A Social Study

We had some shopping to do. We’ll be heading overseas in a few weeks to visit Rashele’s family in Belgium. She was asked by a family member to bring over an Apple iPhone as they’re not yet available there. So a trip to the mall and The Apple Store was called for.

In order to resist temptation and replace my dysfunctional iPod with an iPhone for myself, I elected to leave the Apple store to Rashele.

We were hurried last night since we wanted to be home in time to see Larry King Live and the show on Autism that was being done. (I loved it) I had neglected to set the DVR before we left the house so making it back by 8 was a priority.

While Rashele was doing her thing at Apple, Mason, Claire-Marie and I went to the play area. We frequent the malls a lot as Mason loves to climb on all the structures. This one is one of the best in the area.

This particular mall caters to 5% of the population it seems. It’s filled with very high end stores, which means in today’s economy the mall is almost empty every time we visit. I still don’t understand how it manages to stay in business.

They play area is a big and wide open assortment of giant foods to climb. There’s the big plate of Steak and Eggs, with Bacon. There’s a large oversized Grapefruit, along with a Fork and Spoon Slide.

All the structures are bright and colorful and tempting for any kid.

Since the mall is rarely populated, the play area usually contains a dozen kids at most and tonight was no exception.

I watched Mason climb over all the structures time and time again, never really having any physical detriments standing in his way. His movements are very well thought out and precise, though lacking in great strength and quickness.

While running however he resembles a cross between a bobblehead doll and a marionette. He doesn’t seem to know how to control all those moving parts at once.

Over the course of our time there I’d see an occasional child approach Mason asking him to play. He’d look them in the eye, mumble something, and turn the other way, ignoring them and going about his business.

On one occasion after being approached by a potential playmate, he ran to me. I asked him he wanted to play with the other kids.

Noooooooooooooooooooooo, he sang back to me in a whispy, high tone.

I asked him if he was afraid.

“Noooo?” with a fluxed pitch.

He almost seemed be questioning me if he was scared. I told him it was okay if he wanted to play with the boys and girls, that they were his friends.

An adamant NO was shot back to me.

He went back about his business of conquering the large plate of steak and eggs.

A set of parents sat a few feet away from me. The father interacted with his son, 2 or 3 years of age, verbally prompting him to stand on various parts of the playground. The Eggs, the Spoon, the Grapefruit, and the son giggled as he complied with each command.

The father beamed.

Show off, I thought to myself, my son can count to 10 in 4 languages, 3 that we didn’t even teach him..

Truthfully I was a bit jealous of the ease the father had getting his son to complete these simple tasks.

Along with the lack of social skills demonstrated this evening, the inability to follow the simplest of commands was one of the other red flags we picked up on early in Mason’s lifetime.. Thankfully some progress in the right direction since then has been made, but, I always want more.

In quiet observance from my comfortable seat in the corner, I scanned the now surprisingly growing crowd of children at the play area to see if I could pick up any other kids struggling with ASD. Every now and again I can spot one but tonight it was just mine.