The Farm

Once upon a time, I was a small child at play in the forests and meadows of Oakland, Arkansas where Granny Bailey had a hobby farm. While it was nothing compared to the backbreaking labor and harsh reality that real farm kids experience, I did get a bit of a taste of what that might be like. Walking around barefoot was standard. Exploring real bat caves, crawling through hollow logs, planting my own trees, digging irrigation ditches, catching fireflies to put in a jar, and watching tadpoles become frogs in the trough where rainwater would gather were all par for the course. I think often of that blonde kid in 1980s Marion County and how happy and hopeful he was. Whatever ways autism afflicted me at the time didn't seem to matter on the farm. All I had to do was have a blast and listen to my grandmother tell me what a wonderful person I was and was going to be. You know, I really did believe that.

Granny Bailey is dead five years now. Granddad 13 years, Grandmom 26 years, Pocky seven years, and nearly all of their generation is gone from my family on both sides. While I miss them all, I'm kind of glad they're gone at the same time. Now, I don't know if they realized I was profoundly disabled by my autism or not, but surely some of them had an inkling that something was wrong and of what was coming. I suppose I'd like to think that they died with hope in their hearts for me, if only because that would've helped make them happy and I'd like for them to have died happy. In any event, I don't have to face them and tell them that I'll never earn a living or that no great grandchildren will ever be forthcoming. For that much, I'm grateful. These were not broken dependent people. They all made grand contributions to their families and the economy. May they be at peace, safe from the knowledge I cannot claim this for myself.

The more I understand the extent of the severity of my autism, the more grateful I am for understanding of the natural world and my disbelief in the existence of a supernatural one. That so many believe in and pursue immortality speaks a great deal as to how satisfactory the average person considers his life to be. Death is a consolation to me, precisely because it will mean the end of my autism. While I do not seek it by any means, it will be an enormous relief to me when it finally comes. Whatever good effect my existence may have on the lives of others, and I have always tried to make a positive impact in this way, will not change the fact that it has been a trial to me. When one is raised with all the infrastructure for children available telling you all the work you will do in school and at home is for the express purpose of finding a career and a mate, I'm not sure one is supposed to react to the reality of failure on both fronts. Maybe that kid on the farm was ultimately wrong about where life was going, but, I gotta tell you, I envy him.

-Frank