I met a little autistic boy, recently.

On July 5th, I was at a family gathering, and on my uncle's stepfather's side (I think?), there was a boy around 10 or so who was acting pretty peculiarly. He showed all of the signs... mainly something that I was very guilty of as a kid, being so interested in something, be it a toy, a tv show or whatever, that you basically only want to talk about that and don't understand how anyone could ever not be just as interested in that particular thing as you are. So, I talked to the kid a bit, myself, and... well, yeah. I was suddenly having these crazy flashbacks to when I was his age, and even younger, and being the same way.

I found his mother and asked if he was autistic. She said yes. We talked a bit, and she could see how far I'd come, and asked me things like when would be the right time to tell him (he doesn't know). I said any time is fine, and she just has to build him up and focus on his strengths an' all that, because it's SOOOOO easy for an autist to feel down and view themselves as stupid, inferior an' all that. Eventually, he came along again, and I drew a coupla' things I figured he'd like. I drew Thomas the Tank Engine and Sonic The Hedgehog. His other folks seemed to appreciate me doing... whatever it is I did, and it was a good day.

Soooo yeah... something I've been meaning to write about, and I only just got around it just now.