Dear <<First Name>>,
Tomorrow Derek and I are going on a journey. Along with his friend, Dave, we are driving to Dayton, Ohio to visit the US Air Force Museum. A long way to go to see a bunch of WWII airplanes. But this is not just any road trip.
I recently ran across a news report on the book, "Life, Animated" by Ron Suskind. It is the poignant story of a father who reached his autistic son through his "affinity" for Walt Disney characters. (See the link to the Vimeo clip, above.) Suskind's experience has led to a new kind of therapy for autistic children and adults called "affinity therapy". The idea is that it is through their passions for things like Thomas the Tank Engine, Pokemon, or Star Wars that people on the autistic spectrum make sense of and communicate with the outside world.
Derek's life has consisted of a string of these affinities - passions that seemed to us to be distractions from the real business of life, when in reality they have been his lifeline. No one ever identified Derek as being on the "Spectrum", but this documentary convinced me that it is indeed one of the reasons he has struggled so much.
Derek's current passion is WWII history, and he is a walking encyclopedia of knowledge on every detail of every tank used and airplane flown. He enjoys playing War Thunder and World of Tanks with other WWII enthusiasts around the world, and last week he asked me to take him to Dayton to meet one of these fellow WWII nerds - a British celebrity among them who goes by the nickname of "Jingles". He will be visiting the USAF museum and many of his "fans" will be there to meet him.
So off we go tomorrow to meet "Jingles" and immerse ourselves in Derek's world. Would you pray with me for Derek, that this will be a first step out of his isolation and into the life he longs to live?
Thank you!
Fighting the war for Derek's heart,
Barb
P.S. John arrived safely in Jos yesterday! |
