the traffic light

At the intersection of 9-year-old Asperger's Street and 44-year-old I Just Need To Get Some of My Own Stuff Done Way, sometimes in the summer the traffic light goes out and everyone gets very confused as to how to proceed.

I mean, forget about work. There's no work. You'll have given that up for the summer to be done only in snatched early morning moments.

And forget about self-care of any kind, like exercise, which you will have relegated to nights so that your work-at-home spouse doesn't have to worry about trying to stay at home with Mr. I-Could-Care-Less-That-You-Are-Video-Conferencing-With-The-Company-Owner-And-I-Need-You-To-Listen-To-Me-Talk-About-Something-Right-NOW around, but which also leaves you in a weird dinner lurch of eating things out of cans and bags at 9pm.

And forget about phone calls; short phone calls to confirm things or long phone calls with friends or, God forbid, phone calls that you have to return to students and potential students with questions unless you want to try to duck into a closet while you make them which only will incite yelling and door pounding from the outside (in fact, you'll have stopped answering the phone except in the most necessary of circumstances and only when you know you have a better place than the closet to hide).

Forget about house cleaning on any large scale; it can only be done in snatches, so the laundry piles up clean, but unfolded, and the bathroom is like a truck stop men's room, and you haven't found your other flip-flop in a week.

Forget about errands unless you would like for them to take 4 times longer than usual and you want to feel like you might kill someone by the time you get to Costco.

Forget about summer "sleeping in" (whatever that means) because he wakes at 6 no matter what time he goes to bed, and doesn't just sit quietly in his room but runs loudly through the house banging doors and turning the volume up on the TV to his own intolerably loud comfort level. I know that you already forgot about sleeping in the middle of the night, because he will have already woken up twice and needed to urgently tell you something or will have tried to get in bed with you 3 times or will have demanded food.

Forget about sending him out on his own to play with friends, because a. he won't go unless you do and b. if he does it will end in frustration - yours, theirs, his.

And forget your own hobbies. I mean, I'm laughing right now that you thought you would be able to spend time on any of your own pursuits. I hope you like to play golf, because that's your new hobby.

Forget outdoor movies, fireworks, dances at Centennial Park on Saturday nights, camping, evening barbecues with friends, canoeing, neighborhood spotlight tag or any other thing particular to taking advantage of the extended summertime sunlight hours because his medication will have worn off and at some point, there will be an Issue. I can't tell you what or when, but I can tell you that it will happen, and that you will regret your attempt at keeping him out past sunset.

But you'll keep plugging. Like Lorenz and his ducklings, you were the first duck he saw and imprinted upon, and he picked you to be the guide in this life and the safe place to come back to. And though you can't do any of the above stuff without frustration yourself, you are trying to teach him to be able to do it. The goal is that eventually one day he is able to do all of those things without the problems... and without you. And so you'll keep playing golf, hiding in the closet and wearing incredibly wrinkled clothes for the sake of one day having a brilliant kid who can get along in the world and hopefully care for you in your old age since he will probably benignly rule us all like Bill Gates.