The Collaborative Shut-Out

A Major-League baseball team had an intriguing game recently ... a collaborative no-hitter (or "shut-out"). Something like five or six different pitchers were involved for their team, ranging from a few innings to a couple batters faced, yet none allowed a hit by a batter of the other team. It was a new record for how many pitchers collaborated to make a no-hitter. It may have been a record as a collaborative event in baseball, but ... it's nothing new or unusual for Neuro-Typical conversations.

Friend and fellow "free-range Aspergian" Bryan made a comment a few posts back that for Neuro-Typicals (NT's for now?), conversations are essentially a collaborative process, rather than each person actually trying to communicate their thoughts individually. That conversations aren't composed of individuals sharing their own thoughts with the group so much as a "thought-process" being shared by the group.

Fragmental thoughts shared and combined as a collaborative thought process ... that is as NT as you can get. I think that is especially the form that general time-killing/filling conversations take among NT's. Someone starts things off saying "X" ... which may be either a complete "classical" sentence or two, or perhaps just a clause of a sentence, a fragment of a thought. Someone else will say some other little bit that in some way seems to them have something to do with the first thought-fragment; then another makes a similar fragmental comment but ... spun to something a bit different. Then someone else makes a comment that somehow takes off from the last fragment (but to what seems for us Aspy's a completely different subject matter), and the process repeats itself. Over and over.

As close to "normal" as I appear to most people, this sort of discussion is a LANDMINE waiting to explode around me (and all other Aspy's) any moment. It's based heavily on that shared data-flow of eye/vocal/facial/body/breath inflections that NT's gather without needing to think about, and which shapes their concepts of "what" the conversation is about each moment. 

Remember the explanation above ... the part where I noted the spins and take-offs to what seems a different subject matter? Think about any "general" conversation you are part of. The subject matter of the words does jump around a lot ... but yet in reality to the NT's, the conversation apparently continues without such a jump. All the NT's there seem to understand the links between the "apparent" jumps, or at least, understand that this shift in word-subject is simply part of continuing the same conversational pattern of the group. It is the pattern of  the conversation that is really the main shared communication. This group collaborative-talking process.

We Spectrumites may see some of the 'connecting' pieces between the fragments, and we may say something that feels a 'fit' to the other NT folks there. But no matter how hard we study NT's in real-life, in real-time we will miss probably 80% or more of the full information the rest of the group gets from each comment/commenter.There is no way we can track such complicated thought processes based on data we don't even "see". We're going to say something ... wrong.

I've studied such conversational patterns for many years now. I've had them analyzed and detailed for me by close friends and delightedly blunt enemies. For most of my life, the explanations have been given by people assuming that if I had half a brain and was actually concerned enough about other people and not so self-centered, I'd learn it ... quickly. And that the only reason for not gaining the understanding they were trying to teach to me was if I did not really want to learn how to get along with others. If I was ... selfish. Self-centered. A boor. Thoughtless. A pig.

After one is told this so many times, well, it must be true, right? John Elder Robison talks of how he heard the same comment so many times as a child, from SO many people (from school counselors and teachers to family members and strangers), that it must be true. However odd it seemed to him, they couldn't ALL be wrong. He was clearly a self-centered psychopath/ax-murder-in-waiting! He actually felt he should study which kind of prison he should "aim" for when he finally became what they all saw in him. Not because he felt any urge or inclination to become an ax-murderer/psychopath, but simply because EVERYONE around him couldn't be wrong, could they? (By the way, Federal prisons are better.)

Well ... they were wrong. John wasn't a self-centered psychopath in any way shape or form. His brain was just wired differently, so his interactions appeared differently and were misinterpreted by those around him. Seriously misinterpreted. But my corollary of the last post still applies: this is a two-way smash-up in progress. They misinterpreted him, just as he misinterpreted them.

