Walking Along

Sam and I have gone on multiple walks this past week. This is pretty much the first time we’ve gone for any walks so far this year - if you don't count the feeble attempt we (I) made a few weeks back. On that one, we were going to head down to the corner Walgreens store, which is a little bit more than a half a mile away - but we didn’t make it.

After walking just a few steps out of our yard, it was obvious that my knee wasn’t going to hold out, so we ended up going to the Almost a Dollar Store, which is just on the other side of the parking lot across from our house. We went in and I hobbled around, pretending to be interested in things, while Sam went over to their clothing section to pick off the usual gold mine of loose threads that adorn their high quality dollar store line of clothing. 

After an appropriate amount of time, I gathered up Sam and Sam gathered up his collection of threads and we walked home.

After this first attempt at a walk, me and my knee were granted a reprieve by virtue of a couple of late winter/ early spring snow storms - a reprieve, that is, if you don’t count shoveling the wet, heavy snow.

But the snow had melted and the weather was nice this week so with the nice weather, we decided to go and attempt another walk down to Walgreen's. We made the trip down there without much to report. Sam, like usual, gathered his threads and I like usual, pretended to be interested in buying something. And then we headed back home.

The walk home went a little slower than when we walked down. I did my best “everything’s fine” walking impression, but it was a little difficult keeping up with Sam. Then again, it usually is, anyway. But even with my excellent acting skills, I could tell Sam was taking his time for my benifit. Every time he got a little ahead of me, I would see him glance back at me out of the corner of his eye, and then he would slow down a little. This pattern repeated itself all the way home.

The next night, we decided to keep the walk short (Sam’s suggestion) as one of us was still recovering from the night before. So the plan was to walk back to the Almost a Dollar Store. After making dinner for Sam and after he finished eating, we headed out, along with Helaina who had stopped by the house.

The routine at the Almost a Dollar store was the same as before; the same as it always is. Sam, like usual, went off to the other side of the store to go collect loose threads while Helaina and I wandered around the store, critiquing the quality and organization of their merchandise. 

Hurry! Just one Inspirational Mushroom left!

As Helaina and I get closer to the aisle where Sam was harvesting his threads, I vaguely heard a woman talking in a voice that told me that there must be some kind of a problem. As I started to focus on it, I could hear her saying something like, “If I catch you doing it again , I'm going to have to have to walk you out of the store, and you're not going to be able to come back in again.” 

And in the split second that I was wondering if she was talking to Sam, I turned the corner and there was Sam, standing by the clothes with a deer-in-the-headlights look, saying, “Sorry! Sorry!” 

I asked the woman what was going on. She said that she was the night manager and that the cashier saw Sam seemingly (my word) switching price tags. Now, the idea that Sam would be switching price tags on anything, let alone cheap women's tank tops, is absurd. But she doesn’t know Sam from anyone, so I explained to the woman that Sam was with me and I explained what Sam was doing. What I didn’t say, was that, in my eyes, Sam was doing them a favor by making their clothes look slightly less shoddy by collecting these threads.

The woman looks at me and then over at Sam and Sam stammers something like, “Yeah, it’s kind of a hobby.” She took it in for a second or two, then apologized, and we all moved on. 

After we got back home and Sam settled in at the computer, I walked back over to the store to speak to this night manager. I told her that I had just been in and she recognized me and right away began apologizing. And it was a little on the weird side.

I told her that Sam was special needs (“I know, I could tell as soon as he started talking.” “What’s that supposed to mean,” I thought) and I just wanted to explain what it was he was doing. And she interrupts with, “I’m really sorry,” which she says - more than once. 

And I’m telling her that she doesn’t need to be sorry. That’s not my point. My point was that he wasn’t doing anything wrong but he doesn't always know how to articulate it - and I just wanted her to know what was going on, only because... (“I’m so sorry.” ) And how she doesn’t need to be sorry, because it was just a misunderstanding. And how I know that she doesn’t know him from anybody else in the world, and I understand that she has to look after her own interests, which is what she was doing, but... (“I’m really, REALLY sorry.”) 

