In my dreams

In my dreams, my town would have a place for parents of children with autism and aspergers to gather today.  Maybe it should be a place for all parents of special needs children to gather, because I think all of us can understand what it's like to parent a child who doesn't fit the mold.  We would have a soda, or coffee and eat little treats and relax with each other.  We would talk about our joys and our frustrations.  We would talk about our fears.

We've had a phenomenon the last few days.  J was playing on the playground while his brother was playing baseball.  David and I were watching when we noticed that he was teeter tottering with a girl about his age.  This went on for SEVERAL minutes!  I was so excited.  They walked around together the ENTIRE game!!!  Most do not realize what a MONUMENTAL event this was.  He even let her talk, and he LISTENED!  I know there's a lot of all caps here, but that's how exciting it was.  He got along with someone for an hour.

He's been working hard on a book that I bought him, working on fourth grade skills.  Jackson is a prime example of why No Child Left Behind makes me angry.  He's been working on this book, and doing a wonderful job on the Math, and most of the English.  .  However, he hit the section dealing with figurative language.  J is a child who does not get sarcasm.  He does not get figurative language.  I don't know that he ever will.  He is literal.  He was working on a page of personification.  Things like fog hugging the ground and stuff like that.  We tried and tried on that page.  It makes NO sense to him.  So, I cannot imagine that he's ever going to be able to test successfully on a test about something that I doubt he will ever understand.  I don't know.  Maybe he can memorize what the things mean.  but I don't know that they will ever make sense to him.  We will see.  He took the state test for the first time this year, I am anxious to see how he performed on it when the results come back.  I'm not anxious because I think the test means anything, really.  I am anxious, because the state will judge MY child's intelligence and ability on one test.