The Boy and the Bird Whistle

#86 - Joey is an active, precocious, healthy and happy, towheaded ten-year-old. He is also autistic.

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The Boy and the Bird Whistle 

Joey is an active, precocious, healthy and happy, towheaded ten-year-old. 

He is also autistic.  

It is in his interaction with others, non-family members, that he doesn’t function. There is a disconnect.  

He’s well integrated into his family of older brother and sister and mom and dad. He just doesn’t speak unless spoken to or has a question. Conversation doesn’t go very far. 

Joey spends his day in his own world, on his own time.

His family dotes on him. 

His mother homeschools him. She finds it hard to stay ahead of Joey. He is outpacing her in the sciences.  

He’s a voracious reader. He loves westerns and detective thrillers. 

She provides him with what interests him. Recently, it’s been the Bible. And Kazantzakis’s, The Odyssey.  

He’s in the Cub Scouts. His mom is a den mother and hosts a meeting at the house twice a month. Joey participates when inclined to and is always up for dodgeball in the backyard. He has a good arm. 

They have a large backyard where he and his dad work on their projects.  

Joey’s dad is a builder. They spend a lot of time out back. They built a clubhouse.

He likes tools and has an eye for design.  

As with his studies and reading, he gets absorbed in the task at hand.  

He’ll work with his dad when he is old enough.  

Joey’s brother takes him to ball games and out running with him on the trails. And brings him comic books.  

When Joey was younger his sister read to him regularly and helped him learn to read.  

He was showing signs of autism. 

She was the first to see that reading connected with him. His eyes would focus, and you could see him thinking.  

Now, she listens to him read. 

He gives the family “readings“ or “speeches” from time to time from something he’s read.  

It’s out of character for him. He plays the part. He becomes someone else during the read, becoming animated as he voices the characters, wonderfully natural as he reads. 

And then, just like that, he’s back in his own world. 

It’s the only time he shows emotion. He will even laugh, which he never does otherwise. In the everyday, something funny gets no response from him. He doesn’t get it.  

He doesn’t cry. He can tell you what he wants but looks up the answers to most of his questions. 

He’s on his computer a lot, subject to what his parents will allow for his studies. No social media. 

Video content trips up his eyes and makes him dizzy and nauseous. He can watch a big screen without difficulty but shows little interest in cable or TV.  

Joey has a family that loves each other, and they provide ways for him to be part of the community.  

He must be watched. Though much better now, there were times when he wandered off. Like a puppy. Gone in an instant from distracted eyes.  

Panic would ensue until he was found.  

When he was five, Joey got away for much of an afternoon. He ended up at a local market and was about to board a city bus when he was recognized by a neighbor who returned him home. 

It was during this time that he underwent tests to get an idea of the extent of his autism.  

He was physically healthy, capable, and bright, but in his own world. His communication skills might improve or worsen with time. 

He grew out of his wandering away but wasn’t trusted for having a sense of direction.  

Having a routine throughout the day was what worked for him. He navigated his interests from one to the next. He had a checklist. 

Joey’s sister gave him a bird whistle she got for him on a trip to Greece. A little hollow yellow bird that when filled with water and blown into sounded the prettiest of warbler chirps and peeps. 

He loved it. It brought a rare smile. 

Out in his backyard behind the clubhouse was a stand of trees and thicket. It was part of their property and a buffer zone between his yard and the town park on the other side.

Only in winter when the leaves were down could you see from one side into the other. 

A fence runs along the park’s border keeping people from walking through the stand. 

Joey started calling to the birds. A few tweets every now and again along with his other activities.  

His interest grew. He got a pair of binoculars.  

He put up feeders and planted flowers to attract birds and butterflies and learned the names of the ones he saw.  

There were day trips to birding spots in the area. He always took his whistle. 

Spring came. Outback, the trees and brush grew lush, and the birds didn’t disappoint. It was migration time for many. 

The Mulberry trees were coming into fruit, and they were a big attraction for the birds, and their watchers. 

The island of trees between Joey’s house and the park was becoming a popular place for birders. 

A few birds seldom seen had made appearances. Joey’s list of birds he’d seen grew. 

Joey and Dad were out in the backyard one Saturday morning putting in a deck on the front the clubhouse.  

Joey took the lead on the building of it and Dad played second fiddle. 

On taking lemonade breaks, Joey tweeted his bird whistle and scanned the trees. 

There was a lot of activity and voices coming from the park side near the fence.  

Back in the house Dad mentioned to Mom the activity out back. 

“Oh, yes!” she said. “I heard it on the news. They said the birds at the park were growing in number and that a rare one was in the Mulberry trees.  

“I was thinking we could take Joey over for a look. He would enjoy it.” 

Dad and Mom and Joey with his binoculars around his neck, made the walk down the street to the park entrance and headed for the group of binoculared camera ready people gathered near the fence line.  

“What are you seeing?” Dad asked of a man with binoculars and a camera set up on a tripod. 

“We have an unidentified bird in the Mulberrys. Not one sighting, but it is in there. We’ve heard it. Over two weeks now. 

Pointing at the trees, Dad said, “We live over there on the other side. Joey, here, is our birder.” 

“Ya’ll should come along on our outings,” said the man, handing Dad a club business card. 

“Hey, I have a recording of it! Listen to this,” he said, getting out his cell. “Every so often it chirps. Real pretty, like a warbler. But different.  

“We have a couple of guys in the club who are really good at songbird voice ID and they don’t know. They think it might be a Green-Winged Yellow Finch, heard but rarely seen even in its native habitat of Costa Rica, much less this far north. Maybe a storm blew it off its migration route.” 

As the man was scrolling the menu for the recording, Joey pulled the whistle out of his pocket and gave it a tweet. 

“There it is!” shouted a few watchers. All ears and eyes focused on the trees.  

In the silence, he tweeted it again, and all ears and eyes turned toward Joey. 

The man looked at Joey for a moment like “What!??” and hit the “play” button. It was the same chirp.  

Joey answered the recording with another tweet. He smiled, and then started laughing. 

One by one the onlookers did as well. 

Mom and Dad looked at each other. Joey was laughing.  

They broke into a grin.

 

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