Answering the Question

Aaron asks lots of questions.  Some questions he asks over and over again, and we know that he will continue to ask them over and over again as long as the sun rises and sets.  Sometimes Aaron wants to talk things to death, on and on and on.  Yet when it comes to most of the questions he asks us, he simply wants a simple answer.  Concise and to the point.  Gary and I know this, but do we always follow what we know?  Of course not!  But Aaron will remind us, that's for sure!

Yesterday Aaron was anxious to play a game on the computer.  We had taken the keyboard away for awhile as we do every day, and had also taken that particular game away because of behaviors the night before.  Aaron went outside to ask Gary if he could have the keyboard back and the answer was yes.  But then Aaron asked if he could have that particular game back, and the answer wasn't so simple.

Gary wanted to emphasize to Aaron once again the reason we had taken the game away............what we expected from him if we gave him the game back............and several other points that were well worth making - except that Aaron was totally uninterested in this long answer.  He quickly became lost in all the words even as he tried to focus and to listen.  I heard Aaron take advantage of several pauses in Gary's answer to ask again, "But Dad, can I play that game?"  And still the answer continued.  I listened, knowing exactly where Aaron was going mentally with all of this.

Finally Aaron had heard enough and he burst out, "Dad!  You're not answering my question the way that I'm asking it!!"

Once again Aaron yanked us back to reality and made us smile.  How many times do we do that, I wondered, whether with Aaron or with others?  And I know there are times that I wish I had the freedom to blurt that statement out to someone who is not answering my question the way that I asked it!!

I won't say that to Aaron, though, because so often in his random answers to our questions we learn so much about what makes his amazing mind function the way that it does.