I have been tasked by my good friend, Jim, to finally write again. At times there has been nothing happening and at other times there has been to much to have the time to post. Since it was Jim who pushed me to write then let me write about his son, Noah.

Noah just turned nine over the weekend. He was born with Spina Bifida and autism. He was not supposed to live out of infancy. His parents were told he wouldn't develop much. Those doctors were idiots. While Noah does live in the enclosed world of autism he is anything but under developed. While he has never talked like a "normal" child he communicates. He understands every word said to him and speaks to us that know him leaving no questions what he is saying. He has a personality and loves to laugh. Every time I see him there is something new that he does which amazes me and puts me on the verge of crying.

When we were at Kennedy Space Center two weeks ago we were together for breakfast when his mother asked him to point out people in the room.

"Where is Daddy?" Noah pointed directly at his father.

"Where is Cheryl?" He pointed at Cheryl and made a sound which came close to mimicking the name.

"Where is Jack?"

Noah slapped his hand on my arm and said loudly, "Jack!"

I flashed back to the first moment my own son looked up at me and said, "Daddy". Noah, even though looking away at the other side of the room as if he were completely disinterested in everyone at the table clearly identified me and knew me by name.

I have told his parents many times that as his speech skills improve we have to teach him to say "Bite Me!" Once he has that mastered we will take him back to the doctors who said he wouldn't live so he can say those two words to those most deserving of them.

This past weekend we were at a cookout. Just before leaving Noah had planted himself in front of my car and was studying my House of Blues license plate. I leaned down and pointed out to him Jake and Elwood. I did this only once but he repeated back each name and pointed at them correctly.

"Noah, which one is Elwood?" I asked him in reverse order to hos I had taught him. He picked correctly.

"Where is Jake?" Again; dead on.

I thought about teaching him those two magic words but thought better of it. There's time for that later.

As a final testament of how much a normal kid he really is; the little stinker beat me by 8 pins at bowling. Yes, I was beat in bowling by a 9 year old child with autism. At least he didn't come over after the game with a score sheet to rub it in. Getting beat by a 9 year old autistic child is bad enough; having him trash talk you afterwards would just not be right.

We have to save that for the doctors.