a subtle plug for arts schools

Tonight is the opening night for Cary High’s production of “And Then They Came For Me: Remembering the World of Anne Frank.” It’s a multi-media presentation of the stories of a few teenagers and their families affected by the tragedy  we call the Holocaust. The main character is not Anne Frank, but teens who knew her, including her boyfriend. Part of the story is told by the actual survivors via video. The actors, in turn, portray them in their younger years.

Last night was “preview night” which is a sneak peak of the performance for patrons and parents. I wasn’t really sure what to expect – though I knew it would be different than any other production I have seen at the school.

I walked away deeply touched. While the performance was very well done, and I was impressed with each actor’s ability to pull the audience in emotionally, what touched me was much deeper.

 As a parent of one of the actors, I knew how this cast had delved into their roles.  This was really no surprise. This director has always required a lot of her actors. They spend their weeks of rehearsal learning and developing their characters beyond the stage and their lines, no matter what play they are performing. But this time they were not developing characters; they were playing the parts of actual people.

So during the last 7 weeks this cast has visited the Holocaust Museum in D.C., kept personal journals, met and listened to Holocaust survivors, and of course they have rehearsed tirelessly.

The play was performed in-the-round, with the entire audience sitting on the stage. After the performance, the director brought the cast out for a “talk-back” session. The floor was open for questions and/or responses to what we experienced.

And this is where I was most touched.  As the cast answered questions like “How do you get in and out of character?”…. “Did you really slap her???” … “How has this affected your life beyond the stage?” it became evident that this experience has impacted every single one of them, from the lead roles to the sound technician. These “kids” portrayed the lives of “kids” that lived through a time we cannot even imagine. The gravity of their thoughts, the depth of their emotion and their willingness to be authentic with the audience created a profound moment. 

In that profound moment, as well as during the performance, I loved watching the faces of the Cary High teachers in the audience. (Theatre in-the-round makes that really easy.) Mixed with emotion were faces of deep satisfaction. Satisfaction that their days spent teaching, challenging, grading, disciplining are worth it. Watching teenagers grow as they learn of things beyond themselves and struggle with the challenges in this world probably makes it worth it to get up in the morning and step back into the classroom.

And who would have thought that it's in the theatre department... the arts... the extra curricular program that is so tempting to cut when money is tight, that life lessons are learned.

Life as a Mom of an Aspergian

As many of you know, our second-born has Asperger’s. I don’t blog about it much, mostly because I haven’t wanted to blab it all over the web that Sam has Asperger’s. But recently he started his own blog. He’s amazingly gifted at articulating his perspective and his words have already been a blessing to so many. (Please forgive his lack of posts recently… it’s his senior year and college/scholarship essay season on top of his already crazy schedule.)

So I figure since it’s out there, it’s open season for me to give some perspective on being a mom of someone with Asperger’s.

Sam recently got his driver’s license. At 17 ½ It’s a little later in life than most of  his peers, but as we’ve learned through our years of parenting Asperger’s, sometimes your child just isn’t ready for some things as soon as other kids. This is actually true for all kids, but I guess we have a reason to not feel a need to keep up with the Jones’.

Anyway, finally the day arrived that Sam could drive himself to school. He got the proper paperwork, we filled it out, agreed to the the rules, signed our names, and he was assigned his very own parking space in the student lot.

Yesterday he drove off to school for the first time. It’s a short drive, but like any parent that watches their child drive off for the first time alone, I worried and waited by my cell phone until I knew enough time had passed for him to be safely at school. 

And on the first day… he got a parking violation. Yup, a big ol’ yellow slip on his car.  (Excuse me, his sister’s car) Why? He parked backwards in his space You know, so he could pull straight out when he left. All because I, Mom, suggested it. Well, apparently it’s against the rules.

Being the rule-follower that he is, he was a bit unsettled when he got home.  And I felt horrible for not noticing that rule, and further, for suggesting he park that way. He was wondering what other rules he had missed. So I rifled through his school paperwork to find the parking rules – which I never found because, of course, they are on the back of the parking application that gets turned in.

To be sure that Sam was comfortable with all the rules, I emailed the school asking for an electronic copy of the rules. They were prompt in replying with the attachment, but added As I read them over, I see we do not have the directions for parking on the form. He is fine, now that he knows.

Really?? Really??  This is where life as a parent of an Aspergian can be incredibly frustrating, and even more frustrating for the Aspergian. You have a rule that you don’t share until it’s broken? And yet I can reflect on many times this has happened over the years. For a lot of people it’s just water off their backs. But for an individual with Asperger’s, who really wants to follow the rules, having to break a rule before learning the rule makes no sense.

And so we face another life lesson for Sam. We take a deep breath and start to explain, once again, that life is full of rules. Spoken and unspoken. We’ll concur with him as he argues that it’s inconsistent, yet we’ll persevere in teaching respect for authority and how to be gracious in difficult moments.

And then we’ll collapse on the couch from mental fatigue and wonder how each of these moments is shaping his perspective of this complex world we live in.

