Season 4 Step 1 Blog 5: Can You Please Teach Me How To Dance?

 Can You Please Teach Me How To Dance?

I have talked about my cousin Austin from Orlando, Florida, before. He went to college here in Ohio, and after he graduated, he moved to Columbus for a job. I have not talked about Austin's sister, Paige. Paige has been in a serious relationship with a guy, who's name ironically is also Austin. I spent Valentine's Day 2021 with my "sisters" Aspen and Kid. That weekend was when the previous installment, "Groomsman," about my friend Greg asking me to be in his wedding came out. I worked the next morning, so I wanted to upload the podcast version of "Groomsman" that night, so I didn't have to do any work in the morning. As I was preparing to upload it, I got a text from Mom informing me that Paige had gotten engaged!

The following weekend Aspen, Marshall, and I drove to Pittsburgh to visit my other "sister," August. We left Friday night at 10:20, shortly after Aspen got off work. We arrived at August's house at 2:18 a.m., and after 30 minutes, we were all asleep. Aspen and I ended up sleeping in August's roommate's room because she was not there. When I woke up at 11:30 on my air mattress next to the bed, I lay there for as long as possible until I had to get up because I did not want to wake her up. As I stood up, the floor creaked, and Aspen sat up in the bed.

After everyone else woke up, we ate a late breakfast and headed out to explore Pittsburgh. First, we ended up at a shop called "Global Market Retail." It had cool stuff from all around the world, including a flute from India, which I decided to buy so I have another instrument I can learn how to play. After that, we went to a place called "Dobra," which is a tea house. I usually don't like tea, but I tried their chai tea, and it was amazing! As we sat and drank our tea August told us that she had invited her neighbor, Corrine, up for drinks later that night. When we got back to August's place, we turned on music, made mojitos, and August texted Corrine to come up.

When Corrine came in, August introduced us all, and we all sat down and started talking. Corrine sat right next to me, and as we spoke, the light in the room reflected off her hand and caught my eye. I realized that she was wearing an engagement ring, which reminded me of Paige's engagement and Greg's imminent wedding.

Eventually, a good song came on, and we started dancing. I'm not the world's best dancer, but I'm certainly not the worst. However, whenever Aspen is in the room, I try to copy her because she is the best dancer in our group. As I attempted to mimic her every move, I started thinking about how there's no way I'm going to survive dancing at these weddings without her.

"Hey," I said, "I know I've asked you this before, but can you teach me how to dance? I'm going to be a trainwreck at the weddings."

"Yeah," Aspen replied, "You know you're going to have to dance with one of the Bridesmaids right?"

"I'm sorry, what now?" I asked.

"Yeah, you'll walk her down the aisle, and at the reception, you'll do a dance together!" Aspen explained.

"Hhhhow did I not know about that?"

The girls laughed at my confusion, and then Aspen started giving me some tips. She told me that I tried to make it too much of a show (which admittedly is in character), and I need to be a little more subtle. Over the last week, I've practiced a little bit, and I've seen a considerable improvement! I'll be ready for Greg's wedding in June…

Have A Greattastic Day and Be Safe!

J. Mitchie Ulibarri

Season 4 Step 1 Blog 4: Groomsman

 Groomsman

I have talked about my brothers, Ryan, Luke, and Josh, and childhood neighbors, August, Arden, Aspen, and Arlo (Kid) Anderson, who have become my "sisters." However, I have not talked about my other neighbor, who I think of as a sibling. Let's call him Greg.

The Anderson's are my neighbors to the right, while Greg was my neighbor to the left. I first met Greg at our yearly summer block party on our street in first grade. It wouldn't be until a few days later that I would figure out that he lived directly next door to me and not elsewhere on the street. We were friends during our grade school years, but I think it's safe to say we didn't hit our stride until our middle school years. Throughout our friendship, Greg introduced me to Star Wars, The Marvel Cinematic Universe (for those unaware, those are the Avengers movies), Lord of the Rings, Super Mario, The Legend of Zelda…basically he unlocked my inner nerd!

