When I Grow Up...

Everyone has dreams. And some of the dearest of those are the ones we hold for our children. We all hope our children will grow up to be successful and happy, and maybe even want to take care of us when we get old. Some of us expect more than others, and some fling themselves off the deep end and strong arm their offspring into creepy pageants and talent agencies, but that's a whole other can of worms. I, myself, ask very little of my son in terms of his future. All I want is for him to be kind, to find and follow his passion, and live his life with a sense of purpose. All he wants is to be...Dale Gribble.

Yep. You heard me right. The crazy guy from King of the Hill.

Arlo has wanted to be many different things over the years. I kinda liked it when he wanted to be Stephen Hawking, but that didn't last. And I don't suppose sitting around wanking intellectual about bullshit physics pays that well for anyone else, so I can let that one go. Paleontology, similarly, sounded like a lot of tuition to cough up so he could spend the rest of his life pleading for grant money to pay the rent. And we all went through that phase, anyway, didn't we? But a scrawny, paranoid, chain-smoking exterminator?! That one came straight out of left field.

I understand that my son has a hard time with social intricacies, but even when I pointed out that Dale was created by writers to sound as stupid and crazy as humanly possible, and that no one took him seriously, and that even though he got a lot of laughs, they were the wrong sort, the at you sort...he persists. He even filters current events through Dale's perspective, coming up with new and thoroughly ludicrous conspiracy theories, which drives me batty when there are so many perfectly legitimate ones out there already (Chertoff nudie scanners, anyone?). This persona-borrowing isn't new to me, I remember doing much the same thing in my own childhood when I realized that my peers weren't responding terribly well to my natural self (or my truly awesome Pee Wee Herman impression). But I remember trying to learn to laugh like the pretty girl at the next table, or to be different yet indomitable like Anne of Green Gables. I always wanted to be the leading lady. I suppose he may identify with Gribble's outsider status. It may be that he feels no one takes him seriously and finds a sense of kinship there, which makes me sad. We've always encouraged Arlo to be himself, even if his true self needed to bone up a bit on social graces, we've always stressed that he didn't have to change who he was to get along in the world. Especially not by changing into a cowardly, conniving comic foil for a no-fanny propane salesman.

I tried to give him a reality check by explaining that sometimes jobs can sound cool, but when you stop and think about what the actual, all-day-long work is like, you may change your mind. I love to cook, I explained, and at one point I thought I might like to be a chef. Once I really thought about life inside a commercial kitchen, the long hours of standing, the heat and humidity, the shouting and pressure, I realized I didn't want to spend eight hours of every day like that. To illustrate my point, I recounted for him an episode of Dirty Jobs I had seen where Mike has to crawl under a house so he can learn how exterminators remove raccoons who've selfishly chosen to spend eternity in a nice family's crawlspace. I told him how Mike was cautioned against pulling the carcass by the leg because the putrefied remains may slide apart, leaving a pile of festering goo to be scooped out by hand. I described as colorfully as I could the rank odor of rotting flesh, and how a stench like that would fill the close air in a space so tight you have to crawl on your belly to get around. I even pointed out that once stuck on your belly with floor joists just inches above your head, you'd be fairly defenseless against any other critters who might see this as their very own territory to defend with tooth and claw. All to no avail. In fact, that set him off on a Dirty Jobs marathon, so I suppose I should be thankful he hasn't come up with something worse yet.

I have to admit, it is just the tiniest bit cute when he talks about his plans for "his business". A bit less cute when he asks where he can find some bugs to practice killing, and can he use my office to store his poisons? And less cute still when he runs around the house repeating Gribble's lines like a broken record and cracking himself up. If I hear one more verse of "Bee By Bicky Bo", I'm going to put my shoe through the TV. I absolutely draw the line at smoking, which fortunately has gone unemulated so far, but I guess the rest of it is out of my hands. I'm not sure if it was helping or hurting when I agreed to unpick the dozens of stitches that held my hand made pterodactyl head (Halloween, 1st grade) to the only ball cap he owned, but I did it. I'm sure I can at least fling unconditional support back at him when my aged bones need lifting out of the bathtub.

He left for school this morning wearing that ball cap and mirrored sunglasses, never mind that the bus comes before the crack of dawn. And I stood there with my coffee, wishing his teachers luck, and wondering what on earth my little weirdo will think of next.

*I don't have a Gribble pic yet, so Arlo's Dirty Jobs look from the early days with our house will have to do.*

Lament of the Tattooist's Wife

First of all, let me start by saying that I'm not complaining about my husband. He's awesome. Right now, I'm having a rant about the silly crap that comes along with him, most of which glides right under everybody's radar.

I don't mind being a human billboard. Hell, I hand out more cards than he does. But I do mind being dragged into conversations with random strangers and asked to peel off various items of clothing so I can be used as a marketing tool. Some days I feel chubby, or have a zit on my neck (yeah, I know, fucking gross, right?), or have granny panties sticking out of the too-low jeans that look rad on the rest of me as long as I'm allowed to keep my MOTHERFUCKING SHIRT DOWN.

I don't much care for it when I send him a dirty text message and then find out it was actually received by the counter guy because he was busy. Look, if I'm fixing to get in the shower and things are looking extra perky that day (especially if I'm hoping you'll do something with it that night)...pics are coming your way. I'm not suggesting he drop everything and waste a pair of gloves, just hold his horses a minute. Trust me, if the kid has chopped off four fingers and we're on our way to the ER, I'll take the time to actually dial you up. Also, don't show me the texts sent to you by the guy in the next station. It takes a fucking lot to make me blush, but you dudes find and cross that line with amazing speed. I'll just take your word for it, seriously.

