the measure you use
I kneel next to Adam’s feet, a piece of string stretched along the floor, Sharpie poised. “Don’t move,” I tell him, which comes close to telling Adam not to breathe. He stands in place, but shifts a thin, wide hand to one hip. His toes drift up from the floor and I press them back down with my fingers, stretching the string taught from toe to heel, pressing the tip of my pen down. Black ink bleeds into the string. With this blot, Adam and I create a whole new measure, the Adam foot, which, as you might suppose, misses the standard 12 inches by at least 3/4 of an inch. Considering also the constant movement of my subject even in “stillness,” the inherent slackness in the string even “taut,” and my own natural fallibility as a scientist, we can guarantee even more deviation. Fortunately, Adam and I arrived at the unit jointly; self-estimation only runs more askew.
“Now. We just need 6 more of those,” I say, sliding the string down with one hand, because doing so seems easier than telling Adam where to move and getting him “still” again. I encircle his ankle with my other hand, silently telling him to stay. I won’t check, but I feel reasonably sure Adam foot 1 and Adam foot 2 will not be exactly equidistant to any fine increment. This does not concern me, as at our house, we live daily the very definition of different. We have learned to accept this with affection.
Adam remains, but beneath my hands, I feel him rising and falling to and fro on his heels and toes. He scripts, which is Autism-speak for repeating or echoing words and phrases, for Adam, bits of songs and video games and movie or television show clips sewn together with throaty syllabic trills.
Scripting, which in our world is also called echolalia, isn’t fully understood, but it is fairly common among individuals with Autism. Common, but different, varying away from precise comparison as other things do, like the way each person walks or finds rest or emphasizes syllables. Even our interpretations of the behavior vary. Some experts believe echolalia is a coping mechanism for stress, others describe it as an attempt to communicate, despite the difficulties we have decoding it. It might be one or the other; it might be both. To me, scripting seems only slightly divergent from other “screen-saving” habits that somehow help me focus: the way I hum a tune I have stuck in my head or wildly tap my pen or cluck my tongue in thought. Sometimes I hardly recognize the sounds I make with my own body until someone else draws them to my attention. The observation is like the ink-bleeding dot of this pen in my hand, marking a length of identity I’d never otherwise have noticed. Often, I ask Adam what he’s scripting, and when pressed, he rises out of that sea of sound and words and clips of phrase and tells me before falling silent. Sometimes he looks surprised, maybe even abashed, to have been so discovered, as if he’s thinking (but can’t really say), “Oh, did I say all that out loud?” The whole consideration makes me smile now, as I hold my scripting son’s ankle with one hand and feel the strong, thick cord of tendon rising up from the bone. In all ways, we humans deviate from standard.
Our units created, Adam and I begin to measure other parts of his body by the Adam foot. The exercise, called “body math,” is one of this week’s many carefully-selected lessons, planned and prepared for us by the hardworking, loving teachers of Dynamic Opportunities, the private school for differently-abled middle and high school students that Riley and Adam attend. Adam holds the string with one finger at his wrist while I stretch it out along his forearm to his elbow. “How many Adam feet long is your forearm?” I ask, tapping the first black dot on the string with my finger.
“1,” Adam says, grinning, the number rumbling. For a moment, I wonder how we might all interpret this world if we could borrow each other’s unique measurements. What would this moment, this part of the road, amount to if measured by your feet instead of mine? How long, how hard, how meaningful?
I am certain Adam did not know his forearm was exactly the length of his foot; I’m not sure he knows now. The limits to Adam’s communication skills sometimes make the application of his brilliance a complete mystery. But really, it’s immaterial whether or not Adam understands his findings, whether or not he files away the facts I narrate now as he bends over the worksheet in front of him and pencils in a bold 1 in the blank. “Isn’t that neat, Adam,” I say, maybe a little too enthusiastically. “Your arm is the same length as your foot!” Gently, I round one hand over the slope of his back. The real value of the exercise, Adam’s takeaway, however subtle, will really be the discovery of new perspective, a way to explore and redefine his own boundaries.
We wrap that dotted string around Adam’s fist, around his neck, stretch it out along the width of his shoulders. Some things the worksheet specifies, but when we finish those, I ask what else he would like to measure. “Leg,” Adam rumbles, gesturing. It does not occur to him to measure my body or Riley’s, a door or the table. The Adam foot really only serves to size up Adam.
I get back down on my knees, handing Adam one end of the string, pointing to his hip, “Ok, hold this right there.” And all the while, I’m thinking, oh, the wisdom in that.
