Autism Marpi run

April 9 is the 99th day of the regular year, 100th day on leap years. In the Islamic calendar, the lunar rotation aligns itself with the sun every 33 years. The Jewish lunisolar calendar combines both the longitudinal alignment of the sun to the phases of the moon so every four years of the solar leap year adds a day, while the 12-month lunar year on a leap year gets an additional lunar month.

China’s lunisolar calendar in a 60-year cycle does the same where each year it holds a combination of one of the five basic elements—metal, wood, water, fire, and soil—in their yin and yang state, plus one of the zodiac signs: the rat, ox, tiger, rabbit, dragon, snake, horse, sheep, monkey, rooster, dog, and pig, thus 2015 is yin on wood in the year of the lamb!
But calendars are not our primary concern today, nor the numerology of April 9. Rather, it is autism in the CNMI (parents, call 664-4841 for info on early signs) that grabs our quiver.

We mentioned the alarming statistics of 1 child per 68 children diagnosed with ASD. The disorder was identified in China in 1982 while it was already causing heads to shake in the U.S. since 1940.

I was in the Marpi Walk earlier when hiking the incline toward Suicide Cliff was not exactly a Saturday picnic to a 64-year-old frame. The crowd that gathered at the Command Post that leads to the Banzai Cliff was a rowdy bunch appropriate for the lively occasion. It was a fun run of 30 who gasped fresh ocean breeze.

A crowd of 150 folks is expected to show up as liveliness escorts Saturday’s scheduled Hot Dog Walk and Family Fun Run by members of ASCNMI, in tune with the island’s month for triathlons, marathons, and intense aerobics, save in this case it is a race to understand the universe of the differently abled. 

I have written once too often on the subject of autism and, yes, I happen to take it personally, separated from the presence of two offsprings diagnosed with ASD who lives with Mom in Ohio. The statistic on ratio means more than better tools at analysis. The situation shows pandemic incidence.

Autism’s “Asperger syndrome” is in the ASCNMI vocabulary to name the higher functioning portion of the ASD range popularized by such movies as The Rain Man with Dustin Hoffman, and the witness of veterinarian Grandin Temple’s Thinking in Pictures. Grandin affirms that she could not imagine herself to be anything but herself! Tom Thornburgh at NMPASI recently wrote of autistic persons who wore the diagnosis well with integrity. 

Dustin and Grandin provide glamorous images of the spectrum, but bewildered and anxious parents remain at a loss to understand the cause and grope to manage the effects of autism’s early development. Assistive websites have emerged that offers info on issues, strategies, tips, stories, and more.

Four categories assist to observe milestones that social scientists employ. They are: 1) delay or absence of social skills, 2) an inward but orderly patterns in play, 3) deficiencies, or sensitivity of savants, in sensual sharpness, and 4) a display of repetitive behavior.

Autism and Asperger’s syndrome diagnosis arises from a range of indicators observed in a child’s development and we know that no two children are ever the same. Categories used do not nail the cause and condition of individual cases; the neutral terms are no comfort to the parent who deals with bewildering behavior not quite par to the norm. At an earlier time, autism was secluded at the back of the house.

But if autism is the challenge of our times at the ground level, the more insidious incidence of chemical input into our human metabolism at the worldwide level is equally alarming. A website following sees no difference from experiments on eugenics that the lords of finances followed in the past to depopulate the world. Toxic chemicals abound.

We are constantly accosted by claims of conspiracy in an increasingly suspicious world so we grow weary of wild and fanciful claims, but a sobering account of the not-so-farfetched stranglehold of financial systems on our lives is narrated in thrivemovement.com. The funny issue raised in a painfully funny way about the nation and personal debts in www.youtube.com/embed/Li0no7O9zmE is larger than just autism. The burden of debt is on the next generation! 

(BTW, of walks and runs, Duke badgered Wisconsin, the latter duked out and bedeviled blue out of the NCAAB trophy. Mitt Romney did better at prediction than BH Obama of the White House.)

But at Marpi Saturday, Autism Society CNMI walks on, or run for it! Parents of ASD-diagnosed children proceed and operate from adequacy and courage rather than cower in fear and scarcity. Freedom from fear is endearingly red-white-and-blue.