Comic Relief

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Mine, not yours. I thank God for blessing me with some of the funniest kids around. Even more beautiful is the fact that the humor is usually just accidental...

Easter Sunday came and went with the usual holiday issues around here. The "Go to your mama's house if you want, but don't expect me to join you!" argument happened just like clockwork, as it does on every holiday. After that, the day went pretty much normal.

For those who don't know yet, my son Tallen has Asperger's. He takes everything he hears literally. For example, if the weather is especially warm and someone comments that they are burning up, he sincerely becomes frightened for them. On Sunday afternoon, my mother came over for a short visit. As she sat there on the sofa, chain smoking cigarettes, she spoke to Tallen. He seemed oblivious to whatever grandma-esque conversation she was trying to initiate with him. He walked over to her, stared her right in the face and said, "Granny, you have to stop smoking now, before it kills you!" She muttered something in response. Before I could blink an eye, Tallen had positioned himself on the sofa behind her and started shoving her with his hands as hard as he could. Confused and thinking he was in real danger of rolling her right off the couch at any minute, I said sternly, "Tallen! What on earth are you doing!? Stop before you roll Granny off the couch!" Taking a break from his confusing mission, he replied, "It's OK Mama. I'm just pushing Granny to stop smoking."

Then, there was the trip to the dentist yesterday...

In preparation for this visit, I had his oldest sister arrange to ride with us. Cina and Selly had the day off anyway, so they came along as backup. We had scheduled late appointments for Tallen and Ross, hoping to minimize the chances of Tallen causing a huge scene, as he doesn't like to be in a crowd. Sadly, the waiting room was full when we arrived. Tallen was very nervous. So was I, but from the fear of not knowing what Tallen might do or say. you couldn't have dragged a needle from my butt with a tractor. As he has no visible handicap, strangers usually just assume that the things he says and does are from lack of parenting. I so wished I had went ahead with making him a shirt that reads, "I Have Asperger's. What's Your Excuse?"

At first, he was occupied with trying to leave the waiting area and laughing hysterically, as he kept trying to escape. But, when someone came over the intercom and asked for an interpreter in one of the exam rooms, he stared up to where the voice had came and said, "Screw you!" Thankfully, nobody seemed to notice. However, when a fairly heavyset receptionist walked through the lobby and was entering the door next to his chair, I think he assumed that she was coming to take him back with her. Very loudly, he said, "Get away from me, Fatty!" I honestly think that I felt my brain swell. Things went a tad blurry. Involuntarily, I began to pray under my breath. Cina, who wasn'6t busy being swallowed by the floor, said quickly, in a whisper/yell, "Tallen! You can't say things like that to people! It's not nice!" I swear, it seemed to take that lady years to pass through that door and out of earshot. Before she was out of sight, Tallen managed to reply to Cina, "I'm a nice boy! She just needs to lose a little weight!"

Thankfully, the rest of the visit went much more smoothly. Other than spouting out medical terms and asking all sorts of medical questions, Tallen was so impressed with the equipment that he behaved. When he sat in the examination chair, he asked the assistant if she would give him a raise. She asked him how much of a "raise" he would like and he told her to please give him a raise to the ceiling. This conversation would come back into play later...

Ross was a total angel. She never cried once and talked their ears off. She even let them do X-rays without any trouble. When it was time to leave, Tallen went off the deep end. "I can't leave! I have to stay here! You don't understand! I can't go home!!" I scooped up the screaming, flailing, angry, mass that is my child and carried him to the car. His screams were ear piercing! One of those times that I actually appreciate having only one hearing ear. He kept saying that he hated us and that we didn't understand. That he had to stay at the dentist! About halfway through the hell ride to home, the cause of his distress became clear to us when, through his tears, he managed to tell us, "You don't understand! I just have to go back to the dentist! I'm a doctor now. They even gave me a raise!" Thus, all the stress, all visions of ripping out my uterus and placing it on eBay, melted away into the roars of laughter from everyone in the car. I love you, Tallen. Even your worst days are something to be treasured.

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