Lucky

Every few days I walk the perimeter of our backyard. It is a nice yard, not too big. It is a simple rectangle with a patio and a lawn. I can see the whole yard from the patio, not typically the kind of property that would need someone to walk its perimeter.

But I do. I walk the perimeter checking the fence. I make sure every board is in place, that no new gaps have appeared since the last time I checked, just a few days prior.

Because one time, one of those boards was loose. Moe walked by, and it must have tipped over. He walked right through it into the neighbor's yard.

He wasn't scared. He wasn't escaping anything. He was just curious, saw an opening and walked through.

I didn't see him go through the fence. I was there in the yard with him. He was swinging, and I looked away. Maybe there was a bird. Maybe I stooped to pick a weed out of a crack in the patio or swat away a bee. When I looked back up the swing was going, empty, like a scene from a stranger danger PSA.

"Moe?" I called, peering into the playhouse, the one spot he can hide in our yard. He wasn't there.

I don't know what made me check the fence. But I saw the hole. I rushed through, thankful that I was able to fit. Moe was right there. I grabbed him (and our dog who had of course followed us through), my heart pounding, and ran into the house. Locking the door safely behind me.

I was lucky. Moe was there. He was right there.

Moe was lost once other time, at school. They messed up, two aides each thinking the other had him. He popped into an open classroom. He could have been anywhere, including the creek they walked to every Friday afternoon.

Again, were were lucky.

Moe has been lost twice. Twice found. But I have nightmares about losing him. Shouting his name as he walks away. Begging people to grab him while no one listens.

We recently trimmed some branches from our grapefruit tree. Moe has learned to climb the tree, and as the branches grew closer to the neighbor's fence, I could see him peering over the top. It wouldn't be long before he decided to leap right over.

We are diligent. We are paranoid. And yet, we are human. Just the other day, Moe and I were in the yard. The dog started scratching at the neighbor's dog through the fence. I rushed over to stop her, knowing that the scratching could compromise the fence in that spot. When I looked up, I didn't see Moe. He was fine, just in the opposite corner of the yard.

This week, we lost several beautiful children (in unrelated incidences) who wandered from safe places and drowned. My heart breaks for them, for their families and caregivers. I will not dwell on the people who have chosen judgement and blame. I do not know what happened, but I do know how it could happen. How it has happened. To me. To Moe. Unless you've lived it, you do not know.

We are diligent. But we have also been very lucky.

 

Lost

As you know, I was recently selected as a semi-finalist (top eighteen) in the Notes and Words essay contest. Although I was disappointed to learn last night that I did not make the top 5, I am proud that I can finally share the piece with you here.


The bracelet arrived in the mail, small and shiny. I put it on my son’s four-year-old wrist, fumbling with the clasp.

For a few days, we both were acutely aware of its presence. When I tried to put it on him in the morning, Moe would squirm. I’d curse under my breath as I struggled to take it off at bath time. His wrist was pink where he tried to bite it.

I thought of the kids who wore this type of medical jewelry when I was young. The kid with the peanut allergy. “You can’t even use the same spoon as the batch with the nuts” my mom would tell me, “or he could die.” The diabetic kid at camp—the one I pretended not to stare at whenever he took out his kit.  My friend with epilepsy.

But Moe doesn’t have any of those things. In fact, Moe doesn’t have anything. My son wears a bracelet because of what he is, and what he might do.

Moe is autistic.

Moe doesn’t speak. He is unlikely to respond to his name. And he loves to run.

Like many kids on the autism spectrum, Moe attends a special education day class. My husband drops him off in the morning, and six hours later, I pick him up, chatting with the other moms as we wait for the teachers to bring out our kids.

Every day, I spy my little Moe, with his blue eyes and curly blond hair, walking hand in hand with one of the people I entrust with his education and his care. Every day they bring him back to me.

Except one day, when they didn’t.

I wasn’t worried at first. Moe’s class is often last to appear, as they are the smallest bunch, preschoolers slowed down by oversized backpacks and the frequent need to investigate some bug or crack in the sidewalk. But when the rest of the class had arrived and I signaled to his teacher, she made an excuse about a forgotten backpack. I saw her run back toward the classroom, and I knew.

They had lost my little boy.

For a few minutes, I waited there, the still center of a time lapse photo.  The other parents left. Teachers went back to their classrooms. The bus came and went. And I stood there, waiting.

During those seven or eight minutes, I thought of Moe’s bracelet—the one that had finally become part of his morning routine, the one he still fiddled with but no longer fought against. Why had I put so much faith in that thin piece of metal? It couldn’t keep him safe from the creek running behind the school, or getting hit by a car, or lost in the sea of children leaving school.

I still don’t know who found Moe, who had slipped into an empty classroom. His teacher brought him to me like nothing had happened. I cried on the drive home.

Later that day, Moe was wild. He ran maniacally around the house, screeching and crashing into the walls. I dodged his attempts to bite me as I wrestled him to the floor for a diaper change. His nails, overgrown because he refused to let me cut them, scratched red marks into my neck.

I was bursting with rage. Why couldn’t Moe just control himself?  Why did everything have to be so difficult?

And why wasn’t I strong enough to handle it with grace and good humor?

F. Scott Fitzgerald wrote that the test of a first-rate intelligence is the ability to hold two opposed ideas at the same time, yet still retain the ability to function. To be able to see, for example, that things are hopeless and yet be determined to make them otherwise.

By that definition, I must be a genius.

We parents of special needs kids face overwhelming joy and sadness, intense love and frustration, breathtaking wonder and fear—often in the course of a single day. We work tirelessly to help our kids succeed in the world, even when we have no idea what that success will look like. We are given so much reason to be hopeless, and yet, sometimes hope alone propels us forward.

And so it is that I send Moe out into the world every day, offering the only protection I can give him: hope, a hug, and a small silver bracelet.

Something Good

Earlier this month, I wrote about how I really needed something good to happen.

Well, it did! A few weeks ago, I entered an essay writing contest. The contest is sponsored by Notes and Words, a literary and music event in support of Children's Hospital Oakland.

I worked the piece for a long time. I solicited feedback from people who are good at giving feedback, including my dad who used to edit my essays in school and sometimes made me cry. He was a tough critic.

This time, I made him cry.

And yesterday, I found out I was selected to be a semi-finalist!

I am really proud of this piece and I am so excited I can finally share it with you. Five semi-finalists will be chosen by a combination of votes and judges' assessments. And I'd really, really appreciate it if you would vote for my piece!

It is called Lost, and you can vote for it by liking the essay on the Facebook page.

Just go HERE and click "like!"

I'd be forever grateful.