RE: Re: Context.Helen.

[Guest guest]

Hi Helen,If you can use anything I’ve written, please pass it on. Me and the pussies send their regards,Ron. From: aspires-relationships [mailto:aspires-relationships ] On Behalf Of helen_foisySent: Tuesday, 19 June 2012 4:53 AMTo: aspires-relationships Subject: Re: Context. Bill and CJ. Ron, I liked your post. I wish there were a couple of folks I could show it to. One of them remains (in my heart) a dear friend, who, for the moment, has used up all my emotional capital. I'm very cognizant that there is no malice on her part. Her mis-steps are one of ill timing and not being aware of context, though she should be, she's known me for long enough. But instead, she personalizes and uses her own context, not mine.An example of this (I might have told this story here before) occurred last summer after a vicious hail storm wiped out four months of work in my garden. I was quite sick at that time and it represented more to me than just esthetics. It kept me going at a time when I was otherwise housebound. Of particular pride were some hot peppers that are hard to grow in my climate.I told her the hail had flattened the peppers and she said, " yaaaaaay!!! " I said, " what? " and she said " I don't like peppers. " (I know she doesn't like peppers, she's been saying that repeatedly for decades.) A few days later, in the first week of August, after an elderly neighbor and my husband helped me to pull up the shredded garden, fill a pick-up truck with a cap on it to full capacity, and haul it away to the compost depot, she said, " are you over your garden yet? " When I was physically healthy and had limitless energy, I used to laugh off the " wrong notes " thinking, well that's her, she's oblivious. In recent years she's had her difficulties, and I've been a good listening ear, but reciprocity in kind is not forthcoming from her. Given my low energy levels, I've stopped answering her phone calls and emails because it's just energy and empathy going out of me, and none coming back in again. Something to consider especially as some of us get older and face our own challenges, that it is important to remember to remain sensitive to others and sensitive to their context, whether we are AS or NT. - Helen>> Ah Bill,> > > > For me, the idea of 'context' as being a significant issue in the social> awkwardness of AS, is particularly relevant. I've made my biggest 'fox's> pas' over and over again through misjudging context. I think of my> abominably persistent sense of humour which has led me into innumerable> blunders. I think of the number of times that I have been utterly> bewildered when in the course of a conversation or business discussion along> one particular line, someone has suddenly come out with a question or a> request that is totally separate and unconnected, at least as far as I was> concerned. I just don't care one scrap if it is an old idea. To me it is> a good one. Of course NT folk can have the trouble too, but as far as I'm> concerned it represents one of the major disablement problems that I can> face.> > > > The problem particularly shows itself when I run into people in one life> situation, who normally belong to a totally different area of my experience.> I can be almost totally flummoxed as I try to recall just who they are, and> for that matter, just why the 'ell I ought to be able to recognize them.> In my married periods, I was a sheer genius at picking the very wrong time> to be seriously bringing up some matter, or conversely not detecting that> humour would be a disastrous thing to apply to another. In fact, the whole> business of determining the moods or purposes of a partner has been fraught> with disasters. That mere context of the needs and moods of any other has> confused me over and over. Thinking it over, I rather guess that it has> been a major reason why I have so often retreated into silence, when I was> just darned scared that I would otherwise be saying the wrong thing.> Just so very often, the thing I had the strong impulse to do or say (that> appeared to me to be relevant and sensible) would have been hopelessly out> of place. It must be connected with the bewilderment I've so often felt> about how other people seem to constantly get away with saying things that I> would be far too troubled to come out with. They must just read the> context more accurately, - or else perhaps they just don't have the same> inhibitions or experience of a lifetime of disastrous blunders that I've> had. > > > > I'm not going to get into the scientific debates that you clever devils> might have over the value or importance of the context issue when it comes> to diagnosis or the sheer matter of identification of the Syndrome. For> me it is still a highly important factor in my social difficulties.> Along with CJ I think this is something that is absolutely crucial. The> article gave me an extra very useful descriptive picture that I shall be> utilizing in my communications or lectures. It put into words an issue> that I hadn't quite formulated so distinctly before. Thinking back on> what I wrote about in my book, I must have quoted there, a number of> situations or incidents in which my misjudging context brought me grief.> > > > Cheers, > > Ron.