After a few years of settling into our new place and admiring the pets of our friends and relatives, I began to think that it would be nice if we could have a pet or two. I developed the desire in January of 1993 when my friends, who were also neighbors, were getting rid of their Zebra finches, a male and female pair and offered them to us with the cage. After we had them for only a week they died when our place got too cold for them during the power outage from the Inaugural Day storm.
We replaced them with another Zebra finch pair in the spring after our two-week trip. The female bird died about a week later and I had replaced her a few months later during the summer when one became available the females tended to be much more fragile than the male bird. Even the last female lived only a year and a half. After that I didn’t want to replace more birds since I got tired and had by losing them from their short lives. I just let the remaining bird that was a male live on, even though they tend to do better with a partner or a group. It had been fun listening to their chirps and watches them jump back and forth from one end of the cage to the other.
In May of 1993 I was presented with an opportunity to adopt a kitten. While I was at a friend’s house one evening, I saw a litter of four-week-old kittens with the mother cat. As I held the little ones I fell in love with them as they were so cute. Several weeks later when the kittens were old enough at eight weeks to be adopted, the friend drove them to our place with some kitten food to get started. Kris and I had picked out the only kitten of the three with a full-length tail.
Our kitten was all yellow with fluffy medium length fur. I named him Javon since that sounded pleasant and I had had a friend who years earlier named her son that. Kris agreed with me. We had held back with getting a cat out of fear of not being able to take it to the veterinarian when needed. But, we realized that we were able to work around this. The friend, who gave us the original pair of birds, took Javon and me to the veterinarian for all of his shots, examinations, and neutering. When this friend moved away, I had no problems of getting other people to drive us to the vet. This was a lot easier than getting there by foot. Also whenever we were away on vacations, she would come by to feed our pets. Javon was left out for the entire time of our trips. We had been letting him in and out freely when was home.
We had been very fortunate to have Javon as he had always showered us with unconditional love. He had always been forgiving. Whenever we pet and play with him, we become very relaxed in no time. In conjunction with meditation, exercise, and a healthy diet, our cat helped reduce stress in our lives.
In 2002, Javon started to lose weight after being chubby for a while and his fur lost some luster. He was diagnosed with a hyperactive thyroid. The vet suggested that we give him medication to control the growth in the area or have surgery to remove the thyroid. We chose neither, but to continue loving him. Since I experienced losing a dog through surgery I knew that there were no guarantees. We did not want to risk spending thousands of dollars for nothing. After a while he did appear to get better and gained back the weight and his fur looked healthy again. About a year later, his health declined again and got weaker and weaker until he could hardly walk. He was very skinny and his fur looked awful. I felt that he was not going to make it. I discussed this with Kris and decided to take him out on a cold night and leave him out. This may seem very cruel, but we wanted him to be relieved of his suffering and knew that his death was imminent.
By the next morning on December 31, 2003 when I walked out in our back yard on a frosty morning, I found Javon dead. When the ground thawed a few days later, I buried him close to the back fence. As much as we loved him and felt sad at his passing, we felt that he is in great hands and relieved of his suffering and did not get so emotional as some people do from losing their pets.
During the spring of 1993, I began to notice that my musical tastes were becoming more sophisticated as I drift away from most rock ‘n roll towards more jazz which is more soothing. I gave away many of my rock records that I didn’t care for anymore. I listened most often to the contemporary jazz station.
During 1992, I resumed my involvement with the Autism Society of Washington when I was asked to participate in two meetings of another autism task force. Since transportation was provided I didn’t need to miss entire days of work and was picked up at Auburn Boeing to attend the meetings that were held in Burien. We discussed what services were needed in the community such as respite care and better training for the school staff.
In June of 1992, I was invited to present my childhood experience for a middle school class in Issaquah. They became interested when my friend Katie from WPAS, who participated in a theater project with them, told them about me. Bea, whom I had stayed with in the early eighties, was also invited to present a personal perspective on autism and picked me up at Boeings to give me a ride.
Since this was the first time that I had presented anything for a long time since the Toastmasters, I was very nervous and kept forgetting what I was to mention within the proper sequences and stumbling over my words. Having forgotten my notes made it worse but it had taught me how very important they are in keeping my ideas organized. But, the students and the staff still enjoyed hearing about my background. They asked how I was able to overcome my challenges in communication and how I adjusted to regular public high schools and college. I felt that they learned that there is a great deal of hope of leading a successful life despite diagnosis of autism and with persistence it could be amazing what one would achieve. Though I still had long ways to go.
