I was sitting at the Costco food court yesterday, doing some people watching (and pizza eating) while waiting for a tire repair. (Dangit, they are doing roof repairs and OpenDoor renos all around me, so no doubt I picked up a wood screw right in my own driveway.) There was a kid, about 14 - 15 years old, sitting by himself for a LONG time, with an iPad and headphones. I'm not sure if he was autistic or had Tourette's, but that kid was having the best time sitting there by himself. He was rocking and dancing, flapping his hands and arms all over, and smiling along with whatever he was watching or listening to.
It just breaks my heart, because you never used to see this. You would see maybe one autistic kid in 2 or 3 years. Now, you see them all the time. Do you all remember when that Tom Cruise/Dustin Hoffman movie (Rain Man) came out in the 80s and it was the first a lot of us had even heard of autism?