Sam's Room Makeover

After taking a couple of years off any indoor DIY, I’m back into it. My plan for this fall was to tackle both Chelsea and Sam’s rooms – scraping the popcorn off the ceilings and painting away the colors they chose in their middle school years. 

While I had planned to tackle Chelsea’s room first - immediately after she moved back into her college dorm – my plans were changed when I received a hand-me-down from my aunt this summer.

We visited my Aunt Mary and Uncle Johney in southeast Texas in July on our way back home from Houston. While visiting, my aunt mentioned that she had an old hanging lamp that had belonged to my grandmother. She offered it up to me and I took it. (And Dave just rolled his eyes when he had to fit it into our already cram-packed car…)

By the time we got home to NC, I knew exactly what I was going to do with the lamp.  And it involved Sam’s room. 

So a couple of days after Chelsea moved back to college, I moved Sam into Chelsea’s room and started in on his room.

Here’s a couple of before pics of his room. Notice the dark colors – they were his 2^nd choice for his room in 7^th grade. His first choice was black and I said no way to that. But these colors still kept his small, poorly lit room dark enough….

The first step was scraping the popcorn off the ceiling – down to the dry wall. It’s a messy, ugly, back, neck & shoulder-breaking job, but here is how it looks in the end.

A fresh coat of paint on the ceiling...

Then I painted away those dark colors, we replaced the window blinds and ceiling fan, and we added an extra piece of furniture. All to give the lamp its perfect home (after its own little makeover).

Now Sam has the perfect place to read and think. What does he read and think about mostly? Let me show you a close up of who will sit next to him…

summer comes to an end....

Summer comes to an end for one of us tomorrow.

Our baby starts middle school tomorrow! Yup, he’s in 6^th grade. Our base school is year-round, so he’ll be in school 9 weeks on then three weeks off.

So it’s big changes all around for Jack – middle school, year-round calendar, and a 7:30am start time. Yikes!

I’ll most definitely do the traditional first-day-of-school photo at the crack of dawn tomorrow.  But I’m adding a tradition with our youngest. 

Here’s a photo in his new school spirit wear. 

I plan to take a photo at the beginning of 7^th and 8^th grade, too. These years “grow” by fast, so I’m going to document it with the same shirt.

Stay tuned for next Sunday’s post…. Summer ends for our firstborn in 7 days!

Project Patio COMPLETE

And after almost a year, here’s another patio update (for those of you who ask me on occasion.)

The last time I blogged about our project was in December 2010.

Well, yesterday for my birthday, we made significant progress. And now we have our new patio!

Here are some shots of the day.

It was a guy project, including the boyfriend….

Although one girl did help… sort of.

And here it is!

Next step…. landscaping a natural area. Since we’re in the heat of summer, that will have to wait a couple of months.

An Evening to Remember

Thursday evening we got all gussied up and headed out to the Carolina Country Club. We didn’t know quite what to expect. All we knew was that Sam had written an essay for his math teacher. A couple of weeks ago she told him he had won a contest and there would be a banquet honoring the essay winners.

Eventually we heard this contest was sponsored by the Phi Beta Kappa Society of Wake County. We arrived at the country club a few minutes early so we wandered around a bit, peeking into various rooms and checking out the fancy bookshelves and furnishings.

checking out the country club

As we stood around making casual conversation with one of Sam’s teachers who joined us for the event, people began to trickle in to the banquet. And we began to question whether we had the right details. After all, it looked more like an AARP banquet.  

When we arrived, the greeters took one look at us and said, “You must be the Loomis family!” From that moment on, Sam was celebrity. It was surreal for us, and a bit overwhelming for Sam. One by one, very distinguished, ivy league looking strangers would walk right up to Sam, give him high compliments for his essay, and begin to ask about school, where he was looking at college, and how he wrote such an essay.

chatting with the Phi Beta Kappa chapter president and members

The rest of us just sort of faded in the background, shaking the occasional hand and getting a few “you must be so proud” comments. Gradually the room filled with all generations of Phi Beta Kappa members.  Our family had the privilege of meeting Chancellor Woodson of NC State, who exchanged Wolfpack hand-signs with Jack and promised him a spot in 2018.

Through the course of the evening, two other teens were honored for their literary essays and we learned 2011 was the fist annual math contest, so Sam is an inaugural winner. The pressure’s on for next year, and he’s already thinking about potential topics. 

A cash prize and Princeton's Companion to Mathematics.

it didn't take Sam long to dig in!

 We are pleased as punch that Sam has been honored in this way. His passion for math and learning amazes us and he truly has a gift. As Chancellor Woodson said in his keynote speech that evening, it is the minds like Sam's that will forge the way in research and analysis that will benefit society in so many ways. (Okay, he said it a lot more eloquently.)

Give...Full...Margin...

Three words… Give, Full, Margin.

I haven’t blogged in a long time. But it is not for a lack of words or thoughts.

