Karl's observations

I love my sons. Have fairly neat conversations with them for the most part, and on any given day we laugh together at least a few times - either as groups of two or as a family.

Being siblings, the boys will fight. Usually over stupid things; and they both say stuff to one another (I think) to start arguments, but I also think that's a very typical family dynamic - my least favorite typical thing - but something that happens in every family.

Well, OK. My least favorite...tied with noncompliance of chores and requested tasks.

Due to Karl's Asperger's, he is more pragmatic and literal than most, even cynical television talk show hosts would be blown away by his acuity and mental devices. Thank God he is not a Republican.

As a boy he would grasp things on a different level (and to some small degree, still does), and because of his very literal way of hearing, seeing and processing information, his thoughts and comments have always been refreshing and quirky - and very honest and straightforward (to my dismay at times). Sometimes I would have to stop and think like Karl to understand what it was he wasn't getting, or that was stuck in his brain sideways.

Observations through Karl's eyes have (up until recently) been charming, odd, curious and thought-provoking.

For example:

I was walking along outside near some bushes, when out from it poured a swarm of mosquitoes. As I slapped and clapped and frantically waved to shoo them away from my head, one flew up my nose!

Shocker!

It was one of those things that makes you take notice, real fast. First thing I tried to do was just blow/huff/snort the creature out. But without a visual confirmation, you always question whether or not the bug in question actually did pop back out.

Sooooo, I hustled in to the house and called for a tissue (Karl had grabbed the box from the living room). He came out to find me with a "funny" look on my face, and he asked what was wrong.

While I blew my nose to be certain Mr. Bloodsucker wasn't still residing up my nasal cavity, I relayed the story of the mosquito flying pall mall, kamikaze-style up my nose. To which he matter-of-factly replied: "Ya know, mom, if you were a mouth-breather instead of a nose-breather, you wouldn't have this problem."

"Yeah, but, then I would have a mosquito in my mouth."

"Uh-huh. But that one you could spit out. See?"

Huh.

And then there was time I was trimming tree limbs from a bunch of low hanging branches, and Karl observed that sawdust shouldn't be called "sawdust," because it wasn't the result of the saw disintegrating.

"Why isn't it called "treedust?"

And is "fairy dust" ground up fairy bits? Is Tinkerbell sort of twisted?