My grandson

 My grandson is on my mind these days. He has non-verbal autism but has managed to overcome the non-verbal aspect and now communicates I would say in a meaningful way but I think he is thinking faster than he is speaking and needs assistance with that along with the other needs of children with autism. He needs more one on one throughout the entire day and he will go to a private school in the Fall once again as it was private care that assisted him with the  non-verbal portion. But I think it was good to have him back in the public school system whilst he experienced the fraternity of other children. He has benefited from that but now he needs far more one on one which a private school can offer. I am looking forward to them being closer so that I can help more. Every child has a potential and it is hidden to us partly although not always. With a child having autism we do not see as easily into their minds and they will, eventually, find their path but that is such a waste when there are methods known to help them on their path but the public system can not afford the kind of one on one that is needed for some children. We must not lose such potential in any child really.

My thoughts this  morning as I contemplate the future. Occasionally I do that and raise my thoughts from the books that I am in the process of producing to everyday events in my life. Exercise certainly takes up a lot of my spare thinking time but at 78 the path ahead of me is considerably shorter than the path behind me. I sometimes wonder if that knife had sunk into me  that was heading for me when I was only 19 what would have changed in the world; each individual has gifts to bring when they enter our world (our children, the work we do and the volunteerism that we do). It is the task of adults to help the children shape how that world can be enriched by their gifts. 

God to his glory forms us in the womb and so we come to the world and it is our duty to do the best that we can do with what we are given. Whatever helps in that regard is a good thing for mankind. I do not like abortion nor did I ever consider abortion but I also realize that part of the deep dislike is the miscarriage of two out of four of my pregnancies. There are times when abortion becomes a choice between the life of a mother and an unborn child who can not survive. Yet I remain very conscious of the right of every woman to determine her own future that will work for her; no woman should have to raise a child that she did not plan for or have assistance with raising. Having daughters definitely helped to shape that thought that arose in me when a sixteen year old girl died from a botched abortion. Women and men are equal in this world and the world benefits most when they work together as a team just as the hunter-gatherers must have done thousands of years ago. Whenever women are "controlled and forbidden to find their potential" the world stagnates for those societies as they slip into a dark age.