All To Human

There’s Kyle, he has Down Syndrome. 

He skateboards and sneaks into the ladies locker room. 

I can’t leave his side for a second.  

There’s Drew, he also has Down Syndrome. 

He’s always in love with someone new. I’ve known him for 10 years now. 

There’s Holdon, and I am not sure what his disability is.

He's sensitive, gentle, kind and speaks very softly, almost in a whisper. 

There’s Brain, he has seizures.

We don’t know how much longer he will live for. His seizure medication is causing his liver to fail. 

He’s only 8 years old. He taught me what a Capybara is. 

I will miss him when he goes . . .

There’s Erik, who has Autism. He wants to be a NASA Engineer.

He will fold a paper into an airplane, fly it, study its flight, and make slight folds and adjustments from what he sees. He’ll do this for an hour straight, and at the end of 60 minutes, he will be flying the best paper airplane I’ve ever seen anyone make. He does this day after day.

I think he probably will end up working on rockets or jets. 

There’s Harry, he also has autism. He was the first kid to show me what an Axolotl is. 

Now every kid I talk to loves Axolotl’s. 

Peter will yell, ‘Yahoo!’ every time he sees a truck. And he goes wild for gum. 

Rich is an adult with a lazy eye. He smokes weed and loves to chat it up with me. 

River only drinks milk. And he mostly eats: salmon, frosted flakes and sun chips. He brings a lego set and 4-6 stuffed animals with him wherever he goes. I usually end up carrying his stuff for him. His legs don’t work very well. Yesterday, we went to a rock climbing gym and he and I sat on an old couch playing Lego's. I asked him something. “Do you wish you could do stuff like this?” referring to rock climbing. He was silent for a few seconds, before saying, “Yeah . . . I do.” I held back tears. 

Gaberdine has autism and I am pretty sure he’s a genius. I just did a science camp with him. I fell in love with the old Spanish lady who was teaching it, Pillar. She was a NASA engineer, who worked on the F-15’s. She made a really big deal about me being an author. “It’s more impressive than what I did,” she said, which is utterly ridiculous. I gave her one of my books and she about died. 

Pillar told me a story about her son. The doctors told her there was a %99 percent chance her son would be born with Down Syndrome. All they had to do was measure the curve of his spine to confirm, without any doubt whatsoever, he would in-fact be born with Down Syndrome. “100%”, she said to me, “they told me he was ‘guaranteed’ to have it. So, I volunteered to work with boys with Down Syndrome down in Florida to get ready for him. Doctors, and everyone else, kept asking me if I was going to terminate but I never considered it for a single second. Everyone was shocked when he was born completely healthy. Now he works for Aerospace. He helped design the Artemis 2. The Landing Pads, that was his job. Imagine if I would’ve terminated him . . . Imagine how many people terminate their kids who would’ve grown up to be something special . . . Just because they might be different.”

Pillar gave me a ton of NASA gear, which I want to give to Erik. 

I always did want a scientist to read my book. I wonder what she’ll think of it . . .

Mason Byrd is afraid of birds. 

Jenny B is always on the hunt for ‘sexy men’.

Marry might be the sweetest human I’ve ever encountered before. She’s ‘the mom’ of the adults. If it wasn’t for her, I’d tell you Clara is the nicest person I’ve ever met. She just put her dog down. 

Maybe to you they sound different than you or I, but keep in mind, 

Drew lost his grandpa recently.

Erik's mom just got out of jail.

Pillar’s mom is paralyzed. 

Kyle broke his hip skate boarding. 

Holdon’s family is terrified of ICE. 

River punches and curses out his mom. 

Gabriel is home-schooled. 

Henry is obsessed with Pokemon and venomous creatures. 

Erik has all the highways in America memorized. 

Ollie is an amazing artist. 

Mateo swims like a fish. 

Jason is a mischievous prankster with a contagious laugh. 

They’re human, all too human. 

I’ve come to believe that every single life, no matter how different, is precious. 

CH 8/1/26