RE: https://kolektiva.social/@EricLawton/116245600862832999
Some of my autistic joy are “watching leaves move, listening to water or noticing changes in light“.
@zigi_now9
I just did. I love my cordless vacuum cleaner so much. 🥰 It turned a household task that was difficult for me, because of executive dysfunction and sensory issues (noise, dust, warm smelly air) into autistic joy (dancing with a cute little machine 🤗).
RE: https://kolektiva.social/@EricLawton/116245600862832999
Some of my autistic joy are “watching leaves move, listening to water or noticing changes in light“.
I got this fantastic dress from Princess Awesome for Pi Day, but wasn't feeling well enough to wear it then. Since I just dyed my hair yesterday, this seemed the perfect opportunity to try it on and show off new color 𝑎𝑛𝑑 new dress:
I still think that Dylan Thomas' "Fern Hill" is a perfect poem... So I'm sharing it here, if you need a poem today. Maybe read it out loud, it's got such a lovely music to it.
Just a casual work day… 
… making fidgets :) This is a ‘galaxy’ Zorble! It features both a galaxy black and sparkling blue/purple elixir filament to create a really pretty visual effect. ✨
Perfectly pocketable. Perfectly squishable.
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Another anecdote of autistic joy.
This one takes place after the first Addams Family movie came out. Two neurodivergent friends and I (one was autistic, one ADHD, with me audhd; funny how we tend to form these trios) would go to the same dollar theater several times a week to go watch this movie. The employees there came to recognize us. We'd fill the time before the movie singing the lyrics to the TV show's theme song (with appropriate finger snapping of course). I even started bringing printouts of the lyrics in case anyone else wanted to join in. No one ever did though. In fact, there was seldom more than a few people in the theater with us. Maybe for the best?
And since the three of us were also playing the Vampire ttrpg at the time, our GM decided--after us having watched the movie one afternoon--to play a game right afterwards where our characters were invited to an Addams party. What a blast that was!
Does anyone like to hear anecdotes of autistic joy?
I just read a post talking about autistic people's love of trains, and while I don't share that particular one exactly, I do have one or two other loves when it comes to infrastructure.
When I was in elementary school, we had a vending machine for milk, but it was always out of order. This made me sad because there was just something about getting nourishment from a machine that captured me. It wasn't until the last day of school that, on my way out with my mother, I noticed that the machine was now working. I insisted that she buy me some milk from it, which I'm sure seemed weird, but even by then I was used to being unusual.
The apex of this particular love came when my older brother took me to the college he was going to (I was still pre-teen at that point). I don't remember why we went there, but he took me to the lunchroom (or whatever it was called) to get something to eat. All along one wall was a bank of vending machines of every kind. And along another wall were floor to ceiling windows overlooking the airport (we were a few stories up).
The high I felt, eating my favorite soup* from a can both from and pre-heated by a machine while watching planes come and go was indescribable. I desperately wanted to go back but alas, never got to.
* Actually I'm not sure if it was my favorite soup at the time, or if that's when it became my favorite soup. 🤷
Soooooo..... Today I woke up an hour earlier than usual, thinking it was my usual waking time. Didn't notice for over an hour. While doing my lists I found a lovely name for a tune and bought an English-Latin Latin-English dictionary. For context, I only did two years of Latin at school when I was 10yo, was never any good at it, and dropped it as soon as I could.
On a separate but kind of related note to my most recent post, Entrapta from SPOP has been genuinely good for me.
Thinking of "What Would Entrapta Do" has literally helped me move past moments I'd normally ruminate on to a self-destructive level. Her ability to simply be herself, do her own thing, and find joy in it so frequently, is something that (after a lot of work) I've been able to start emulating more. Joy over shame.
Even if only a bit for now.
I'm getting there.
the light was good on yesterday's walk so here is some handsome lichen on tree bark.