{"id":1357,"date":"2006-05-19T19:17:00","date_gmt":"2006-05-19T19:17:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/susansenator.com\/blog2\/2006\/05\/flowers-never-bend-with-the-rainfall\/"},"modified":"2006-05-19T19:17:00","modified_gmt":"2006-05-19T19:17:00","slug":"flowers-never-bend-with-the-rainfall","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/susansenator.com\/blog\/2006\/05\/flowers-never-bend-with-the-rainfall\/","title":{"rendered":"Flowers Never Bend With The Rainfall"},"content":{"rendered":"

Through corridors of sleep
Past shadows dark and deep
My mind dances and leaps in confusion.
I don’t know what is real, I can’t touch what I feel
And I hide behind a shield of my illusion.
So, I’ll continue to continue to pretend
My life will never end
And flowers never bend with the rainfall.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

–Simon & Garfunkel, 1965<\/p>\n

Why does my equanimity slip through my fingers like water? The day after writing my screed about the Autism Everyday<\/span> video from Autism Speaks, I find myself feeling completely defeated. I brashly posted yesterday’s blog entry on an autism email group I’ve been part of for some time, and everyone who responded talked about all the different recovery treatments they were pursuing, and how they’ve been so successful. How moved they were by the video. How they will never stop trying to make their children “well.” It was kind of the last straw for me. I unsubscribed, because I could no longer bear to read about the various modes of chelation, the oils, the vitamins, the diets, the laying-on-of-hands and the children who mysteriously de-autisize.<\/p>\n

Then I got the news that Nat had a half-day today. All plans shot to hell. I said to Ned, “I can’t do it — ” Last time I brought him into the boys’ school at pick-up, he had a terrible tantrum and was hitting me and Ben in the head over and over. I had to walk him out of the school, holding his hands together. Thank God I could.<\/p>\n

The funk settled over me like the dust that gathers in the corners of the house, minutes after I have vacuumed. Suddenly, looking at Nat, whom I still cannot leave alone in the house, I felt so trapped. This is forever. Eternal responsibility. Albatross in the shape of a beautiful young man. I felt the old familiar torpor, the overwhelming need to nap, heavy head crushed against soft white pillow, the desire to cry and cry without anything tangible causing it.<\/p>\n

I looked at Nat, as still as Buddha, on the white couch, and I heard the same evil tape recording playing relentlessy. Did I…? Why doesn’t he…? Will he ever…?<\/span> We don’t even have a regular respite worker! All he does, aside from school, in terms of therapy, is speech once a week. We are so pathetic! <\/span> What might I have missed? <\/span><\/p>\n

I was so sad about being sad about Nat. A direct violation of our Sweetie Treaty, Ned’s and my contract from long ago: No feeling bad about feeling bad. But I did. I really did.<\/p>\n

The heavy rain did not help.<\/p>\n

Ned knows me so well. He knows how conceivably, I could put on the Allman’s Sweet Melissa<\/span>, the song that conjures up Nat’s labor, and weep fresh tears until my whole face is puffy and red. I could eat a tub of chocolate ice cream without blinking. Finish it off with doritos. Call up friends who are not always so good to me.<\/p>\n

After lunch the Winston Flowers truck drove up. Parked unmistakably in front of my house. The guy came out with a huge, chunky floral arrangement<\/a> of tight orange ranunculus, Caribbean blue hydrangea, peach roses, and lilacs. The color seemed especially vivid in the gray of the afternoon sky.<\/p>\n

Ned,<\/span> I thought.<\/p>\n

The card read, “Stay Strong.” Ned, I’m getting there. If only this rain would stop.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>A good, strong moment.<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Through corridors of sleepPast shadows dark and deepMy mind dances and leaps in confusion.I don’t know what is real, I can’t touch what I feelAnd I hide behind a shield of my illusion.So, I’ll continue to continue to pretendMy life will never endAnd flowers never bend with the rainfall. –Simon & Garfunkel, 1965 Why does […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1357","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/pSTth-lT","jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"jetpack-related-posts":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/susansenator.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1357","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/susansenator.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/susansenator.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/susansenator.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/susansenator.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1357"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/susansenator.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1357\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/susansenator.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1357"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/susansenator.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1357"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/susansenator.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1357"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}