Unusual Gifts, Pt. 2

He cannot tell a lie. No he is not George Washington nor honest Abe Lincoln, he is Joel Tucker, our 16 year old autistic son. His affliction/gift prevents him from applying creative thinking to situations. Lying is a creative endeavor in that it takes an actively creative mind to fabricate and elaborate. Joel states the facts without embellishment.

We can always depend on Joel to express the events as they happened or at least what he sees and experiences. He does not assume things and does not tell anything that he thinks might have happened. Like Dragnet, he sticks to the facts and often expresses them without any emotion. Joel's world is somewhat pleasantly superficial in that he does not imagine the abstract or pretend to know something that is not there. He lives in the concrete world of the five senses without anticipation of what those senses will be. He responds in truth to what he sees and does not interpret beyond the obvious.

This results in extreme reliability of events and situations without the typical guesswork found in most people's views. We tend to rely on the perceptions and interpretations of individuals rather than on strictly the facts. Joel, however, provides us with a reliable account of his experiences. It is both comforting and frightening for us as parents. I am often glad Joel does not see or sense any criticism or even anything negative around him. This causes him to have a pleasant demeanor and to find the best in everyone and in everything.

On the other hand, it is a little unnerving to know that Joel does not sense any danger or possible threats around him. While Joel brings an eternal optimism with him in his responses to people and events, the truth is that not all experiences and not all people are well-intentioned. This keeps us and Joel's brothers on guard to insure that any threats whether veiled or obvious are quelled and that Joel is protected.

But we do not necessarily desire to change Joel into a suspicious, darkly questioning individual. There is enough of that in the world already. Instead, while we do wish to instill in Joel the ability to discern and recognize differences in people and situations, we hope to retain the goodness and joy that he emanates everywhere he goes.

This is probably Joel's greatest gift: to transform the world around him and to spread joy infectiously to other people. A great writer will work linearly to provide congruity and concinnity to his prose. Like a great writer who speaks with the pen or the keyboard, Joel's personality and comportment are beyond reproach and his natural magnetic charm joyously infects every room he enters. Never a braggadocio, he won't boast, bluster, or exult himself in any fashion. He is not capable of exaggeration, hyperbole, or self-absorption in the way we normally define it. His acts of selfishness are to serve his own need to meet people, love people, affirm people, and help people.

Joel's unusual gifts of honesty and unlimited powers of love, set him apart from the rest of world and make him unequivocally special. In a world replete with fear, suspicion, caution, prejudice, and judgment, Joel escapes into a world complete with love, goodness, acceptance, tolerance, and trust. Perhaps the world would be better off with more Joels!