Writing

What can I do?

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I can’t think.

Sometimes things become bigger than they should. I get into a spot where I am trying to process what is happening. I am trying to make sure I am making the right decisions for everyone, but I can’t think fast enough. Thing move faster than I can process.

Often at the end of the day, I am exhausted. After I drop the children off at the gate, I need time to reflect, or process. I know I have to write a notice home to parents. sometimes it is for the whole group. Sometimes is is individual parents, to praise or inform of difficulties their child has had. If it has been a difficult day, I cannot do this immediately. I need time to process. What did I do right, or wrong? What can I do better next time? Could I have done better? How? What do I need to do to help these kids?

One of the things I have to unlearn is that it is not always my fault. Growing up, All miscommunications where blamed on me. I was not clear enough. I didn’t say things fast enough. I wasn’t assertive enough. I was too blunt. My tone of voice was wrong. My face was wrong when I was talking.

Often, I have moments in the middle of the day, where what I planned is not working. I have to switch gears and try plan B to explain things. Then Plan C. When Plan H has failed, I am left lost. Sometimes well meaning people come up and ask me what they can do to help.

I am left at a loss usually when this happens. I cannot begin to think about how they can help. I am at a loss. I am still processing what went wrong in the first place. My prepared response is always. “I don’t know right now. Can I get back to you?”

If I get 2 or 3 people asking me back to back, like today. I just… I don’t know. I can’t even think yet..

I know then mean well. At least one does. I may have misread the other’s face. To me their face was saying “Why can’t you do this on your own?” Again, I may be misreading.

I have now taken an hour. let me start again.

Too many things.

When communication isn’t clear, I don’t just feel confused—I start blaming myself. Doubting myself. Spinning. Many autistic people prefer written communication—and I can see why. Emails can be great, because people take time to think about what they are writing. They look back over an email and edit for clarity. Instant Messaging can be terrifying and I still dislike it.

People text brief messages that are often misunderstood, and there is no review before sending them. Last night after work, I got a string of messages from my administrators. No context. No details. Just enough to make me feel like I’d done something horribly wrong.

I spent the whole night replaying the day—trying to figure out where I’d overstepped. I knew what I’d done, but not why it might be a problem.

In the morning, more messages: “Let’s meet.” No explanation.

I asked for clarification. Nothing.

You know how deer freeze in the headlights of an oncoming car? They aren’t being reckless—they’re overwhelmed. Their brains stall, trying to process what’s coming at them. That’s how I felt. Stuck. Not knowing what to think, say, or do.

The meeting was more positive than I had anticipated. But up to that point I was terrified. The team asked how they could help—but the truth is, as I’m still processing, I have no idea what I need. That is something that needs to be planned. If you show up and ask me what I need help with in that moment, I’ll freeze up.

I have students who freeze up like I do, and I’m not always perfect at giving them the time they need. I also have students who try to take advantage of that lag, which helps no one. I want to give them the space I sometimes don’t know how to ask for myself. But like me, they don’t always know what they need in the moment. And like me, they’re still learning. We’re not being difficult—we’re just trying to keep up with a game that moves faster than we can think.

I want to write…

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I find writing very therapedic. I love writing, as most Autists do. But often times I just can’t do it. I will sit down with a great idea in front of my computer, and then something will interrupt me. Once I am interrupted, my brain doesn’t reset to work mode.

Tonight I opened my novel, Gateways, I was about to start writing ideas for chapter 5. As soon as the file loaded, my wife sat down beside me. She wanted to talk about our current Job hunt. I understand that, and I love my wife. So we talked about the future for a few minutes. maybe 5. and she left me to continue my writing.

It was gone. all my thoughts on the chapter had now been released to the wild. I sat there trying to focus, and I found I was no longer even in the mood to work on that book. So I opened up my New Valarians book. I started to make notes on Chapter 7 of that book, and it was not time to tuck my daughter in.

I love reading to my daughter, and tucking her in. It is one of my daily highlights. But when I sat back down, and stared at the book pages… nothing. Those thoughts had flown the coop. And I no longer felt the urge to work on that book.

So I sat staring at my screen, and drank my tea. and I thought I would share my notes on Autism and Writing.

Written Communication Over Verbal Communication.

Many Autists prefer to communicate through writing. There are a few reasons for this, but it starts with our difficulty with verbal communication.

When we speak to a person, there is an unwritten rule about the proper pace. How much time needs to be between each speaker. Too long, and the one speaker gets bored or thinks you are not listening. Too short, and you are too eager, or you are not listening, because you border on interrupting. Both are often labeled as rude. Also if an autist, like myself is talking and we get interrupted, we loose our thought process. We stumble, as we had our words laid out in our mind before speaking. When we write, we can take our time to plan out what we want to say. We can take our time, and not be interrupted.

Clarity is also an issue. When we want to communicate something, there is often a lot of details we want made clear. We want there to be no chance of misunderstanding, and so a lot of written messages are long. We cannot get that clarity when we speak. Allistic (neurotypical people) often ask questions to clarify. Once we have been asked a question, often times we have to spend time searching up the information in our brain to find the answer. Because of course the questions asked are not the questions we thought would be asked. Also the pause to find the best possible answer can be often seen as not knowing the answer. Thus it seems like we are deferring to the wisdom of the allistic person. Even if our information is more up to date, or correct.

I love writing. But I do not enjoy texting. I used to enjoy texting, back when it was simple. But nowadays, no. I will often times use voice to text, and then spend 15 minutes editing the text. You see when you communicate by text, there are now rules to texting.

