tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3379518858474986857.post3768485280649286009..comments2024-01-27T00:42:48.097-08:00Comments on Renaissance Oaf: Back To The Psycho MinesSean Cravenhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13763869499494698057noreply@blogger.comBlogger2125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3379518858474986857.post-60811467237648752592009-07-27T06:17:38.008-07:002009-07-27T06:17:38.008-07:00Hey, Rob --
We've got a copy of Curious Incid...Hey, Rob --<br /><br />We've got a copy of Curious Incident floating around somewhere. I'll have to hunt it down.<br /><br />One of the things in the Temple Grandin book that I found interesting is that she was able to intentionally cultivate a sense of empathy for people. It made me think of a discovery I made in early childhood.<br /><br />I had a strong drive to communicate my thoughts and I found that if I just yammered at people they got sick of listening to me fairly quickly. Somewhere between one and two -- I think, I'm gonna ask my dad about this -- I realized that you had to listen to people if you wanted them to listen to you, and that it made a real difference if you cared about what they were saying. So I deliberately taught myself to care about what other people thought.<br /><br />Sometimes I wonder if that was the smart thing to do. Too late now.<br /><br />I have to admit that I might not want to leap full into the fray of self-analysis right at the moment. Given my current emotional state I'd be too tempted to turn it into a game of pin-the-symptom-on-the-psycho.<br /><br />And after my last experience, should I give meds another shot I'm going to be a lot more active in determining what and how much I take, but I'm gonna want access to an expert opinion while I experiment. I have had interesting results from the use of amino acids -- I'll have to turn that into my next blog post. This reply is getting long enough.<br /><br />Interesting thought on pronouns. Might be a good hook for a literary movement. I've always wanted me one of them things.Sean Cravenhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/13763869499494698057noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3379518858474986857.post-7198635342085121912009-07-26T19:04:35.735-07:002009-07-26T19:04:35.735-07:00Hey Sean,
Since Susan teaches autistic children, t...Hey Sean,<br />Since Susan teaches autistic children, there are quite a few books on autism around the house if you want more reading along those lines. I'll ask her to read this post regardless; maybe she'll think of one in particular that you'd like. Although Grandin's particularly interesting - such a high-functioning person, and despite the difficulty regarding empathy with humans she seems to have an empathy with animals that other people, autistic or otherwise, just don't have.<br /><br />The most popular autism book in the house, far and away, is The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-time, which is fiction and sometimes veers far from reality but in general is very well done, entertaining, and close to reality. And it's a damn fast read, both because it's entertaining and because it's short.<br /><br />And yes, my own autistic tendencies have been pointed out to me more than once. Because it's a spectrum of behaviors there are probably quite a few of us who register somewhere on the spectrum. Like most things, it's a matter of how you function with it.<br /><br />Totally off the topic - the Safire grammar column in today's New York Times brings up the fact that 'they' was the common and thus proper non-gender specific singular pronoun for centuries until grammarians made the pronouncement that the word could be used only as a plural term, thus creating the he/she conundrum that plagues us to this day. Safire was of the opinion that we should go back to what worked for Dickens and his ilk (the column is two rooms away, I refuse to walk that far for specifics, I may well be keeping the column for reference anyway. Maybe I can be at the forefront of the neo-Dickensians using 'they' as it was intended. Not to detract from the fabulous use of 'you guys' in your novel - I love that scene, much as I frequently enjoy the confusion or embarrassment of other people).<br /><br />Okay, away from what's yours and back to the mines (I think that's a really pretentious and insulting to the difficulties of miners phrase unless, like me, you use it to refer to "I, me, mine." Ego doesn't mean you think a lot of yourself, just that you think of yourself a lot. Tis a stolen line and I may have typed it elsewhere recently, would give attribution if I knew where it came from. For now it's like the Maltese Falcon dropped in my lap without my knowing where it came from. Only that it's stolen.)<br /><br />Cheers of course, and since doctors can't seem to settle on what's wrong with you they damnwell can't be trusted with prescribing your meds - it's up to you. Oy, I ramble when it's writing time; been there?robphttps://www.blogger.com/profile/12139515613226908345noreply@blogger.com