Really, though, the thing I enjoy least is the innuendo. I wish to god I had a nickel for every set of eyebrows that have been wagged my way when I say my husband tattoos. Yeah, ha ha fucking ha, "you know how I pay". Aren't you funny. Nobody's ever thought of that one before. Look, fuckstick, we don't know eachother, and just because some gold digging broad screwed you over doesn't mean poor moral fiber comes with the cunt. I have a job of my own and I'm raising his evil genius child, which is not for the faint of heart. I've paid my dues by being a guinea pig/advertisement for over a dozen years, and by picking up and moving everytime a shop owner decides he didn't really want to go co-op afterall (seven months pregnant, that time), and most of all, I love the bastard and I didn't marry him just to get free ink. Fuck a polaroid, I can shake it like your brain bouncing around inside your skull, which it will if you make one more lewd crack...but that doesn't mean that's all I have going for me.

Oh yeah, I also hate having my arm grabbed and twisted by total strangers on a regular basis. And don't ask me if I have those tats "everywhere". Yes, I do, and no, you can't see, and also, nobody calls them that.

But I do love the way he gets all giddy after a particularly exciting consult. And I love that he has the freedom to pop by for a nooner once in a while, or to take the morning off to sit through a school meeting with me. I love that he's doing what he loves, and that I get to watch him do it. I love that he designed a great big girly-as-all-get-out piece for my friend who wants to cover up the scars of her younger days. And I fucking love it that my kid uses the chained-down pen at the post office to "tattoo" Crash Bandicoot characters on the backs of his hands. So yeah, it's worth suffering a few idiots. Just think twice the next time you reach for the arm of a tattooed stranger, I'm pretty sure I'm not the only one needing to vent a little steam.

Monty Python and the Endless Question Why

Asperger's is no laughing matter. Except when it is. Because sometimes it really, really is. And sometimes it had better be or else you'll tear your hair, eyes, ovaries, and wretched shrieking brain out with your bare hands.


Perhaps I'd better explain. My name is Nani, and I'm raising your next bloody totalitarian despot. I promise that wasn't what I set out to do, I had every intention of bringing up a happy hippie plastic-rejecting peacenik. We even named him Arlo. But some things are inborn, and it appears that this one will have tanks rolling through the streets before too much longer. He was always strong willed and single minded, and always a bit of a mystery. I read every book and magazine on the subject of parenting, but never found anything that made sense with my little monster. He was sharp as a tack, able to remember comments made in passing a year and a half ago, but highly distractable, and more than a little obsessive. First it was cows, then at two years old he discovered the vacuum and that was the only thing in the world until dinosaurs took over. He stomped around the playground, wrists held limp at chest height, roaring at anyone who dared come near him. All salutations were met with "Did you know allosaurus...", or something similar. It got to the point where all communication with Arlo had to be couched in reptilian terms. When trying to explain why one couldn't simply run away from the line on the way to recess, I reminded him of the fate suffered by small hadrosaurs who wander away from the herd. This made sense to him, but changed little about his queueing skills.


As we rattle along the roller coaster ride to adolescence, we're finding whole new puzzles to tackle. Arlo is finally coming around to the idea that he might want to interact with people his own age, instead of simply talking AT adults and watching them ooh and aah at his vocabulary (which is honestly mind-blowing). The tricky thing about Asperger's is that none of this social stuff comes naturally. All those little facial cues and nonverbal communiques that we take for granted have to be spoonfed (repeatedly, for quite some time before anything happens) to the hapless Aspie. This, while tedious, is straightforward enough. It goes something like this: I say "Arlo...Arlo...ARLO. Look at my face. Do I look happy with you?" He looks for a bit, then replies "Uh...no." I say "Do you want me to be happy with you so we can have a nice day together and watch movies and enjoy all our privledges?" "Uh...yeah." "Okay, then stop bouncing the ball off my head." At that point, he'll either shift gears or he won't, but he has a better understanding of my feelings on the matter. At school, they use role-playing games to improve perspective-taking, and even employ a cast of comic book characters to symbolize the different Aspie tendencies that can take over our brains and render us socially retarded. It feels odd at first, explaining all the most basic aspects of human interaction like it was some kind of chemistry experiment, but you get used to it. Recently, I've run into something much harder to translate. Comedy.


Arlo loves to laugh, whether it's mirthful, mischievous, or occasionally malicious, he's a joyful little bugger. Suddenly, he's been overtaken with a powerful drive to GET laughs, and here he's hit a wall. Early on, when he developed a spontaneous silly walk, I decided to introduce him to the Pythons. Carefully fastforwarding past crossdressing judges and epithet ballads, I watched my son light up at the sight of philosophers playing soccer and grown men acting like chickens. He worked up a truly bizarre British accent and surprised me with a full run through of the albatross bit (omitting several choice words, thank goodness).

So now all conversations begin with "Wouldn't it be funny if I..." and end with me explaining how his proposal would be funny in cartoons, but would incur stiff legal penalties in real life. He's found Gary Larsen recently, which has turned him on to cartooning, a prospect which allows his father and me some hope for future visits at a house of his very own (and not run by the state or federal government). We have a long way to go, us three, but at least in the meantime we're learning to understand eachother. Now I try to explain greater social mysteries in Pythonese rather than Prehistoric, and when I finally give up I mumble "You're a very silly man..." to which he replies "and I'm not going to interview you!". I'm deeply grateful to Mr. Raymond Luxury Yacht for the ability to end even our failed communications with a giggle.