When Greg graduated high school, he was accepted to Cornell University in New York, and while he was there, he met a girl. I have met his then-girlfriend a couple of times. She made an excellent impression because she's an incredible person. Still, on top of that, I can tell that he is incredibly happy! I have known for a while that they were thinking about getting engaged, but it took some time.

Back in September 2020, my friend Marshall and I were at my house. He was studying, and I was writing. I had a bad case of writer's block, so I whipped my phone out and started scrolling through Facebook. It didn't take me long to find the post that officially announced that Greg was engaged! I waited for Marshall to go home, and then I called Greg to congratulate him. We talked for about 15 minutes, and I asked him what he was coming back into town. He said he was coming back on the 14th of December to visit his dad for Christmas.

On Thanksgiving, I texted Greg to wish him a happy holiday and ask him if things were still on for the 14th. He told me things were still on for the 14th, but he was also coming into town that the following week for a few days. He also told me that he had something to ask me. I knew his question probably had something to do with the wedding. Still, I was annoyed that I had to wait the entire weekend before I got confirmation.

The following Monday, Greg decided to pick me up and not have me drive anywhere to meet him because it was snowy and I hadn't driven in the snow yet. When he picked me up, we landed on going to Panera. We got inside, ordered our food, and sat down. We talked and caught up for about an hour before he asked, "So, do you want to be a groomsman in my wedding?"

"Uh, Yeah!!!" I responded excitedly.

I'm so excited about this wedding for a couple of reasons. Number one, this is the first wedding of one of my friends and the first wedding I'm going to be in (outside of when I was little)! Second of all, I don't expect 2021 to bring its "A-game"; I just want some positive trends. A wedding is a pretty positive thing, don't you think?

Have a Greattastic Day and Be Safe!

J. Mitchie Ulibarri

Season 4 Step 1 Blog 3: Death Sentence

 Death Sentence

From my experience, I can tell you that growing up with autism and not being diagnosed can cause many problems. Peers of an undiagnosed child with autism think the child is weird for the sake of being weird. There is no way to tell other children, "Hey, I'm not weird, I just have this thing, I don't understand social norms the way you do. Stop bullying me!"

However, the part that I think can be far more damaging in the long-term is the diagnosis itself. I believe an Autism diagnosis has the potential to be a death sentence. To explain that, I have to explain how the autism spectrum works. People think that it is one line that goes from one end to another. At one end are the "high" functioning people, and on the other end are the "low" functioning people. People get wrong about the spectrum because it is not supposed to chart how autistic a person is; instead, it shows us how autistic specific characteristics are. In other words, I am not on the spectrum I have characteristics that are.

The problem is people who are low functioning are frankly easier to spot in everyday life. In general, people act like the term low functioning means "low functioning in life," not "person with low-functioning autistic traits." On top of that, most high functioning people are depicted in pop culture as super-geniuses. So as an autistic person, no matter when you're diagnosed, your people will only see you as someone who can't take care of themselves or Sheldon Cooper.

In my case, I was diagnosed right before 7th grade. Before that, I got bullied, and it was traumatic, but at least adults thought I was cute. When you are a kid, there is no pressure on what you need to do with your life. Yeah, I was a little weird, but it was way more endearing because it was a phase. As soon as it was no longer a phase, people started treating me like I probably wouldn't be successful because I was obviously no super genius. I would probably never have a job, probably never get married, or have kids. Any friends I had would probably leave, and I would likely end up living with my parents for the rest of their lives, and then I would die alone.

I know for a fact that people didn't intend for me to feel like this is how they felt about me, but it was the vibe I was getting, intentional or not. I don't want to speak for anyone else, but I'm not the only autistic person who has experienced this, from what I can tell.

I don't want to spend my life acting like I can't do anything because of my autism. I want to go out there and make something for myself and prove to people I can do it! Step one in my plan for how to do that is to move out of my parents' house. In preparation, I have already taken on more hours at the Kroger grocery store where I work. I am tentatively planning to move out of my parents' house in the fall or failing that early 2022.

Have a Greattastic day and be safe!

J. Mitchie Ulibarri