AED dictionary: Dance - The artistic form of nonverbal communication

When I was younger there was nothing more I enjoyed doing then dancing on my Grandpa Wilcox's toes. He was a phenomenal dancer when he was in his younger years and even as he got older he could still dance. His dance partner in life was Gloria Wilcox. When my Grandmother Gloria succumbed to the effects of diabetes she could no longer dance with him, but they sat together in their living room and watched all the old Fred Astaire and Ginger Rogers films and in the evening they would watch Lawrence Welk. Even after her death my Grandpa continued the ritual of watching Lawrence Welk. Every Saturday evening when I went over to his house to help my mother clean, Lawrence Welk would be blaring from the TV. I would dance to it as I mopped the floor. Sometimes Grandpa would shuffle into the kitchen to see what I was doing. He couldn't really lift his feet anymore so he would always drag them across the floor. I’d catch him smiling in at me and he’d beam clench his fists and shimmy his upper body. I like to call that the grandpa shuffle. I’d dance around him as he went about getting something to eat. It was because of his love of dance that I love to dance as well, but never publicly. I once embarrassed myself at a singles dance after a full day of activity and I broke down. Breaking down is always at the back of an Aspie’s mind, it’s never the fear of dancing itself. I still love to dance and last Saturday when we went to a Wedding Reception all the guests were dancing. One of my close friends was up there dancing the night way. She is very outgoing and more fluent in the social scene then I am. Shut Up and Dance with began to play and my friend spotted me sitting on the side. She danced over and pulled me in. I am very happy to have friends who challenge me to do things even if I only danced for only a few minutes. Those few minutes are vital to build up to dancing longer. I look forward to the day when I go to another dance.

Also here is the music video for Shut Up and Dance With Me by Walk the Moon. 

Strange music video, but I still like the song

 

First Attempt at a self portrait

I've never really been one for painting, but I enjoy the quiet simplicity of it. Painting is very forgiving because if there's something you don't like you can just add more paint and correct it. This may not be my best work, but it most certainly won't be my last. My last project in art class is to paint another self portrait. I've always had trouble painting my nose ever since my sixth grade Art Class. Why you ask? Well in my 6th Grade Art class we had to do side profiles. I had been previously bullied about my nose from some very rude kids. To add to this the boys in Art Class were talking about what things were ugly. Other classmates chimed in “spiders” “worms” “warts” and then they began to name people. I sank low in my chair. I knew my place in the class food chain and I was right at the bottom. I tried to hide as far in my chair as I could go. As the names grew more playful I sank further into my chair until I was practically on the floor.
“The ugliest has to be Diana,” one of the boys said.
Their laughter was cut short by something slamming hard across the table followed by the definite roar of my teacher, Mrs. Clark, “Stop it! Stop it all of you! Disgraceful! Disrespectful! I thought you’d never stoop so low!”

She flew across the room toward the boys her face redder than the kiln. She extended a long wagging finger, brow furrowed, and shoulders arched.

“You know what’s ugly?!” she shouted face to face with the young boy. “Every one of you! How dare you bully her! I should have you marched straight up to the principal’s office if I weren’t so disgusted!”

Then tears began to form in her eyes and I realized it was no longer about me, the bully had brought back something painful from her past.

“Its kids like you that disrupt dreams, wreck lives, and destroy creativity! You are a disgrace! A disgrace! Now I want you to apologize to her and then get out! Get out! I don’t ever want to see you here again because you don’t deserve art!” she continued pointing to the door.

“Sorry,” the boy swallowed hard and he gathered his things and ran out.

Mrs. Clark slammed the door behind him her lip puckered. She tried to hold back the tears.

“That…” she began, but her voice broke and she shook her finger at the door, “that is what ugliness is. A bully. A thief. Never be that! If you become that you destroy the dreamers of the future they who hope to be better than they are. Diana, are you okay?”

I had no words to speak. I was astounded and nodded a simple yes. Mrs. Clark tented her tears and turned her back to the class. It was through art I learned to express myself and I continue to do so today. There are still some things I need to fix about myself and lets face it we all do, but my nose isn't one of those things.

