rule for life
Before morning light cracks the sky, Kevin drives away for work. In the headlight beams, I watch raindrops gently fall, but everywhere else, the morning looks blank and still. Coming up behind me, Riley wraps her arms around my shoulders. I lift a hand, folding my fingers into the sign for I love you, and Riley chants her see you later‘s over my head like a mantra. I punch the button on the wall and the garage door hums, motoring down as I turn back to the warmth of the kitchen, where Adam now moves away from the table, balancing his plate on a wide, thin palm, gripping a coffee mug in his other hand. He bows his back, curving over the coffee, as though this will protect against spills, and glances up at me, only briefly lifting his gaze from the creamy liquid sway. I watch him settle the mug and plate slowly on the counter before turning back on a mission to gather his cereal bowl and spoon, and I chuckle. Every day now, just as Kevin leaves, Adam begins a relocation project.
When it comes to most things, including rules around meals, Autism has made our family compassionate and unconventional. Whenever we can eat together, we gather at the table, but catch-as-you-can meals, especially now that the kids are teens, happen when and where eccentricities allow. Anxiety about eating alone nearly always puts Riley at the bar, facing and absorbing all of the activity in the kitchen and living room, while Adam, our restless, rarely still child, prefers to stand and pace a four-foot path while I work.
Out of curiosity, I mentioned Adam’s behavior to Kevin and asked if he and Adam had had some conversation about where Adam should eat breakfast. Kevin shook his head and shrugged, looking baffled. We laughed, because although as a father Kevin is far from demanding or critical, Adam creates many of his rules and patterns specifically around Kevin’s routine. Although many people with Autism make seemingly arbitrary and unique rules for their lives as an easy way to increase the predictability that makes them most comfortable, Adam’s choices appear to be uniquely centered on and motivated by his love for his dad. In this way, Adam’s life patterns call to mind an old spiritual practice actually labeled “rule for life,” in which supplicants create “unique and regular rhythms” that open them to “the will and presence of Christ,” and draw them “more deeply into loving God (Adele Calhoun, Spiritual Disciplines Handbook, 37).” Observing this in Adam inspires my own mental list of regular routines I’ve intentionally set into place because I love God and love being with Him. I love knowing I can inspire God’s delight, and this new habit of Adam’s falls in with a succession of others, all of which appear to be less about what makes Adam comfortable and more about delighting his father.
In the afternoons, when the garage door motor rumbles, signifying Kevin’s return home, Adam immediately stops everything to take out the garbage and empty the recycle bins. The diligence with which our son sets to work reminds us, with joy and wide grins, of the words of Jesus regarding his own return: “It will be good for those servants whose master finds them watching when he comes (Luke 12:37).” Without a doubt, Adam listens for Kevin and, even though Kevin has never made an issue of it, understands with some wisdom that it matters what your dad finds you doing when he comes back.
I’ve also observed that even though Adam may be fully engrossed in listening to music on his tablet when Kevin gets home, as soon as Adam finishes his trash duty, he switches to playing games on the Xbox. This puzzled me for quite a while until I realized that Kevin, when walking through the living room, often jumps in, steals turns, and jokes with Adam while Adam is playing on the Xbox. So, Adam works to please his dad and then intentionally sets up an ideal situation for their interaction.
In addition to all of this, when Kevin is home, Adam periodically announces that fact, like a random herald, his tone satisfied, his heart happy, the syllables dissolving into laughter. And Adam always pays close attention to the movements of his father: Where Kevin goes, Adam follows, busying himself always somewhere nearby and within calling distance. As routinely as Adam behaves this way, I gather up the sweetness of it and treasure it in my heart.
So I stand in the warmth of the kitchen now, ever the mom detective, wondering how this new dad-centered behavior fits with all of the others, and I don’t know if Adam chooses the table for breakfast when Kevin is home because he believes it to be Kevin’s preference or because it offers Adam a posture more open to observation and response. But regardless, I do know that the one motivation for Adam’s behavior remains: He loves his dad; he loves being with his dad; and he loves knowing that he inspires his father’s delight.
