Thursday, July 29, 2010

Lilith Fair

When Riley was five, we went to see one of her school friends in a dance performance. Riley made it through the sensory overload of the show, only to break down during the applause at the end, specifically when I "woot- wooted" enthusiastically for her friend. I remember her look. It wasn't a meltdown, it was a "you don't even understand," cringing, wincing along with her cries. A silent scream. She was in pain, and her mother, whom she loved, had unintentionally inflicted it upon her.

Five years later, things have changed.

Tuesday evening, we took the kids to Lilith Fair. At one point, sitting on our blanket on the lawn, I looked over at my husband, our daughter in between us, our son Seth on my lap, and mouthed, "Did you ever think?" 

He smiled and shook his head. We were out there, having fun!   

"I'm so glad you're old enough to do something like this," I said to Riley. And by "old enough" I meant, "able to."

She beamed. She wore her white peasant skirt and a purple tank top with a glittery butterfly on the front. Her jeweled white sandals completed the ensemble.   

It certainly was loud. And wild. People were drinking. Lesbians were behaving badly. Two different couples stopped not twenty feet from our blanket to grope and dry hump each other in front of our children. 

Side note:

Man/woman, woman/woman, man/man...doesn't matter a bit to me, but I happen to think dry humping is something to be done in private, with that special someone(s).

We used it as a teachable moment, told the kids how people who are hurting often need to draw attention to themselves. We made sure they knew this wasn't representative of gay people, and pointed out the fact we know a whole lot of gay people who would never be so disrespectful. Then, as a family, we made the decision not to look at them, not to encourage them. Riley and Seth were happy to comply. Ew. Gross. Soon the couples lost interest and moved on.

It was dark by the time Mary J. Blige performed. The place was rockin' and we danced on the lawn. Seth did his Michael Jackson moves. HT did "the white guy." I did my thing, which consists of a lot of hip swaying, knees bouncing and of course the occasional hand twirling in the air like a lasso(my signature move). Riley sashayed her skirt to her own quirky rythym doing a move she learned watching the dancers perform The Paso Doble on Dancing With the Stars. We are so weird.

After Mary J. Blige, and before Sarah McLachlan, we were offered an upgrade from the lawn to the reserved seats. We took it and ended up in front of some really obnoxious young women. They screamed, and sang very loudly. So loud we couldn't hear Sarah. After two songs, Riley leaned over and politely asked, "Do we have to sit here? These girls are getting on my nerves."

Self-advocacy! No crying! No screaming! 

We offered to just go home, it was late, but no! She wanted to stay. Riley wanted to finish watching the show.  

We found new seats in a section we had all to ourselves. We told Riley how awesome she was to take good care of herself (and all of us) by requesting what she needed to make herself more comfortable. We were all much happier in our new spot and we finished out the six hour show, encore and all. The applause roared, and Riley did her own woot-wooting!

Thinking back five years ago when Riley could not handle applause at a school  performance, I never imagined we'd be able to go to a concert like Lilith Fair. There were times I wondered whether we'd ever have fun again.

Life is not always easy. She still has profound challenges and needs a lot of support. But we have days like this as well, happy, happy, hopeful days. 

Days which, truly, deserve a mention.

 

Michelle O’Neil has contributed to A Cup of Comfort for Parents of Children with Autism, and Special Gifts: Women Writers on the Heartache, the Happiness and the Hope of Raising a Special Needs Child. She has written for Literary Mama, The Imperfect ParentAge of Autism, Cool Cleveland and Sensory Integration Special Interest Section (SISIS) Quarterly Newsletter, a professional publication for occupational therapists. 

She has a ten year old daughter with Asperger’s and a seven year old son whose health is returning to balance after wrestling with the auto-immune issue PANDAS for a while. She’s married to the wonderful Hot Toddy and has been blogging about autism, family and spirituality since 2006.

 

14 comments:

  1. Love this! Yes, yes, and yes!
    Oh, and the dry humping? Huh. I remember those days...

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  2. Yay! Celebrate this milestone!! Happy Times! :)

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  3. Good for Riley and good for you for pointing out what lies behind deliberately obnoxious public misbehavior. I'm sure the humpers and humpees were hoping and HOPING that somebody (preferably an angry man) would take umbrage to their lesbian lubriciousness, giving them the opportunity to rally the troops and get all defiant and political. Throw alcohol into the mix and it's Katy bar the door, as grandma used to say.
    it so misses the point of all people deserving to be with the one they love and it becomes something that's just offensive.

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  4. Congrats on such a fun and positive experience for your family. I'm disappointed to hear you describe the young women sitting behind you as "really obnoxious," though. You constantly hope that other people will not rush to judge Riley, that they will grant her (and you) the benefit of the doubt. It seems only fair for you to return the favor. Maybe those young women were hard of hearing and unable to modulate their volume. Maybe they were struggling with severe depression and finding in their singing and screaming an outlet for overwhelming emotion. Or maybe they were just obnoxious -- or just exhibiting typical behavior for a concert aimed at young adults, not families. But you don't know, and more than the people who watch Riley melt down at the playground or beach or botanical gardens know whether she is "really obnoxious" or facing other challenges.

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  5. I love your family in all its weirdness. This is a-may-zing! WOOT WOOT!

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  6. Anon-thank you for pointing this out. I was thinking the same thing.

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  7. This was certainly a feel good post for me. So happy for Riley and for you to be in a place where you're able to enjoy such outings as a family. That's something I really aspire to and stories like this give me faith that it can happen.

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  8. I love you and EVERYTHING about you.
    YAMH.

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  9. Such a lovely story. I'm thrilled for you all. Laughing at the cool way you handled the adolescent behaviors all around.

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  10. what a wonderful and cool milestone to reach !

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  11. So happy for all of you! This is fresh in my memories, with Nigel attending his first concert last summer, and how thrilling and wonderful it was, since his sensory issues used to be so extreme. How great to be able to experience! xo

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  12. So let me get this straight. Everyone else in the world is annoying and obnoxious with the exception of Riley and her family who are always 100% right and perfect. Also, if the world isn't sensitive to Riley 100% of the time then they are even more obnoxious and insensitive. Got it. It's no wonder no school is good enough for her child.

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  13. Listen, a teacher. I really dislike your tone and feel pretty strongly that you're harshing the mellow around here. This isn't the place for you to wash your dirty laundry. This is a place where we come together in support of one another. Your issues need to be dealt with elsewhere.

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  14. This is a beautiful post. *happy sigh*
    And I agree with Hetha about 'a teacher', and would add it to the "anon's " as well. So lame, and obviously passive aggressivly hostile... Wow, people are transparent sometimes. The no real name thing is always a give away of a certain kind of person.
    :)

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