It’s been a fairly slow week around here. The weekend had two highlights. The first was on Saturday, when Nate sat down at his laptop and wrote code for his class on Web Design. I saw him sit down, and, when I asked him to show me his work later in the day (as a way to make sure he did the homework), he clicked open his pages and, there it was, a fully formed site. How’d he do it? I don’t know, but he did, and I recalled our first visit to SUNY-Cobleskill, when Professor Lauber took Nate into her Web Design class. As I observed Nate observing college students, I knew at that moment he would succeed in college. Now, three years later, he’s one of those students. Wow.
The other big moment was the season premiere of The Simpsons. Nate was very happy and, as he does on Simpsons’ Sundays, keeps the TV on Fox all day long so he doesn’t miss a second, or get fooled if somehow the show makes a surprise start at 5 PM instead of 8.
This is the 100th Mission of Complex post. When I began the blog in June 2010, I did it for several reasons. One, was to get on record a series of funny, touching, personal anecdotes about raising Nate that would be helpful to other parents and family members in similar situations. Two, by doing so, I would create for myself a bank of source material for when my book proposal sells and I have to get down to some serious writing time. Three, having never written about the Katz’ publicly, to put down our story, for my own cathartic reasons. Four, to impart a possible future, granted our own, to families with younger autistic kids. When Nate was little, Karen and I were desperate for stories, any stories, of an 18- or 21- year old version of Nate. Now that we’re in the position we are, it’s beholden on us to share, to lessen the strain of some Moms and Dads in whatever way we can.
Happily, the goals have, and continue to be, met. I’m so thankful that I’ve heard from parents of younger versions of Nate, who have benefitted from these posts. Thanks for being part of it. There’s no point in writing if nobody’s reading.
