, through their mutation, possess supernatural abilities. The X-men are leery of "normal" humans, don't understand their motivations, but find themselve... Continue reading ...
Posted by Rebecca L. on Monday, July 18, 2011,
In :
Aspergers
Found this on a wordpress site (www.theotherside.wordpress.com)LOVE the positive spin. Discovery Criteria for Aspie…
A. A qualitative advantage in social interaction, as manifested by a majority of the following:
1. peer relationships characterized by absolute loyalty and impeccable dependability
2. free of sexist, “age-ist”, or culturalist biases; ability to regard others at “face value”
3. speaking one’s mind irrespective of social context or adherence to personal beliefs
4. ab...
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Posted by Rebecca L. on Wednesday, June 15, 2011,
Autism--Dads: nothing to be ashamed about
This
blog goes out to everyone but especially fathers of children with
autism--since I too am a father of a 5-year-old precious boy who has
autism and I can only speak for myself. This is also a reason why I
wanted to insert snippets of thoughts and opinions in our new book,
"Look At My Eyes" that SHOULD BE ON OUR FRONT DOOR STEP TODAY!!!! You
can always find more information at
www.lookatmyeyes.com.
When
we realized William was not as typical ...
Posted by Rebecca L. on Tuesday, May 24, 2011,
Guest Blogger Seth Fowler is co-author (with wife Melanie) of the newly released book : Look at My Eyes, available for order here from Brown Publishing. Read more about the Fowlers on their site by clicking here.
I often hear my 5-year-old son with autism as "being inside a box." I get that. He's in there somewhere...he reacts, he can speak a little bit, he feels and he knows when things are not how they should be. So it's not like he's just a shell of a person with nothing going on inside....
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Posted by Rebecca L. on Friday, May 20, 2011,
Like everyone else in the Northeast, I've been following the case of Camden Hughes and his mother Juliann McCrery. We don't know all the details yet, but what we do know is shocking and awful.
An adorable little boy with bright blond curls wearing Lightning McQueen sneakers was found dead in the woods in Berwick ME. A couple in the area saw a pickup truck and described it to police.
Police found the boy's mother at a Massachusetts rest stop in a pickup truck matching the description. The moth... Continue reading ...
Posted by Rebecca L. on Sunday, February 27, 2011,
In :
Aspergers
Just a quick note on a small revelation I had this week. I started on twitter (never thought I'd like it, but I REALLY do) and discovered what a great place it is to network for the Rhythms of Grace ministry. It really is wonderfully comforting to endure a major meltdown from my Aspie son, only to see someone else tweeting that the same thing is going on in their life at that very moment! Real time communications are amazing.Now maybe this isn't a revelation for anyone else, but as I started ... Continue reading ...
Posted by Rebecca L. on Wednesday, February 16, 2011,
In :
Aspergers
I recently read an old, old article by Frederica Matthewes-Green. Here is a link to it: click here. It got me thinking and praying on the promise of being known by God, even from before we were formed.I tell volunteers to be prepared for a different kind of joy when they work with autism spectrum children.The payoff for most of us in children or youth ministry is seeing these young people grow in the Lord -- seeing their enjoyment of programs, an increase in knowledge, a growing awareness of... Continue reading ...
Who belong to your flock, your church, your worshiping community when your primary socializing is done online? It's an interesting question and one many denominations don't really want to tackle.
Some denomination leaders dismiss it as pandering, of trying to shape the ancient traditions of the church into a transient fad. Some denounce it as a "gimmick" to try and attract younger families (and what's so wrong with that, one wonders?)
If it is true that mainline Protestant congregations are p... Continue reading ...