Obsession into Joy

Last night as I went about cleaning my room I discovered my old notebooks sitting at the bottom of a bookshelf in my closet. I thought it would be a fun idea to take the notebooks out and see how many I have. So I devised a clever plan to stack them next to the dresser and count them. I piled them high and was surprised to find that I have 68 notebooks and a large three ring binder filled with stray pages. 68 notebooks is a far cry from the 25 notebooks I started off with in middle school, though my obsessions for writing began long before then. My father used to tell us stories about the brave and sometimes erratic adventures of Dr. Indiana Jones. Sometimes they would be silly like Indiana Jones had to use a cough drop to stop a coffin from attacking. Other ones were grand adventures like finding the ancient city of Atlantis or lost Mayan tombs. My father helped me develop a taste for oral storytelling, but I was not as strong as speaking aloud as I was putting words to page. By the 3^rd Grade I had read the entire dictionary front to cover. I loved words and if there was a word I didn’t know I would figure out its meanings. Hymns in church and scriptures also helped me develop a taste for words. Throughout elementary school I wrote short stories, but that changed for me in the 3^rd Grade when I had to learn cursive. My teacher found my handwriting atrocious and made me do drills again and again to learn how to write. This went on throughout elementary school until I was diagnosed at the end of the 4^th grade with Dysgraphia. Dysgraphia means that the muscles in my hands didn’t form write causing tremors and sometimes pain when writing, I write fast to avoid this pain. Trying to make my handwriting legible was a seemingly impossible feat, while it has improved over the years it will never be perfect. I love my handwriting because I can read it and no one else can. By the time I reached Middle School they felt something was still wrong and placed me in Special Ed class. At first I thought it was a mistake, but it turned out to be one of the best things. In Special Ed Class our teacher Mrs. Green was replaced with Mr. Rasch and he taught me how to write better than before. Had it not been for him I would not be the novelist I am today because he had faith in me when other teachers doubted. From there on I soared. I wrote my first novel in 7^th grade, my first musical in 8^th, and my first 1000 page book by Junior year in High School (no one ever told me that novels should be no more than 100,000  words, unless you’re already a successful published author). Yet after all the fantasy and science fiction I wrote I couldn’t put a word to page about my own story until now. It will be ten years in April that I’ve been diagnosed with Asperger Syndrome, what a perfect time to start penning the story of my life. Writing may be my obsession, but it has turned into a dream filled with the hope that one day I will be the published author my 10 year old self never thought I could be.

A Day in the Life of An Adult With Anxiety

I was not feeling well Sunday and stayed home from church. On Monday morning after a very restless night (nights are usually restless) I woke up early and despite not being my best I showered and got into my car. I've had my permit for four years, but didn't drive for a long time until my sister-in-law exchanged driving lessons for babysitting her children. I've only had my license coming on two years and I'm working on driving on the highway, but that's still a long ways off since my 21 year old car is not the fastest and tends to shake like a rocket when barreling down a road at 50 mph...I don't want to know what it does at 65 or 70 (fall apart?). I'm okay to drive, but I don't like the unpredictability of it because you never know what other drivers are going to do especially if they're being their usual idiotselves on the road (I can't believe that some people aren't allowed to drive, I guess that's how you learn though). However my Grandpa taught me to assume the other person is going to make a mistake so this eased my anxiety a little bit, besides I am the one in control of my car and I won't be the one who makes stupid decisions on the road. Second, I had to navigate the College parking lot, which college students aren't always the best drivers and I've had my fair share of almost being hit. I like to park away from other cars. Second I love school and the freedom of having a very open schedule. Before in High School I had seven to eight classes in a day with heaps of homework on top of it and I was prone to breaking down two to three times a week due to the stress. Needless to say my grades suffered. However in college I like to take two or three classes a semester its better on me and my grades don't suffer. After I learned this I became an Honor Student with Phi Theta Kappa lets hope I can hold that title when I do math next year. School is fun, but sometimes its a little hard for me to socialize, but as soon as I get going then I'm find. Third I had to drive again on a three lane road, merge through all three lanes, get to the turn lane, and find a parking space. 

