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Location: Toronto, Ontario, Canada

Writer/Curator/Founder of The Autism Acceptance Project. Contributing Author to Between Interruptions: Thirty Women Tell the Truth About Motherhood, and Concepts of Normality by Wendy Lawson, and soon to be published Gravity Pulls You In. Writing my own book. Lecturer on autism and the media and parenting. Current graduate student Critical Disability Studies and most importantly, mother of Adam -- a new and emerging writer.

“There is no hope unmingled with fear, and no fear unmingled with hope.” -- Baruch Spinoza

Friday, December 23, 2005

 
In the dark hours of 2 a.m., my son asleep at his grandparent's place, I twirl my hair obsessively whirling thoughts on my pillow instead of closing my eyes. It is yet another sleepless night when tomorrow morning I have to meet with a new school for Adam. Instead of just thinking, I kept the promise I made to myself many a sleepless night ago to just grab this computer and write the damn stuff down.

I entertain thoughts of the salsa lessons I always wanted to take, maybe a hip hop lesson or two -- to get connected to my body again -- this one that is sagging just a little more than it used to -- a far cry from my fitness instructor/modelling days of my twenties -- those jobs I juggled while going to school. Now, when I get work, my mind disconnects from the body and while it reels, I feel more tired and sluggish. It's all about time and paying attention to these things of health and vanity. Like Emmanual Kant, I consider the rituals of daily walking, at the very least, to stay connected to myself and other possibilities that surround me. Walking, for Kant, prepared him for his daily writing. I truly love being immersed in work, but I also long for a kind of freedom I once had -- smoking cigarrettes on my window sill in Freiburg (I've long since quit and can't stand the stuff), luxuriously writing down poems, stories and diaries of worries that now seem sensual and sometimes, just plain trivial in the grand scheme of life as it is for me today. That is what youth is for -- all of those wonderful experiences that prepare us for the life ahead -- the life of giving another young person the same opportunities. Marriage for a woman should definitely be put on hold until at least 30. There is so much wonderful living to do before we have children. Then, at least when we have them, there is no real unknown or imagined life. Only the reminisced one.

I believe I also can't sleep because Adam isn't home. For all the work our children bring, we miss them so when they go out. Everyone I talk to seems to have the same experience. Love is truly built out of all the tough steps of life -- and sometimes,just sticking together. It amazes me, because remember I only have one child of my own, the infinite love I feel for Adam. I wish, sometimes, I could have more children, but Henry has 5 and he's done. I respect that and now that I'm getting older, I feel I am done too. Adam can get the benefit of all of me instead of a sibling. I was an only child too. It just is what it is. Is there any point living the imagined life?

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