Almost a year later March of 1993, I was called to participate in a video to be shown at the statewide conference on autism in spring of 1993. The film, We Are Not Alone, included interviews of a few individuals with autism, including me, and a few parents. It was basically about the struggles that people in the community dealt with and how they coped. A mother spoke about her nine-year-old son and how the school worked on controlling his behavioral problems. A man with autism, who had his own apartment and worked at the University of Washington, talked about his social deficits and his strengths in memorizing historical facts and organization of information in the research library in the university. His stepmother spoke about the challenges and rewards of raising him. I was filmed at my back yard within minutes of coming home from work. I talked about general things about my life, such as my childhood, schooling, and my up-to-date situation.
Though I went to the annual conference that year, I only attended on Saturday. The film wasn’t shown since it was viewed the day before. But, I was able to see it during a special viewing a year later at the conference in 1994. While I was watching myself being interviewed, I tended to be highly critical of myself. I thought that I had come off as being too forceful with my loud voice and excessive gestures, some of which were related to my nervousness and a lack of confidence. But, people still had enjoyed seeing me on the video and even complimented me. A while afterwards I began to work on my voice and gestures.
Just before the video crew from the autism society left after interviewing me, I was nominated to the board of directors of the Autism Society of Washington. I was voted in and joined the board right after the autism conference of that year. This enabled me to provide a fresh new perspective to the board meetings with my personal background. The all-day meetings were held about four times a year at the Fircrest School in the north end of Seattle, where the Autism Society of Washington was located. Usually I was able to get rides from board members who lived in Tacoma. Along with discussing and voting about the society’s business matters, it was a lot of fun to mingle with the people from the autism community over coffee and lunch. During my terms on the board additional help was approved and added to accommodate the growth in membership. Committees were formed to organize the conferences and monitor the office personnel and positions.
For the 1994 Best of the Northwest annual statewide conference on autism in March, I was recruited to present with a panel of individuals with autism. It was to be about educational experiences during a session on a Friday afternoon. I talked about challenges of attending special private schools and regulate high school and college. The audience learned that I had received some benefits from special education by smaller classes and receiving more individualized attention, but did very well in the regular schools. Despite my challenges with a disability I did well in college and earned a four-year degree.
Since I did get the whole day off for something as important as that I attended the two days, Friday and Saturday. That time I made sure that I had notes with me and had practiced a few times so I had improved since my classroom presentation. I still had ways to go until I would feel completely at ease. A few people had commented that I had did better on the presentation than I did a year earlier on the video.
During the summer of 1991 while I was having challenges with Dean at work, I began to develop plans for eventually leaving food service to move on other pursuits where I could utilize my skills. I thought it would be good to pursue an occupation where I could challenge myself. I had received some guidance from articles and friends that it was important to seek out opportunities where one could grow and realize the potentials as much as possible to make greater contributions to society. Since I had been in food service for over eight years, it would be a good time to make preparations to move on.
I thought along the lines of working with other people with challenges to improve their lot in their lives. I felt that I had improved enough over the years to gain confidence that I would be able to work well directly with others. I considered eventually pursuing training to provide occupational or physical therapy. I thought of educational instruction or assistance to regular or special education students. I had a friend and neighbor who had begun her schooling for opportunities in occupational therapy who gave me some ideas.
With increased contemplation I had zeroed in more on special education since I felt that I already had more of a background for that with my autism and having been through a special education system myself. I felt confident that I could become an effective teacher, since with my personal experience I would be able to relate to children with challenges, especially with autism.
When Kris and I visited family during April of 1992, a relative with two master’s degrees who had experiences in school’s special education had discouraged me from getting into the field. Though we had got along very well and she was well meaning, she felt that I would flourish better in other careers that didn’t involve so much direct interaction with children. She suggested that since I had expressed my love for nature and with my creativity that I should consider horticulture. I began to think that maybe she was right since I still had a speech impediment that might get in the way of getting hired in the first place.
Along with getting discouraged about pursuing special education, I was becoming increasingly concerned with the logistics of how I would be able to resume schooling for a teacher’s certificate and a master’s degree. In order to afford the costs, we would need to save for several years. The only way I would be able to go was to take evening classes after working all day. I was worried that my energy reserves would get drained. With these considerations in my mind, I began to have second thoughts that maybe I shouldn’t pursue another career. It was much easier to become complacent and just remain in food service, especially since I would stay in my comfort zone with my easy short commute and without any greater risks to take since I already knew exactly what to do.
After a period of complacency, a bunch of major changes and reorganization in food service were instituted in response to the down turn of business at Boeings. Just before there was any talk about it, I had sensed that there would be changes in my life but I had no idea what they would entail. In early February of 1994, everyone had their hours cut with reorganization of jobs. I was shocked that the hours weren’t reduced proportionally. I resented that my hours were slashed by half that were more than everyone else’s reduction. My hours 9:30 AM to 1:30 PM, though were much shorter, still didn’t give me that much extra time at home as my day was broken up and I didn’t get home much earlier, but yet I was paid a lot less. Though I was able to sleep longer in the morning and was able to accomplish a few small things before I walked to work since the bus didn’t run when I needed it.