Dramatization of driving, I wish that was my corvette 

Then I went to Subway and ordered food, which before I never liked this interaction because I had to communicate to someone what I wanted and that's always a difficult thing for someone with Asperger Syndrome. After lunch I drove another ten minutes and went straight to work. Work during the winter is slow I usually work when I am called, I'm like their minute man if the true receptionist gets sick. The thought of work would've driven my teenage self to tears. Its not really a fear of work, but a fear of going and socializing that really worried me. I had always embraced the stereotype that people with disabilities weren't able to work. This is a huge misconception there are many of us who do work and sometimes were better suited for some jobs then others based on the specialized skills we come with. People with Autism have a very select group of skills like I am very good with writing and editing, but I'm not so great with math and statistics. I didn't think I was very good with socializing, but my job requires that I answer the phones and make sure the contact gets to the right person and if the person isn't available I have put them through to their voicemails. This is unusual for a girl who didn't learn how to answer the phone by the time she was 20 (I still prefer text message maybe because I'm better at communicating through words then speech). After learning my job I became comfortable with my position and the people around me. After work I got home at 5 and debated whether to go to the Singles Ward Family Home Evening (social gathering of young single adults where we have fun activities), which is another 15 minute drive in the dark, socializing again, and another 15 minutes back. After a full day of social interactions and not being able to decompress (decompression is an important stage where an individual with autism unwinds from the day by doing their favorite activity mine is writing). I decided to stay home because there's always this nagging fear of breaking down in front of people, which I get embarrassed by. Its not that I don't like going, I enjoy it thoroughly, but after a long day of social interactions it was a little much. However I am slowly working up to it and looking forward to the day when I can go to social functions after work. Anxiety is a real thing, that I tend to overthink and I know I'm not the only one with anxieties, what are some of yours?

The World of Kong: A Natural History of Skull Island (King Kong)

Just got my copy of The World of Kong: A Natural History of Skull Island off of Amazon. For years now I've been fascinated with King Kong ever since my Grandfather Lealand Wilcox told me of the day when he and his brothers snuck into the movie theater to see the now infamous film King Kong. He thought it was a terrifying sight to behold, but he though the monkey needed to look more terrifying then being silly. 72 years later in 2005 after a disappointing 1976 cash grab failure Peter Jackson put his cinematic talent to the awesome feature King Kong and came out successful. While I feel that Jack Black was miscast as Carl Denham I loved the world of Skull Island Peter Jackson created and the raw power of the creatures he brought to screen specifically the V. Rexes. I was 13 at the time when I first saw King Kong and like moviegoers before I was thrilled by what I saw. King Kong was a rare treat because movies now lack the monsters epics that made Universal Studios king back in the day. I wanted to explore this world for myself and recently learned there was a book I rushed to amazon to purchase it and I wasn't disappointed. First flip through there was dazzling concept art and detailed descriptions on each animal within Skull Island. Not only this, but I loved the fact that the people of the Weta Workshop dressed up as 1930's expeditioners and posed for a photo at the very back. This little thing brought the book full circle. I can't wait to read it.

Beginning Nanowrimo

Yesterday was the beginning of Nanowrimo, but I was at church, so today I am starting...yay. That's a less than enthusiastic cheer. I love to write, but the hardest part about writing for me is always the beginning. I usually like to start on the end and work may up. I tend to write five or sometimes ten different beginnings before the story starts to flow. I guess I'm more a visual learner that I like to see things in my head before committing them to paper. However in that moment when it comes to put ink to paper the transition is sometimes awkward, but then it begins to work out eventual. I learned early on that when faxed wit ha blank white computer page I have a hard time typing because I end up erasing it all. A notebook enables me to write down whatever I want and make mistakes, which I illegibly scratch out with ink. A notebook gives me the freedom of making mistakes, but the best part is when I write out on a notebook and go back to type up on the computer I have an easier time plotting things out rather then trying to go through and read a microsoft word document. However writing drafts in a notebooks has one monstrous downside, what does one do with all the notebooks filled with drafts? They're half way to the top of my dresser