Ice Cream

As I was checking out a father at the bookstore his son began to talk to me… before I finish…I think it's time for a little history… For 39 years I taught Autistic students…a career that was as wonderful as it was long… My job was to help my students, in spite of their weakness…find what made them strong. I had successes…I had failures…each made me more compelled… to see their Autism not as something we needed to ignore… nor as a place we needed to dwell. I think the moment I became a good teacher was the moment I learned to see… not the label but the person who was staring back at me. I return often to that moment when my understanding and my empathy grew… for not only did it make me a better teacher…but a better person too. Which brings me back to the young man talking to me…he was wildly gesturing with is hands…his speech was mostly unintelligible…impossible to understand. So I listened even harder…his eyes I tried to meet…and when he finished I said, "Sure…it's on the corner…just across the street." His dad's eyes widened…his mouth dropped even as he continued paying… "You mean to tell me you understood…" he asked, "everything my son was saying? " "Oh God no! " I smiled. "My hearing's not that good." but I believe I heard him mention ‘ice cream' and those two words I understood." The father smiled as I handed him his book…his transaction was complete… then he and his son headed out the door…to the ice cream shop across the street. And once again I thanked my Autistic students… for helping me discover a way… to look a little closer and listen a little harder to what people are trying to say.