A free-range Aspergian talks about fatherhood
JOANNE LAUCIUS speaks with the bestselling memoirist, who is set to appear at the Ottawa International Writers Festival.
John Elder Robison flunked out of high school. But he was a genius when it came to electronics and sound systems.
In the 1970s, Robison, who lives in Massachusetts, toured with Roxy Music, the Kinks, Canada’s April Wine and KISS. Ace Frehley’s firebreathing guitar? That was his creation.
Robison was 40 when he was diagnosed with Asperger’s syndrome and finally understood why he felt different, “a magnet for bullies and predators.”
He is the author of three memoirs about life as an Aspergian, including the newly released Raising Cubby: A Father and Son’s Adventures with Asperger’s, Trains, Tractors, and High Explosives.
Robison’s son Jack, (Cubby), also has Asperger’s, as well as a burning curiosity about chemistry and physics. This led Cubby to make explosives out of household chemicals, which he set off and filmed in the woods behind the family home.
Cubby had never been in trouble in school or with the law, and he taught the Scout chemistry merit badge course. Still, a state prosecutor decided he was a terrorism threat. At 17, Cubby faced four felony charges. It took $100,000 and a trial to set the record straight.
We talked to Robison about Asperger’s and his son, Cubby. Do you think your life would have turned out differently if people understood Asperger’s better?
It’s hard to say. If people had recognized my Asperger’s as a kid, and had a plan to get me through school, I might have graduated and gone on to college. That would surely have been a different path for me!
However, I probably would not have found myself on the road with KISS or April Wine. I’d have been in school instead of racing my motorbike west on the still-unpaved TransCanada Highway. And I’d surely have missed riding the freight trains out of Alyth Yard in Calgary.
So my life might have ended up more typical, but it probably would have been less colourful, too.
Books like yours and Temple Grandin’s offer a glimpse inside the autism
spectrum. What’s your role?
I have to be very careful because the autism spectrum is very broad, and our range of abilities and needs is very large. Some of us are nonverbal and very disabled, while others are able to live independently. Some autistic people need help with speech, while others have medical complications. Many have social challenges.
The autistic population contains people with extraordinary skills. Some of the greatest mathematicians, artists, and musicians the world has known are believed to have been on the spectrum. At the same time, many if not most autistic adults are unable to hold down jobs or support themselves. With so much diversity, it’s near-impossible for any one person to be an ambassador for the whole group. Aspergians are characters in television shows now. (I’m
thinking Sheldon in Big Bang Theory, but the word “Asperger’s” never comes up) What’s right and wrong about the way television portrays Aspergians?
I don’t watch much television. I find the fast-paced and exaggerated expressions of emotion stressful ... In general, I think the media tends to sensationalize stories and the majority of the autistic population — who are silent, not sensational — are ignored. ... In that sense, popular media portrayals do the wider community a disservice.
Is life better for a child with Asperger’s today?
In some ways. However, kids with Asperger’s grow up to become adults with Asperger’s, and so far, there are virtually no supports or services available.
I serve on the Interagency Autism Co-ordinating Committee of the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services. One of my goals there is to advocate for more adult services at all levels. What’s Cubby doing these days? What do you hope for him?
Cubby is living on his own and going to college. He’s taken an interest in robotics and he’s working on some new inventions and some extensions of current open-source projects. He’s got a girlfriend — who also has Asperger’s — and he’s stayed out of jail! What more could a dad hope for?