With greatly reduced hours my duties were modified. For example, instead of slicing the meat for the cafeteria, I portioned out the meat that was already sliced by the main cafeteria and shipped to my location. As soon as more people were brought in, meat slicing was resumed in the cafeteria, though I didn’t work in that area as I had previously. I didn’t prepare salad dressings as they were being ordered already made, though I still made the tartar and cocktail sauces. I was placed back down into the cook’s helper job classification due to the cutbacks.
Though I had understood that the reductions of the labor costs were necessary whenever there is a continued down turn of business, I was angry that my hours were cut much more than anyone else’s. I figured that the reason why my hours were reduced the most was based on my job classification and the high number of years working for the company. I felt that the management wanted to cut the hours of those who, including myself, were hired before the mid eighties and received longevity pay on top of the regular rates.
Even though I had realized that the steep reduction of hours wasn’t based on my character flaws or my autism, I felt that I was being discriminated against which I took personally. I was affected the most from my feelings of being less valued rather than the other workers than the actual cut in my hours. Fortunately Kris and I were able to manage with my reduced income, though we had to cut back on expenses. My emotions about discrimination boiled to the surface as I associated the feelings of being devalued at work to the childhood discrimination that also affected my self-esteem. Whenever the emotions laced with anger and depression popped up, which occurred frequently for several months, I cried for a few minutes. Though in general I had cried only occasionally. I was very determined to work on the emotional issues to release them from my system.
Shortly after the new work schedule was in effect, ideas about leaving food service and pursuing other things began to resurface after the period of complacency. I had become serious about contemplating changes that I needed to make and to take responsibility for a better future. I realized that I could not stay indefinitely in an environment that was lacking in employee morale and would be dehumanizing. I felt that the workers were being valued less than profits. I would have been able to understand the need to reduce the hours if it had been done much more evenly with a fairer distribution among the staff.
When I talked about my reduced work schedule to my co-workers and my close relatives, they agreed that I was treated unfairly and suggested that I file a grievance with my union and the state Department of Labor and Industries. When I called my union representative, he didn’t have anything to refer to and help. I was discouraged. He had pointed out my low plant seniority of a few years as a strike against me. I lost my company seniority and had to start all over when I transferred to Auburn as that was voluntary even thought I already put in almost eight years at the transfer. When I had read all of the basic rights of workers in the national labor law, I didn’t find anything specific to my case and assumed that there wasn’t any legal recourse that I could take to restore hours.
However after several months of the changes in food service, some of my hours were restored. My shift began at 7:00 AM and ended at 1:30 PM. There might had been something written in the labor laws that my hours weren’t allowed to be cut so much and they were required to restore some of the hours. Somebody, probably from the union, might have investigated my case and caused the legal recourse on my behalf. Though I appreciated that my hours were restored up to par with the other workers, the struggles weren’t over.
What irked me more than anything else was that so many additional workers, new and transfers from the other cafeterias were brought in even though there was less work to go around. More and more of my responsibilities were taken away from me to be spread out more to my co-workers. It tended to be much more stressful to not have enough to do than have too much to do. The slack periods lacked the structure in the work place that I thrived so well in. When it was slow during most mornings there was very little for me to do from my list and I spent much of the time before the lunch service hours scrounging for things to do. To keep myself occupied, I ended up doing things that we didn’t need to do such as extra cleaning and flattening cartons since that was the janitor’s responsibility.
One day I was so irritable that I was unlike my normal self and lashed out to a woman who didn’t have much to do and worked on my task of preparing hot sandwiches. I realized that she didn’t mean to do any harm and afterwards I felt very remorseful as I knew that I had done wrong. I also was coming down with a cold that made me even more irritable. Even though I only helped others with their tasks when they were behind schedule or asked for assistance, it wasn’t for me to judge others or to expect them to do the same.
I had become so burned out with food service that I became less loyal to the company. I began to decline request for working extra hours during swing shift that involved walking back to work after being home for a little while. When I stayed home with a cold, I took a few additional days off beyond what was needed for recovery since I didn’t want to work in the cafeteria anymore. Sometimes it was difficult to contain my emotions when talking to others.
As I contemplated my future career options, I felt that I could get started, with the education background that I had already, in jobs in community services and schools working with those with disabilities. I thought that once I had work with human resources, I could eventually pursue advanced degrees in special education as I had resumed the idea of teaching. I became so determined to leave food service that the idea of going back to school became much more appealing than before when I wasn’t as motivated to make big changes.
