Asperger's Syndrome

I have bronchitis and a cold. Illness, especially the communicable variety, brings isolation, and solitude encourages reflection. I thought of my phone conversation with my mother yesterday, which was unusually candid.

Asperger's Syndrome is interesting, and I'm fairly sure my father has it. He has the full-blown variety, no half-measure. My mother agrees with me and also agrees I inherited the trait, which would explain my nerdiness in school. Years ago, such a reflection may have seemed threatening to my ego, but I am not bothered by the working hypothesis, because I like to understand things and get closer to the truth of a matter. Recollections that for a long time puzzled me become clearer when I accept this hypothesis, as though a missing piece of the puzzle falls into place, and the complete picture is revealed to me at last. It is not embarrassment I feel therefore, but satisfaction, to find at last the answer to a riddle that perplexed me for years.

What is nerdiness after all? It is below average adaptation to the social environment. Asperger's is a weakness in interpreting subtle social cues. A person with Asperger's may sometimes be mystified at the reactions of other people. He may not be quite as good at nonverbal communication and may not be a very engaging speaker. Lack of facial expressions, lack of physical expression. Disinclined to engage in social events; prefer to be alone. This is the textbook description that I know by heart. Yet, beware. These are rough generalizations, and variations abound, because the subject is not a mineral that can be classified with precision, but a human being. Furthermore, I describe how the subject appears to some from without, not from within. I describe how norms perceive things, or how I may be perceived on occasion. To a certain extent, Asperger's is a box into which shrinks have thrown some of the kids that aren't making enough friends in school or some spouses whose other half has enrolled them in couples therapy. Asperger's is more or less a pseudoscientific euphemism for nerd. The kids on the playground and the shrinks are using different labels that mean really quite the same thing.

After surviving the trauma of school and gaining experience in the world, neuro-atypicals get better at interpreting subtle social cues. When discussing a subject close to the heart's joy, such as computer programming, certainly there may be emotional emphasis and an engaging speech indeed, no monotone at all. The trouble is that most people don't care about the kinds of things that interest a neuro-atypical. The norm's window of curiosity is half-closed. Who has a Syndrome? Who has the weakness? This is all a matter of perspective. Another way of looking at things is that the guy with Asperger's lacks interest in what other people find very interesting. It is difficult for a neuro-atypical to generate interest in other people. Knowledge helps; if the other person knows a great many things, then that can be very appealing, because hunger for knowledge is a very real need. Depending upon the social events in question, a neuro-atypical may be well-inclined to participate. I think of Asperger's as being the equivalent of a learning disability in social engineering, in networking with other people, or perhaps a reluctance to manipulate others, a disinclination to become drawn into the affairs of others. Although learning may be delayed, many skills can be acquired, depending upon the individual.

I made friends in school. I wasn't quite as nerdy as some, but nerdier than the average boy. I was called a "walking, talking encyclopedia," because I knew words with more than three syllables. I thought everybody should know and use such words. What is wrong with the world, that people don't care to learn everything they possibly can about everything under the Sun? This was my first reaction. Compliments and straight-A's fed my ego, but actually this sort of thing is typical with Asperger's. I got more joy sometimes from reading something as mundane as the back of a cereal box than talking with a peer. I wondered what the ingredients were, and sometimes I had to pull up the encyclopedia, my best friend, to find out. I remember that as a boy I was so naive that I believed everything I read, as long as it corresponded to the general sense of reality and wasn't mythology or magic. Now I know that what one reads on the back of a cereal box must be taken with a grain of salt, along with everything else. One must look to the author and his motives. Of course the cereal manufacturer's motive is clearly to sell cereal, so perhaps not everything can be trusted to be completely candid.

My brain was a sponge, although my memory is very far from photographic, and I'm definitely no savant. I think I was wasted on my school, because I was ahead, and the classes were just lagging behind, leaving me bored and with no sort of challenge at all, just brainless makework. School was a punitive environment. By the time eighth grade rolled around, I was completely disengaged from school. I got into trouble because I wasn't reading social cues as well as the others. I was at least a full grade behind in social development, and a couple grades ahead in academics. I don't think schools knew what do with kids like me. Maybe they do now, but back in the day, the chips fell where they may.

Silence was an early coping mechanism. Silence avoided hostile scrutiny. I learned how to be invisible. Almost all my teachers were less informed about the subjects. Those teachers who knew more than I did, I prized. They were my favorite teachers. But most did not. Teachers who had less knowledge nevertheless had the power to wreak revenge upon their arrogant pupil, and I was certainly arrogant. Let us define arrogance. Arrogance is a failure to understand and apply unwritten and undeclared social norms. One such social norm is that we should convey thoughts and feelings in an inoffensive manner that does not appear designed to make the listeners feel small. Appearances are extremely important, the most important thing in fact, and if one cannot speak without seeming arrogant, silence is preferable. It is better to be silent until one learns the social skills one needs to learn. Of course other boys and girls did not like to seem stupid by comparison, so I learned to disengage and stay quiet in order not to offend anyone. My first lesson in school was the power and the virtue of silence. After several betrayals and cruel pranks, I also learned to be suspicious of others and never to accept what anyone said at face value, but to search for hidden motives--and once the search is complete, to keep watching, because some motives are hidden well indeed. I am almost never taken in by anybody anymore. But in order to achieve such invulnerability, perhaps it is necessary that one endure numerous betrayals, which are such valuable learning experiences. I would not have gone without them.

Some people are better at interpreting social cues than others, and they flourish as social butterflies: politicians, actors, business managers. There are great rewards available for those with above average skills of social perception. I think the self-made rich almost always have something of the social butterfly in them. There is great value in networking, and it is the best way to thrive in business. On the other hand, people with Asperger's seem better with computers, engineering, science, and other detailed and complicated skills. In my opinion, they would also adapt well to the military, which is a system much like a computer, very rule-based, with clear priorities and a chain-of-command.