And just as I and those around me do. And those wonderful little conversational jumps that aren't really jumps? I haven't a clue how they work to NT's. An NT says one set of words that (to me) completely changes the "apparent" subject matter of a flowing conversation ... but it isn't a change to the conversational pattern. Yet any slight change in "apparent" subject matter that I might provide is quite possibly going to be seen as a rude and dismissive commandeering of the group's conversation. With the other folks shaking their heads at how thoughtless I am.

I can't get it, and I certainly can't "win" at conversation either, though I've gotten better at fighting it to a draw or at least a stand-still. Participation is Hell on wheels, and staying aloof and "outside" is not much better. I know that if I say anything, eventually (and sooner rather than later) I will insult or anger someone or multiple someone's. Or at the least, I will be taken as thoughtless, boorish, self-centered, egotistical, and rude. If I don't say anything, eventually I will come across as either disinterested in others, ridiculously shy, or lacking in proper social graces by refusing to engage with others in "proper" social interactions. A self-centered boor by a different means.

But life is a participation sport, just like baseball. It's a "purist" sport, however. No designated conversationalists or relief-talkers allowed ... but oh well, many consider the designated hitter an apostasy even in baseball.

Autism/Aspergers vs "Normal" Communication Part II

John Elder Robison has an example of how differently we Spectrumites communicate from EnTy's, about our typical lack of complex motives when we on the Spectrum speak. His example: If we tell someone that the red dress they're wearing today makes them look fat (or if we've learned some sophistication, "heavy") and the blue dress they wore yesterday doesn't, it's simply a direct attempt to help them look their best. We're only passing on useful information. They should go home and put the blue dress back on.

There's no emotional content nor any other implication intended within the comment. It is a purely factual communication. Direct, simple, straightforward, and most importantly to us, useful for the other person. The best kind of communication, right? They should even thank us for it.

However, what most EnTy's will "hear" is that we intentended to insult them, and they will never ... ever ... believe otherwise. And worse, they'll KNOW that any attempt by us to "explain" our silly excuse for reasoning is just a show of  how STUPID we think they are (that we think they'd believe such crap!). Once they've taken a comment 'wrong', there's no recovery possible, or at least, likely.

Mr. Robison's example is straight-forward and in some ways comical, and I know many EnTy's will consider it perhaps 'extreme'. My experience is similar to Mr. Robison's, but ... in real life it goes ever so much farther than his example. Everything I say to an EnTy is processed in the same way. Every instruction to an employee, every suggestion in a meeting, every conversational comment to clients or friends ... it is all processed this way by the other side, in a way which I can neither natively understand, predict, nor accomplish on my own.

Even in this, as I'm trying to be precise in an attempt to communicate clearly, I will probably fail with many (or probably most) of the people who may ever read this LONG epistle. It will be all sorts of things "wrong" but not the right things "right". Because I've found, even in written language, there's something different about the way En-Ty's perceive my words that I can't ... fathom.

The few times I've had "successes" at getting much meaning across have been only a partial success ... a few percent of the idea made it across. It's been rare to actually get any complex idea absorbed in a way that it is still useful to others in the way that I meant it, so that they acted on it as I had envisioned. And as always, if I try to correct the perceptions of what I'd said, people get puzzled ... then they get ticked at me.

My communications successes have mostly been in dire emergencies. It seems that the ONE time that EnTy's shut down that predictive-meaning facility is in DIRE emergencies, when most people's upper-brain functions shut down in general. Suddenly, they hear my commands as simply and exactly the words I intend them to be, follow precisely my bluntly stated commands, and ... we get through, with everyone amazed at how strange it was that I could communicate so clearly and take command so easily. But as soon as their brains relax, it's back to ... normal.

John Elder Robison and Temple Grandin and others all say that with time and experience "we" get better at getting along in EnTy society. We become functionally near enough to "normal" as to be fine and enjoy life with and among EnTy's  just dandy (or at least, close enough).