You cannot make a large text, it is rude. You have to use simple words, because if you use real words it may offend the other person and be seen as patronizing them. CAPS CHANGE THE MESSAGE. So if you accidentally lock the caps on, you have to go back and rewrite it. Emojis are used to show feeling, and many other things. I liked it when there was just 5 emojis; 🙂 😀 😛 😦 @-}–

When I send text to people now I have to spend 5 minutes just scrolling through the emoji list. I’m asking myself which one is the correct one to use… I don’t know. If I put a flower, does it mean, I want you to have a happy day, or does it mean romantic feelings? Why do we even have an eggplant? and Flags? birthday cake? streamers? dogs? cats? soccer balls? Why can’t we just use words for these things?

When I am writing my novels, or my blogs, I do not need to use emojis. I can relish in the joy of real words. It is a blessing. It helps me de-clog my mind. However, sometimes, as is often the case in here, I feel it is unstructured.

It takes a lot of energy to structure my thoughts into comprehensible writings. Then to go back and add details can bean added hurdle. That’s kind of why lately I feel more like I am just rambling on my blog, but it brings peace to my mind and helps me sleep.

So that is where I am off to now.

Maybe this weekend I can get some writing on my books done.

Memoires – My First Time in Japan

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Every Monday I go to a Men’s group. This group meets for coffee, and we discuss life through the context of the Bible. I have shared a lot of stories about my life with these guys. One of them the other day recommended I start putting some of the stories of my life and adventures down.

Now, I have put several childhood experiences relating to Autism down here. I, however, realized I have not spent much time on my wanderings. So Here I go.

My first Trip to Japan.

I used to live in Korea. Several places in South Korea. In 2001, I was living in Pusan, the second biggest city. While there, I discovered there was a ferry from Pusan Harbor to Hakata, Japan. There were 2 options actually, the Hydrofoil took 3 hours, and the Cargo ship was an overnight experience. They were the same price. I decided I would go, by using the Hydrofoil.

I went on the internet and reserved a hotel. The Green Hotel, if I remember correctly. and I pulled money from the ATM near the harbor. I got on the hydrofoil just after lunch, and the speed of the boat was great. I have always loved the feel of the ocean. About an hour in, I realized I didn’t exchange any money from Won to Yen. I went to the store on the boat to ask if they did money exchanges.

The store told me no. They however did give me some advice. There is an ATM in the Harbor. And if that didn’t work, there was an international Hotel that did international exchanges. So I was happy, and went back to enjoy my trip and watch the ocean bounce by under us.

When we arrived at the Harbor I walked around. The thing I always enjoyed about going to new places is walking around. I put my headphones on and went looking for the ATM. Found it. “Great” I thought and put my card in, or tried to.

It was at this moment I made a discovery. The domestic Bank Cards from Korea had their embossed numbering offset from the rest of the world. The card would not physically go into the machine. I tried many different times. (This would come back to haunt me in later trips as well).

So I only have the money I pulled from my bank back in Pusan. I decide, ok, I need to find that international Hotel. I headed back to the harbor and grabbed one of the area street maps from the information desk. Then I started walking. The map was bilingual, so I could read it. But my direction sense is not great in new places.

I walked through some beautiful shopping plazas, and along a river, and I really enjoyed the walk. However, I got lost. Some older women saw me looking at the map and came up to help. They spoke no English. The map was bilingual, so I pointed where I wanted to go and they helped me get there.

I finally got to the international hotel, and walked in. I went straight to the information desk inside. They happily informed me that they did convert money from the major international currencies. The Euro and the US Dollar were used as examples. They did not accept Korean Won.

So I was in Japan for the first time, and I had no money. There was no hydrofoil leaving until the next day. However, my ticket was for Sunday, the day after. I couldn’t check into my hotel or even buy myself a snack. I instead decide to just walk around and sight see. So I put my headphones back on and did exactly that.

When it was near dusk, I found myself at Hakata Train station, and I sat down. An older gentleman came up to me and asked if I was ok in English. I told him what was happening and that I was just going to rest there on a bench for the night. He sat down. He was a retired English teacher who had come here to get something. He told me that someone had stolen his car (Turned out to be his bicycle). So he was stuck too. He was too far from home to walk, and wouldn’t be able to get a cab home at this hour. We sat and talked for a bit.

When the sun went down, we were joined by a young lady. She had to wait for the morning train home. She had just returned to Japan from abroad and didn’t have hotel money. So the three of us sat and talked for a bit.

I know so far 3 random people meeting that can speak together in Japan is odd, but it gets odder. About 30 minutes after sunset, a group of homeless men appeared. Or maybe they were just drunks. They came out from somewhere and approached us. My 2 new Japanese friends translated our situation. The men pooled their money together and went to a 7-Eleven nearby. When they returned they had Sake for all of us, and some finger foods. We sat up until close to Mid-night with these guys, drinking and eating and sharing stories. This was the first and last time I had sake. I am not a drinker. However, I felt it would be rude to turn it away. They were buying me food and drink to share with everyone. They were honestly just trying to be kind.

The girl and I fell asleep against a large rock. Nobody bothered us.

When I woke up, she headed into the station for her morning train home. The teacher and the drunk men were gone. So I got up and headed back to the Harbor. There, I asked the ticketing agent if I would be able to exchange my ticket for an earlier boat back to Korea. They happily exchanged it for me.

When I returned to Korea, I went to a Lotteria (Korean Burger Joint) right away and ate. After that, I went home to sleep the rest of the day away.

This first trip, despite not being what I had planned made me fall in love with Japan. Everyone I met there was so kind. (Yes, even the money exchange, who could not sell me Yen was polite.)

I was just looking through my old photo albums, and unfortunately the photos are all corrupted. I will check my back up drive later and see if there are any on there.

Anyways, I will periodically tell you all about some of my other adventures traveling around Asia. I hope you enjoyed going down Memory Lane with me.