Give: In January, many of my friends chose a single word for the year to ponder and apply in their lives. Some of them blogged about it. While I pondered and came up with the word “give”, I have not blogged my thoughts on this word and why I chose it.

Full: Life has been full. In a good way, and sometimes a challenging way. But nonetheless it has been full.

Margin: Because of the aforementioned word, there has not been much margin in my life. And margin is where I write.  Living a long time without margin is not a good thing for anyone, so I’m seeking margin and looking forward to getting back to my already infrequent blogging.

As I reflect on these words that have themed the first few months of 2011 for me, I realize how intertwined they are.  And alas, another blog post idea pops in my head.

So I’m off for now, seeking a bit of margin.

Oh, and P.S... add Yikes to my words. I have a new laptop (yes, I'm dabbling in the world of Mac) and my blog colors are horrendous on this screen. They look nothing like what I've seen on other screens. So... that may be my first order of business!

Five years ago...

Five years ago to today, we rolled into Cary, North Carolina in our car, affectionately named Big Red, hauling all of our belongings behind us. Literally. A few hours later we were finished signing papers and moving into our “new” house.

Our return to Cary was bittersweet. It was a new beginning yet so much was unknown. We were returning after having lived in England for three years. We had lived in Cary prior to living in England, but it was only for two brief years. And we had no family in Cary or anywhere in North Carolina, or the southeast for that matter.

So why did we return to Cary? Well, that’s the story I’m reflecting on today.


A few months before our return to the States we received a long awaited diagnosis for our son, Sam, who was 11 at the time. High functioning Autism, aka Asperger’s Syndrome. This diagnosis was not a surprise to us, as we had spent years trying to comprehend Sam and help him understand himself. Asperger’s had been a word out there for a few years, but it seemed that everyone wanted to rule out everything else first. In that process we worked through many of his sensory issues, general anxiety and social withdrawal. But when intense anxiety struck his mind a few months before his diagnosis, it turned our family life upside down. Months of sleepless nights for him, and subsequently us, pushed us to the point of realizing that we were not managing his issues well. We were at the end of our rope. We knew it was time to seek answers and get support. So we flew back to North Carolina to UNC Chapel Hill to seek answers, and got the diagnosis.


On the flight back to England, I consumed an entire book on Asperger’s, treatment, challenges, etc. I literally read the entire flight. And Sam read the newly released Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince for the entire flight – cover to cover. And then he started again. I don’t remember if Dave was reading or sleeping. :-)


We came away from Chapel Hill and reading books knowing that we had a choice. We could help Sam now in his pre-teen years with cognitive behavioral therapy and self awareness, and give him every chance to flourish into an independent adult who can live a full life and contribute significantly to society. Or we could ignore his challenges and let him get by in school and allow him to continue withdrawing socially.


And so our return to Cary was in pursuit of the best opportunities for Sam. We returned to a doctor who had known Sam since he was seven, and knew our family well. She was a huge part of helping us and Sam navigate the ebb and flow of anxieties, middle school, self-awareness, parenting Asperger’s, family dynamics and more.


Fast Forward to October 2010.

Sam, in his appearance in A Midsummer Night's Dream at his school, wrote a biographical poem for the playbill. Here it is:

Sam Loomis (Thisbe/Flute)

My name is Sam and I am playing Flute
I’m always doing math and finding roots
I’m in eleventh grade, 16 years old
Got Asperger’s and allergies to mold
As you can see, I write much poetry
Pentameter or writing verses free
I’d like to thank my friends and family
My teachers who have taught me selflessly
My God, who is the maker of all things
For the support and kindness you guys bring.
That’s all for now, I hope I’ve paid my dues
This poem ends – Adieu! Adieu! Adieu!

The first time I saw this poem was on opening night. I was shocked – the word Asperger’s jumped off the page and I wondered if Sam knew what he had done. As far as I knew, this was the first “public” outing of his diagnosis. Yes, his teachers know, but wow. To put that in print in front of your peers is a big thing.


Yet each night of the production, someone would approach me and ask if Sam was my son. Always, they commented on how well Sam did and how they would never know that he has Asperger’s. The most touching conversation was on the final night. A mom approached me as we waited for the actors to come out after the production. She started making small talk and eventually just came out and said “my son has Asperger’s.” I heard a twinge of despair in her voice and so I asked how old he was. “Eleven,” she answered. Wow. Rewind to five years ago in my life and I’m pretty sure I know how she feels. We talked for a bit and at the end of our conversation she said “Sam gives me hope.”


So that’s what I’m reflecting on today…

A Picture a Day

I started this project on January 1st.


I don’t know how consistent I’ll be, but I like that it’s an easy way to remember one detail about each day of the year. And who knows, maybe I’ll dive back into being a creative photographer. It’s been way too many years and I know some day I’ll get back into it.

I wish more of my friends were doing it. It’s a fun way to get a glimpse into others’ lives.

So if you’re already doing it, or if I’ve inspired you to give it a go, let me know so I can follow you!