A Hated Shield

The thread allows me to live, to think, to exist, to create beauty in the darkness of the world, to bring bright colours to the grays and browns and were-once-whites that make up the world around me. 



It was perfection, what I could create.  The bracelets, necklaces, belts, all of them, were beautiful, vibrant, glowing with colour.  They were not difficult for me to make, on the contrary, the intricate stitches that no one else could learn were as instinctual as breathing for me.  I wove my consciousness, my fear, my imprisoned soul, into the coloured string, knotted the disease, the terror, the anger and the bitterness into the pattern just as I knotted the thread. 



It is a miracle, the power of creation that my scarred hands have, the beauty that my pale fingers can create. 



At first I could do only simple stitches, quick ones, stripes and spiral staircases, but I can do much more now.  V's and x's and diamonds, and small, stylized fish, one after the other, each a different colour, each one perfect. 



My hands themselves are not marvels, only what I can make with them is extraordinary.  There is a ring on the next-to-smallest finger of each hand, on the left, tarnished gold, forged in the shape of a hand.  On the right, a silver band, with two dragons, formed of twisted Celtic knotwork, facing each other, perfectly symmetrical, just like my bracelets are. 



Symmetry is wonderful, not only that, but absolutely essential to continued existence.  Each asymmetry, no matter how slight, is a small crisis, a small tear in the fabric of order, a crack through which chaos can slip, the chaos of sights and sounds and feels, the chaos that is the world outside of me. 



The scars on my hands trouble me slightly, in that they are not perfectly symmetrical.  But because they are equal, neither hand has more than the other, and because I cannot change them, I leave them be.  Those scars are mementos of a darker time.  My memories are blurred, my shield keeps them from frightening me, but still I remember a little.



I made the scars myself, carved them into my skin late at night with a safety pin by the light of a small reading lamp I was forbidden to have on.  I found joy in it, the small joy I found in my bracelets, the systematic self-mutilation, the pain.  My hands burned through the night, stinging, and when I tried to quench the flame with cool, healing water the fire flared up instead of subsiding, burning and burning.  I told my parents the cat scratched me.



There is one scar that is not symmetrical, however, but for some reason I do not mind it.  On the inside of my left wrist is a small mark, two scars that follow the blue veins that lie sleeping beneath the blanket that is my skin. 



I was afraid then, after I scratched the scars into my wrist, not of the pain, nor the fact that I had intentionally hurt myself, but because someone might realize.  It was too much of a coincidence that the scars would follow the veins.  But I did not let my parents see, and stopped worrying after a time.



I was young, young when my parents realized that I could never lead a normal life.  It was many years later that I knew the name of my affliction.



Autism.



Autism.  The word tasted strange, bitter.  People pity me when they hear the word, the word that I have to struggle so to pronounce.  But it is I that should pity them.  I am safe, safe behind the shield that they call autism.  I am protected from the cruel world, they are alone, vulnerable, unprotected.  I do not know how they can stand it.



There is a veil between me and the rest of the world.  It is my shield.  Nothing can affect me while I hide behind it, and I am not brave enough to let it go.  I know I could, easily, if I wished to, but why would I wish to overcome it?  I am happy this way, happy watching the water rise and then form a spiral and drain away, happy knotting the string precisely the way it should go, happy sitting alone and rocking, rocking, until it is I who is still, and the world rocks around me.



There are a few things I will allow to penetrate my shield.  My cat, the one I told my parents had made the scars on my hands, I would let him through.  His name was Smeagol, I named him after a character in a book I read.  People are surprised than I can read, so much and so well, but why should I not?  My books allow me to live happily within my shield, knowing true life through the written words.  And I can write as well.  People say my writing is beautiful, but there is no beauty in it.  In my bracelets, my string, there is beauty.  My writing is simply that, writing.  There is bitterness in it maybe, and maybe anger, but still it is just writing.



My cat I would let into my shield, Smeagol and the other cat, Hawthorne.  And Shenah too, but she had turned cold and still in my lap one day, and she would not purr for me any longer.  My parents took me from her, and buried her in a hole in the cold wet earth.  I think of her every now and then, and pity her, trapped in the cold ground. 



Bu the cats loved me.  And I did not have to fear them.  Sometimes their razor claws drew blood, but I did not mind the pain.  I had felt that and far worse many times before.  They did not pity me, they did not count themselves lucky to be other than I was, they simply allowed me to pet them, pressed their warm, purring bodies against my cold fingers, falling asleep in my lap.



I am not friendless.  I even go to school, do well in classes.  The doctor says I am lucky that my disease is not seriously, that I am, as he says, only "mildly autistic."  I have friends.  Some of them know of my disease, some do not, but they do not hate or fear me for it. 



I cannot imagine what their lives can be like, and someday, I suppose, I shall work up the courage to ask them.  They are good friends, kind, intelligent. 



But despite that, I am lonely.  I suppose I must always be, my shield keeps me alone.  My parents say that I am a young woman, that I should find someone who will love me, someone who I can love, but I am not so foolish.



I know what it is to love, and I know that love can only mean heartbreak.  My heart must remain my own, but I fear that I cannot keep it, that it has slipped already through my fingers, that it now resides with another...and I know that if it has there is nothing I can do, it is gone, and if it is gone it will be broken.  Can I love?  Am I, untouchable behind this shield, able to love?  I do not know if my shield, if this thing that is called autism, will allow me to.  It is a demanding shield, a jealous protector, that will not allow me to live without the safety it affords.



They tell me that I cannot bear to see and hear too much because of the autism, but I think they are wrong.  I think that I have this autism because I will not be able to bear seeing and hearing too much. 



My parents, my friends, they tell me that scientists everywhere are working on a cure for autism, that perhaps I will soon be free of it, and their eyes shine with hope.  But I can do nothing but turn away, silent, praying that this dream, this nightmare is not realized.



For nightmare it is in truth.  If they found a way to cure my autism, to penetrate my shield, to murder my loyal guard, I would not be able to survive outside of the veil, not in this world, nor in any other. 



I have never met another like me, but recently I read of one, in a book my friend lent to me.  Two.  It was incredible to read, for the first one, the one who had been designed to be encased in this cocoon, he overcomes it.  He steps outside of the veil.  Could I do that as well?  I have no doubt that I could.  But I do not want to, I shrink from the very idea, tremble in terror.  He must have been very brave, very brave or very foolish.  I cannot help but believe he is the latter, but what do I know?  What can I know, limited, imprisoned as I am? 



For I do not delude myself that I am free.  I may have embraced my imprisonment, may have willingly offered up my freedom, may shrink from the idea of being free once more, but I cannot force myself to believe that I am not imprisoned.



I am not happy in this prison, nor will I ever be, but I am content to remain here, which is more than many who are more free than I can claim. 



But I do not believe that I necessarily should be free.  What have I done to deserve better than what I have?  True, I have done nothing to deserve worse, nothing for which I should be punished, but I have done and will do nothing that would justify a blessing for my tortured soul.  Perhaps those around me, those I see so happy and free, perhaps they have done nothing justifying their freedom, but Fate has chosen me for the strange conglomeration of curses and blessings that is autism, and I will bear the burdens and accept the gifts, and I will embrace my shield more than I ever have before, make it so intrinsic a part of my being that I no longer hate and fear it.  Perhaps then I can be happy.  Perhaps then I can be free. 





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