And how she doesn't need to be sorry, that I just wanted her to know because we come in all the time and we'll probably be in again. And I get where she was coming from, and that she wasn’t being rude, it’s just that Sam didn’t know how to handle it. (“I know. I’m really sorry.”) And that my ONLY reason for coming over was that we live right across the way and we come over often because we live so close... (“I’m so, SO sorry.”) 

I was beginning to feel like she wasn't sorry so much for the misunderstanding, but there was something in her tone that felt like she was somehow sorry for me, that Sam was special needs. I told her that there was nothing to be sorry about, I thanked her for her time, and I hobbled back home.

Later, back at home, I talked to Sam a little bit about apologizing, or rather, not apologizing when you haven’t done anything wrong. And about how, when someone asks, it’s important to try and tell someone what it is that you’re doing and how, when you give an apology, you’re taking responsibility for something that’s happened.

Things like this are so hard to convey, these nuances of human behavior, these nuances that involve speech. These concepts, these relationships, play into areas that are so hard for Sam. And explaining them is so, so tough for me. The best I can do (and I’m not at all convinced I’m much good at it), is to try to keep it simple and to try and keep it short, and to come back into it later - dipping a little bit deeper into the pool each time.

This is just the kind of thing that plays into my deep fears - at least, my fears regarding Sam. I always see stories in the news about things that had escalated out of control over some simple misunderstanding or some miscommunication. What happens when Sam is alone and he doesn't understand what he’s being asked, or he doesn't have the tools to explain what’s going on or he can’t get his words out fast enough? We work on these things, but still… I wish I were better at this. I worry.

The following day was another warm and sunny day. Sam called me at work - his usual home-from-school check-in time. After the usual attempt at trying to glean any information from him about his day, he asked if we could go for another walk in the evening. He suggested that maybe we could walk the bike path in the neighboring town. How do you turn that down? I said “sure”, though my knee was suggesting otherwise.

When I got home, I fixed Sam his dinner and like usual, I sat with him while he ate. Near the end of his dinner, Sam said, “You know what? I've been thinking. Maybe we should go with my metal detector over by the High School instead.” This was good news to me, because it meant less walking.

Sam finished eating, then we gathered up his metal detector and found a small garden shovel on the front porch and we headed over to the woods next the High School. 

Almost right away, Sam found a penny buried in the still wet ground- all on his own. Shortly thereafter, he found a quarter and then a nickel, which appeared when he wasn’t looking. But other than the occasional rusty bolt or crumpled up bottle cap, it was pretty slim pickings. Before too long, Sam said, “You know what? How about we go for a walk on the bike path after all?” I knew I should have dropped more coins.

We walked back home, dropped off his stuff and then took off for the bike path.

We walked along the bike path (some of us better than others) and as we walked along, mostly in silence, I pointed out how high the water was from all of the melting snow. We stopped a little further down and watched the rising mists from the waterfalls that were just out of site, and we listened to the roar of the water as it fell on the unseen rocks below. And I mentioned how quiet the water was the last time we were here.

And we started walking. And I talked about the misunderstanding from the night before and how important it is to speak up for yourself when you can, and when you don’t understand, it’s ok, and to take your time, but to let people know. And it matters. 

And we walked.

We passed by the rickety foot bridge that hangs low over the canal and I mentioned how I don’t like walking on bridges and how I’m not particularly comfortable walking over water and how that bridge had the worst of both worlds for me. Sam agreed and we talked about some of the things that we do like, things like smell of the spring air and hearing the birds chirping after a long, silent winter, and being able to go for walks together on warm evenings. 

We followed the canal, finally rounding the corner and we walked up the hill, Sam slowing down to let me catch up. We walked past the ice cream place and commented on the line of people that was all the way out the door, and eventually we made it back to the car.

Before driving home, we drove over the other side of the river and parked in a rest area to watch the waterfalls that earlier had been beyond our view. We watched silently as torrents of water beat down on the rocks below, creating white waves that churned frantically. And we watched the soft mist that rose high over the waters - only to fade away.