Aspie Child Crossing: Street Trouble

Just having got back from this walk with Tessie, I can remember every detail.

Tess enjoyed herself very much, that's for sure. However, I did not.

Thankfully, she never left my side.

First off was the silver Ford F-150 going the wrong way down our street--after signalling that it was about to turn to go the correct way. The Do Not Enter signs have been up for at least ten years. Yet people still disobey them on a daily basis.

Next came the horrible feeling of the slack leash as it brushed against the pavement. Tessie was behaving herself well enough that it didn't bother me at first, but as soon as I felt it, I started freaking out. Tessie came closer to me, immediately ending the horror of the leash. But just to make sure, I wrapped the leash around her chest (a trick I've developed to get rid of the slack) and the problem did not repeat.

Then came the muskrat. Put simply, Tessie took no notice. I was happy. Oh, do you want the full story? Well, the muskrat was at the house of a West Highland White Terrier. It will be gone within a few days if that dog takes notice. Therefore, Tessie knew it was not her prey to chase. Because of the fact that she didn't go chasing it, I was happy.

After that was the Yorkie house. Two kids were outside doing gymnastics, so Tessie wanted to say hello. But I didn't bother, knowing that she wasn't going to care very much. She hasn't even begun sulking, so I think it's fine.

Next, there was no one at the park. No one. That is crazy rare, and since Tessie only does her tricks for an audience, we just turned around for the walk home.

Oh, and did I mention the constant firecrackers the whole way to the park? Yeah, Tessie hated them.

But as soon as we turned back, things went better. We got home without a hitch (other than the extremely annoying rock in my right shoe). Tessie is now laying by my side as I type this. I may not have enjoyed the walk much, but Tessie performs extremely well under the most extraordinary of circumstances.

Now, if only she would quit jumping on people...

Tessie

Having autism, I know what it is to be different.

My dog also knows.

My best friend, Tessie, is half Siberian Husky and half Bluetick Coonhound. She is a beautiful girl. But the first thing everyone notices is the single china eye. One eye is pale blue, sometimes called white. The other eye is dark brown, with a tiny stripe of blue going from the white of the eye through the iris. But she isn't blind in the blue eye--if anything, it's closer to the opposite.

Tessie is a very special and incredibly intelligent dog. I got her from my brother for my twelfth birthday. I had only met her once before, that summer, but we had an instant bond. She listened to me as I started to teach her commands the day we met. And she remembered all of those commands.

So when I got her the following November as a belated birthday present, I immediately started training her. I was very careful, but she surpassed all of my expectations. Tessie and I started slowly, but within a year, we had grown to the point where I could signal her and she would just understand my innermost thoughts. 

There was just one trouble, though--she ran away.

The Coonhound in her is always begging her to sniff, so she rolls in the grass a lot. But when she rolls, her leash comes unhooked. And she can jump right over a four foot fence without trying. We live right near a major roadway, so that is very dangerous. She once crossed the roadway. We only caught her because of her fear of water. And even then, my dad couldn't have got her if he had run for her. But the moment I called, she came running, just like the song always says.

Winter is her favorite season. She can jump vertically through the piles of snow we get around here, and the best part is that I can keep up. Spring and fall come next. That's when we take three hour walks after school is over for the day. We'll go down the street, visit her friends(Jinx, Lilo, and Max, along with others on occasion), and finally go to the skate park. She taught herself to climb the concrete half pipe. So I used that to my advantage, and after a lot of practice, she was able to do anything I told her to when we were there. She's become the unofficial dog mascot of the park.

In the summer, I don't see her much. I have words floating around my head all day, every day, and I can only write them down constantly for three months of the year. So Tessie will lay outside the closed door to my bedroom until Mom gets home from work at two o'clock. We'll be forced out of the house for a couple of hours. And for once, I actually don't want to.

But with Tessie around, I don't care. I can still remember all the words I need to write down for when I get home. So even if it does get annoying for the dog, with me typing all day, we are still happy.

And that is what matters.

Thinking in Words

Hyperlexia.

Overactive imagination.

Autism.

For me, those three things tie together very tightly. Those three terms describe my whole life.

I am Arianna.

I am Arianna, an autistic teenager with an eidetic memory. I am Arianna, a girl who has written novels in her spare time. I am Arianna, the girl the whole school knows of as the genius.

I am Arianna, the girl who wishes she wasn't so different.

Even as a young child, I was different. My whole family could tell. I never cried after my mom started teaching me American Sign Language at two weeks old. I was signing myself a few months later, and by three years old, I knew about eighty signs, not including the alphabet. In preschool and kindergarten, I was in a grade of my own, one might say. I was doing sixth-grade spelling lists and getting the sixth-grade averages. My teachers pointed it out to my parents. But for the next seven years I continued to blend in well enough. And because of that, they didn't realize what the negatives of my intelligence were.

Finally, in July 2012, my cousin realized what it was about me. I had Asperger's syndrome, mild autism. When taken into perspective, it explained the bullying that had followed me through two schools. It explained the difficulties that had come into play as I transitioned into middle school three years before. It even explained how the struggles my parents had grown to consider normal after my ADD brother had been passed down to me.

Going into high school this coming fall will most likely be the most important transition of my life so far. It will be the first major change after the discovery of my autism. And it will be the first time I must call myself autistic, thanks to the DSM-V.

But high school will also be the time when I can learn to cope. Everything around me right now seems to be at least a million times more powerful than it should be. My tears tend to spill on a daily basis. I hope that I can learn what I need to learn in the coming years. I hope that I can continue to be me.

Because I am Arianna, a girl who thinks in words.