Q47 Would you give us an example of something people with autism really enjoy?
We do take pleasure in one thing that you probably won't be able to guess. Namely, making friends with nature. The reason we aren't much good at people skills is that we think too much about what sort of impression we're making on the other person, or how we should be responding to this or that. But nature is always there at hand to wrap us up, gently: glowing, swaying, bubbling, rustling.
Just by looking at nature, I feel as if I'm being swallowed up into it, and in that moment I get the sensation that my body's now a speck from long before I was born, a speck that is melting into nature herself. This sensation is so amazing that I forget that I'm a human being, and one with special needs to boot.
Nature calms me down when I'm furious, and laughs with me when I'm happy. You might think that it's not possible that nature could be a friend, not really. But human beings are part of the animal kingdom too, and perhaps us people with autism still have some leftover awareness of this, buried somewhere deep down. I'll always cherish the part of me that thinks of nature as a friend.
-- The Reason I Jump by Naoki Higashida, translated by KA Yoshida & David Mitchell
