Not a day went by when David didn’t laugh. Even on the worst of the worst days, a chuckle escaped, bellowing from inside his stomach. Even if only for just one tiny second. However, it was the days where you could hear his laughter for hours on end, those were our favorite.
Life with David wasn’t easy. There were some days when all you wanted to do was curl up in a ball on your bed, throw the covers over your head, and just scream in your pillow and cry yourself to sleep. All you wanted to do was escape and only to return when everything was right again.
I had that liberty and choice. I easily entered my room and closed the door, hoping to escape the monster that seemed to have overtaken my older brother’s being. My parents did not.
My parents define marriage for me more than any book I have read, love song I have sung along to, or any Disney movie that has blared across the TV screen. While other young girls dreamed of fairy tales with happily ever endings, I wanted a marriage like my parents had. One that despite the hell that sometimes erupted in their home and in their life, they have stuck together. They are a team. They love each other, and us their children, and have never broke the unity they share. (Trust me, I never could play the game of asking one parent’s permission knowing they would say yes if I said the other parental unit also said yes. I knew the answer would be the same, no matter who I asked.)
I never wanted a Prince Charming who would only save me in the beginning of our love story on his white horse, I wanted a person who would stand with me through it all.
But there were days that David laughed and made others laugh with him. David had this way and still does of bringing out the best in people. Some people passed by eyes glued to their phones or their own agendas, but those who stepped out of their lives and saw us walking on the sidewalk, smiled upon meeting him.
More often than not we were treated with kindness when David was around us. Being that his favorite restaurants had cheeseburgers, fries and C-O-K-E (Mom always made him spell it), we could often be found in the local fast food restaurants once a week. Mom was given extra napkins and a discounted coffee more than once.
People held doors for us. All mascots, dressed from head to toe in school team’s colors, let David hug them longer than the average toddler. The bank tellers often gave us extra suckers or stickers. Marching band members and cheerleaders waved in parades directed right at him. Bus drivers and school administrators worked it out so that one bus came back just for David, so he could have a free ride to school and the bus to himself. They didn’t have to, they could have forced my mom to take him, but they didn’t. They let him ride and worked it out special.
They didn’t have to do anything. But they did. Countless people stepped into my brother’s life and our lives and made it worth every rainy day. Every day we wished bedtime was now or that dad would come home early.
As autism is becoming a part of more and more conversations and a growing awareness of the disorder spreads, my family is thankful for the number of resources out there for young families like we were once, fighting the uphill battle of what it means to be a family. Of what it means to have faith. What it means to hope. Trying to find out what the best education out there really is. But to also have the very definition of joy sitting right in their living rooms.
I am so thankful for David. But even more than that so I’m thankful for the people David touched.
While we tread through the murky waters of adult autism, which include David moving out of our house a few years ago, we are still meeting people who David interacted with.
Still today former school teachers of his stop me in the grocery store and comment on David’s joy. Joy for all things sports, family, music and food. They mention his past time of endlessly singing and marching through the school hallways. Espeically when it was game day, dressed from head to toe in purple and white. Former staff members still call my parents and ask how he’s doing. Friends still sing “Hang on Sloopy” and instantly text or call me to say they thought of David.
I tear up normally every time this happens. Every time someone asks about him my heart warms me up right down to my toes.
David is not one of those people you meet and then just walk away. He leaves a mark. He leaves an impression on you. One that is often paired with a smile, a laugh and a hum of the National Anthem.
I pray I’m the same.