I've not found that the case. Most people I'm around don't even realize I am on that spectrum. I'm not such a display-case that it's obvious except to those with good experience in these things. One would think that being (at least in appearance) closer to "normal" than most of my true peers, I should have somewhat better communication results. Or at least, some ability to improve the quality of my communications with EnTy's to a sort-of comfortable state. Not so, at least, not with only 37 years of adult attempts.

The only way I've really found to achieve a "comfortable" state in communications with EnTy's is ... to stop almost all attempts to talk with EnTy's on anything past the weather and how old their kids are. In any subject past that, there will be miss-communications galore. At some point, I'll make what seems a simple straight-forward comment, perhaps even just a hmmm of agreement, and the conversation hits a hard STOP as they're standing there somehow completely puzzled by my response. And when I realize it's happened again, if I try to correct the "miss", it makes the personal interaction worse. So it's much easier (both socially and emotionally) to try and fade into the woodwork, to become ... less. Less obvious, less "there", and less ... me.

But that of course makes it impossible for me to get anything done that matters to me. Life is created by the doing of something worthwhile. For my business to take good care of my family (and make some sort of non-peon retirement possible) I need to be able to make things happen. And yet as I spin my mental wheels in all this analytical mud, my brain racing around trying to find SOME way to get traction and move forward somehow, all that this excellent reasoning power of my brain shows me is that ... This Is The Way It Is. This Is Why It Is. And ... It ... just ... IS.

And so far, it seems there's no way to fix it. Every communication of any length or depth I have with every Enty I meet always leaves me aware I've ... surprised them somehow. That I didn't communicate something that I'd expected, wanted, or needed to with them. That I've left them wondering about some puzzling comment or pause or whatever. And it leaves me feeling very isolated, singular, and separate.

No, I'm neither proud of nor comfortable with being a Spectrumite. It's what I am, similar to being say left-handed or long-bodied/short-legged. It just is. It is often a cause of embarrassment and emotional hurts, both for myself and sadly (and to my shame) for others. But my continual lack of ability to get traction burns.

I should be able to do better than this ... and I will always try.

Autism/Aspergers versus "Normal" Communication

In tested mental capabilities, I'm HEAVILY geared for analysis/synthesis, and that capability comes with a ton of native "horsepower". Which naturally means I look at things around me, analyze, re-think, and envision alternate ways of doing anything. That's me. That's how I see the world every minute. I analyze, I pull things apart in my head, and see if there's another way to put them back together that might be better for at least some purpose than the way things are now. And truthfully, there are always ways to improve things.

But I'm not a tin-pot dictator in some third-world country with the self-awarded title of "Colonel", wearing a cute quasi-military uniform I designed for myself. And no, I don't even have those darling aviator "shades". So I can't order anyone to follow my ideas and threaten them with torture for failing to understand me. Not even within my own business. I have to use words to illustrate and define my ideas, and make my thoughts understandable to and for those who must then help plan the implementation and carry out my ideas and goals.

I was an English Lit major in college, and compared to my peers in the department, writing was a strength. But as an adult, even though interpersonal communication seems like something I should be able to do in my sleep, it has been so often a botch-job that I learned to dread meetings. Not that my efforts always seem so "botched" by others, but that so rarely does any real depth of my intent get across the Great Divide.

As part of my continuing studies of the Autism/Aspergers spectrum, I have learned to understand some of the communications differences between those of us who are "Spectrumites" (my newly-minted term) to those who are "Neuro-typical", or "N/T's" (let's call them "En-Ty's", for short). And yes, there is a sort of code-book situation going on. A horrifying one from the vantage point of those of us on the spectrum.

In verbal conversations, most "En-Ty" brains absorb the words they hear as only part of the context of the situation they hear them in. That context is a very complex compendium of their own sensory perceptions of the face, body, breath-patterns, vocal and other 'inflections' they perceive from the one who's speaking. From all this, and AS the words and sensory perceptions come in, they determine what is the most likely motive that one who would use such words would have for saying those words in that way in this situation here and now. THEN, having deduced the true motive behind the words being used, they determine the true or intended meaning of the person who just said the words they heard.