With the encouragement from friends and acquaintances, during the summer of 1994, I went to the administrative building of the Auburn School District to fill out an application for opportunities to work as an educational assistant. Twice a month throughout the summer I called the personnel office to show interest in openings that might arise. This would be a great way to get my feet in the door in aspiring to become a special education teacher.
Despite my resume and a good cover letter, I was informed that I wasn’t chosen for hire since there were others with prior experience with the schools. Though this was discouraging, I wasn’t about to give up and could still seek other opportunities or even volunteer in the classrooms so I could become known in the school district to increase my chances of getting hired.
A friend, who felt that I would do well in providing community service for those with disabilities, had investigated non-profit organizations to make contacts. She connected me to I Am Cares that had been involved with job development and coaching for the disabled community. Perhaps I could do job coaching similar to what was done in my Renton cafeteria for a woman with a disability.
There were periods during the summer that I had job burnout so bad that I felt like walking off the job and turning in a two-week notice to quit right then. But, I needed plenty of time to think about when to take action. I shouldn’t act on the spur of the moment with such a big change as quitting a job. As weeks went by I figured that the best time to resign would be just before our planned vacation in February that was just a few months away. By then I would had put in twelve years of service that would make me eligible for additional paid vacations along with paid time off during the holidays. Besides it would be more fun to make the change more dramatic by timing it with a vacation to make it seem more like a big celebration. As the time got closer and closer during the autumn, I became anxious and began counting the weeks and days since it was hard to wait.
When I had turned in the two-week notice in January of 1995 and informed my co-workers, they were surprised that I would quit even though I had expressed my emotions about job burnout. They were amazed that even to the very end that I had remained a responsible employee with good attendance and always putting out my best, unlike many others who slackened on their responsibilities when they wanted to quit.
Some customers and co-workers expressed sadness of my resignation. On the last day Valerie, who had had a hard time accepting me, was sad and commented to me: “Believe it or not I will miss you.” She really meant it as I was always available when she or anyone else needed help. I had always believed strongly in team work and help each other out whenever possible. During my last day, February 10, 1995, I felt unusually calm and sad even though I was very confident I had made the right move. I felt sad about missing the people but not the job.
During my final lunch break in the cafeteria; my co-workers gave me gifts, cards, and good-byes. One woman who was especially friendly, though being out from knee surgery, showed up at the cafeteria to give me a gift and say good-bye. I was very impressed. A very friendly customer gave me a small gift that was appreciated.
With twelve years of working in food service I had received as much out of it as I could. I had gained a great deal of social and people skills from being around different people and learning how to deal with all sorts of personality types. Since I had learned as much as I could, it was time to move on for other opportunities with new experience where I could grow. Not advancing forward is in effect regressing backwards. Though I had endured unpleasant experiences during my final year in food service, I was grateful in the long term as this propelled me forward to advance into new opportunities to better utilize my skills and contribute to the disabled community.
By the time I was thirty-seven and a half I had enough faith and confidence that I could with persistence push my limits to realize my dreams and goals. Even if I couldn’t get another job right away, I could keep myself occupied by seriously writing my autobiography. I had actually begun working on my book thirteen years early, but only had done a page here and there as I lacked motivation.
As Kris and I with his parents, right after the weekend of quitting food service, went on vacation to Mazatlan, Mexico, I felt that I was crossing a big bridge from the woods with limited vistas to sunshine for rapid growth in self-actualization leading to meadows with large expansions of open space and a greater variety of landscape for enriching experiences. Even though I was nervous and didn’t know exactly how my future would unfold, I had faith that eventually everything would fall in place. Our trip was a celebration of our tenth wedding anniversary, though a month early, it felt more like the celebration of achieving victory in courage to make changes in the right direction as well as to sustain a very happy marriage of which we mutually supported each other. Our successful marriage was a major contribution to my increased sense of security along with unconditional love.
Even though I had by prayer to improve my self-confidence to overcome my poor body image and an eating disorder and gained enough courage to leave food service I still had ways to go to really feel good about myself and overcome feelings of inadequacy. Since I had so many years of negative programming of my psyche it took me a long time to transform the programming into the positive. Kris had provided me with a lot of continuous encouragement to love and accept myself the way I was while still making steady progress. On the same token he made me feel needed and valued by allowing me to help him by cooking, gardening, and navigating steps when out together. The challenges throughout my life had provided me with opportunities to grow as I learned to take advantage of them that would enable me to change sourness into sweetness.
“but those who hope in the Lord will renew their strength. They will soar on wings like eagle; they will run and not grow weary, they will walk and not be faint.”—Isaiah 40:31
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