Between the ages of 5 and 8 there was a girl in my
class who was autistic.
There was a divide amongst the boys and girls in my
school. Created more by teachers than anything. They’d make the boys sit with
girls because that seemed like a good way of keeping them from talking. It
didn’t work at all but they did succeed in creating an unhealthy perception for
us from a young age that boys and girls are behaviourly different and that
girls are responsible and well behaved while boys are bad and annoying.
It was kind of a self-fulfilling prophecy. The boys
would be loud and obnoxious because they were expected to be. Including me
sometimes. But I don’t think it was something I was very comfortable with and I
quickly grew out of it.
The other girls collectively treated the autistic girl
like a baby, which was necessary. But the boys tormented her. Entirely because
it was expected of them.
I don’t know if it was because of me being the only
boy that didn’t make fun of her or what, but she eventually developed what she
thought was a crush on me. Given that we were both between the ages of 6 and 7
when this started it’s likely that her feelings were some sort of psychological
construct based on something she saw on tv.
She used to randomly apologise to me for things.
Dramatic outbursts pleading for forgiveness. I don’t think she ever told me
what she was apologising for. The girls in the class would angrily ask me what
was going on and what I’d said to her that made her upset and I had no idea so
I’d just get in trouble for no reason.
I hate to perpetuate stereotypes, but in Ireland a lot
of kids are forced into Irish dancing by their mothers. I was one of those
unfortunate kids but probably solely because my aunt was the teacher. I can’t
remember exactly how many boys there were apart from me, but I do remember that
one week the autistic girl from my class came.
We were learning a new dance and for this we required
a partner. I was allocated the autistic girl. I was apprehensive because of all
the trouble she got me into in school and I had no idea how she was going to
react to me but I didn’t really show this. She complimented my shirt. It was
navy and had a bear on it. It was my favourite.
After the first few runs through the dance I noticed
all the adults in the room laughing at me. I wasn’t embarrassed because I was 7.
It took me a few seconds but I realised that autistic girl was trying to kiss
me. She didn’t succeed before she was pulled away from me.
I can’t remember who exactly pulled her away from me
but I think it was her mother.
Her mother was such a milf. I didn’t know that then.
But I vividly remember now how she looked.
The reason I bring this whole story up is because
recently that girl who had the crush (I just referred to her as that because "autistic girl" seems harsher than I intended) added me on Facebook. I’m not sure how she found me. But I think
it might be because I looked her up recently and searched through her profile
for pictures of her mother.
And that’s the moral of the story. Be careful who you
stalk online because the algorithms used to draw people together on social
networking sites might just give the game away. The more you stalk somebody the
greater the potential for you being recommended as a friend. If somebody you
hardly know keeps getting recommended to you they’re probably regularly reading
your posts and you should feel flattered, but you probably won’t unless they
are hot.