Gardening on Mars

Here I am on the mainland.  My brother meets me at Schiphol, we take a train, and from Centraal we walk. A delicious decompression after the rushing and penning of flight and the relentless administrations of travel. Roland points out buildings and waves in directions and weaves in narratives while I partition the rest of …

Half Term Writing Round-Up with Bonus Track

Because it's not blogging, what I've done is to post 'homework' to tumblr. If you're Facebook friends with me you might have read most of these, but even if you are there's the evil of algorithms, so here they are. We were given briefs and told 300-500 words. I made it my business to write …

Kitchen Sink Drama

While I was busy getting on with things THIS happened. It was one of those dramas that then takes over your life. I now have a working field kitchen through the back, which is just as well because even though men came that day and took lots of ceiling down to stop more falling down, …

Writing My (Autistic) Self

I've been doing this writing course, as you know, and I've been a bit blocked if I'm honest. I fobbed last term's teacher off with a couple of blog posts as if that'd do, and she kind of called me on it, so here's the longer piece I finally submitted, Given More Time I Would Have... …

Authentic V Nice

Just before Xmas I was aware that although I don't have a lot of people to buy for I'd sort of stalled and time was passing. Then, in an amazing flash of serendipity a friend posted on Facebook that some original 1960s racks were being sold off by the London Transport Museum shop. They were, at …

Human Condition

How has college been going? Well, we're one term in and I'm still managing. I haven't been to all the classes but whatever. I didn't want to miss the last class with the lovely Holly, partly because I didn't want to miss the last class with the lovely Holly Dawson, but also because we had …

ADHD PTSD ASC and Me

Good Mornington Crescent* This morning I was supposed to go to a day school thingy for my course, but yesterday I was in a world of migraine and now I'm having a lovely postdrome thankyouverymuch. Postdrome is a bit like a hangover for reference. So, but I have a rather clear day, and apart from …

Wasps and Crisps

In the never ending gift of what it is to finally find 'your people' I've woken up this morning and gone straight into the vortex of the lovely aspie women's group I'm in online. We're talking about echolalia and the different words we like to say. Over and over again, because that's how we like …

Routines, Subroutines, and Mono-type Obsessions

Good morning. Or whatever. It's a different week for me this week which is a bit good and a bit not good. It is a truth universally acknowledged that ASC people NEED routines. Like, it's not just that things go better if things go well and normally, nor is it exactly OCD either. It's just …

A Buffet of Senses

Two hard days down the migraine mine shaft, I've even missed my restorative yoga Monday evening with which I hope to offset the back pain from sitting in class today, so I head towards the pool before class. It's dazzling sunshine and perversely I stick to the shadows rather than go to the effort of …