Let's recap: first, they take everything they've mentally and sensorially experienced/noticed/perceived from the speaker (with the actual words being only a small part of the total input); from the total received intake they then they deduce a motive for the communication; THEN they determine what the true or intended meaning of the comment was ... from the motive and perceptions of delivery they just deduced.

EnTy's do all this instantly, and most of them don't even have a clue that this is the process they use to give meaning to the words they hear. It truly is an amazing bit of mental gymnastics, exceeding the capability of a quad-core computer chip in near-instantaneous processing speed. Brains can be marvelous devices, you know.

But there is a horrific part in all this for us Spectrumites. We're mostly to COMPLETELY oblivious to all of this "extra" mental thought-processing. Not because we haven't bothered to learn it, as so many folks tell us. But because our brains aren't hard-wired to do it as theirs are. After studying this communications dissimilarity for a couple years, I can logically understand how it works, but I cannot possibly apply that knowledge in "real-time". I don't have the automatic sensor-connection between the parts of the brain that control my eyes and ears to my "thinking" section that would make all those data-bits (that don't seem at all inter-connected to my brain) somehow affect the meaning of the words I hear. In many situations, this action by EnTy's seems to completely replace the meaning of the literal words with another "thought" entirely, one in complete opposition to the stated words. I can't figure out how to do that.

Nor can any EnTy for whom this is "natural", turn the process off when they're around someone who doesn't share the ability. In fact, those who do this most strongly are highly likely to insist that they DON'T do any such thing at all. It is probable they will take great offense at the mere implication that they would. And so, they insist we've just made a statement that bears no relation we of the Spectrum can tell to any words, thoughts, or understanding we've ever had in our lives. Let alone the words we just said. It's often infuriating to both sides. What a life, eh?

The lives of the created ...

Somehow, our creations often have lives of their own. Authors talk of this when they talk shop, how they fight with their characters time and time again. I think most of the time, the characters have the best interest of the story in mind, but that is not always apparent to the author, and so can be amazingly irritating. Fighting with characters who only live in your own mind, think about that ... just who do they think they are, anyway?

Of course, not all characters in stories play nice with their authors. In fact, I've wondered if that isn't the reason some characters get such spectacular endings to their personal tale! Still, I think it oft unwise to take your creator's angst out upon a poor character ... or, for a photographer, to forget to "finish" an image that just didn't quite somehow make it up to what we thought we saw at the moment of creation.

I had such a moment yesterday, when an image I'd originally created several months back just ... stopped me. I hadn't been thinking or stewing over it, and it was from a session with many standout images. There was no reason to even think about that image any more. Still, there was something about the image that gave me a feeling when going through that session looking for other images, that I'd not ... finished it right, somehow. It needed work. It could be so much more, it could be something if only I completed it.

And now, I have. What was there in this image was what was there all along, what somehow I think my eyes and brain could see from the moment I captured it. My mind apparently couldn't grasp the essential part because of attention to what were, in the end, extraneous details.

When I finally eliminated the non-essential and therefore extraneous details, a clear and interesting image appeared with an obvious "treatment" that it needed. And though it is wonderful to see it now, completed and at rest, I feel very silly I couldn't see this all along.

The block of stone needed to have the extraneous stone removed to become the statue it could be. The writer needed to find why her characters were unhappy. And I needed to find the essential elements of that image. In all three examples, there is a certain ... something, I'll call it life ... native to the created. And the creator needs to be attuned to what his creations ask of him in order to achieve the completed work.

Even a creator is wise not to dictate! I am grateful for having found the needs of that image. It is one of my favorites right now. And I am also grateful that, unlike for the author of written stories, my images don't actually argue with me inside my own head!