Retirement

Autistic people tend to dislike change, especially fundamental changes to lifestyle and routines, so approaching retirement was something that I viewed with considerable trepidation. I gave the university six months’ notice (rather than the usual three) partly to help them, but also to help me prepare psychologically. It is now a month since my retirement date, so I thought I’d pause to reflect a little from an autistic perspective.

The most dramatic change, unsurprisingly, is to my routines. Many of these were created over time to enable me to get to the end of the day with less drain on energy, or ‘spoons’. So, things like the breakfast routine, with its sequencing of marmalade and coffee and precise timings, existed to prevent me having to think about what I was doing. This gave me more headspace to cope with the anxiety that always built up before a day’s work. The coping strategy involved visualising all the situations I would be going into and scripting likely conversations and meetings. None of that is necessary now, so the whole routine has collapsed. Is this a good thing? I’m not sure, but my wife tells me I seem more relaxed, so perhaps it is.

Certain routines, like having lunch at 1.00 pm, have not changed, so the days are not totally without form and structure. But I can sense myself seeking to create new routines to fill the void. Working in my lovely garden office is helping with this. And I do still have quite a few projects and commitments going on, so they help to provide structure. I think the sense of empty space will really kick in after Christmas when those are over, but probably I’ll find new ones. I have started to get more involved in house and garden activities, and to go to the gym. Perhaps those will also add some routines once I get into the habit. 

The most positive thing is that I’ve now got more time to work on trying to help others. So, I am working with the Leicester, Leicestershire and Rutland NHS Autism Partnership on projects like Autism Space and the Supported Employment Service and I have joined their Board. I am working with All-In Leicester to review venues and we are currently consulting with the people who are redeveloping Leicester Railway Station.  I am also working with ArtReach on a research project funded by the Arts Council entitled ‘​​Developing Disabled Leadership in the Midlands’. 

These kinds of projects, combined with ongoing relationships with my former university and quite possibly another university means that I am transitioning into a retired life, rather than abruptly ceasing work altogether. In fact, retirement to me means just doing work on a different basis, one which resembles somewhat being on the dole back in the 1980s, when I didn’t have much money but did have a great deal of freedom. I can remember from those times, though, how much I struggled with the lack of structure.

One final thing is that my anxiety and stress levels have reduced considerably, thanks to being much more in control of my environment. No longer having a daily expectation of traveling by bus or train into an ever-changing workplace is a great relief. As Luke Beardon famously said: autism + environment = outcome. Here I have an environment that is exactly how I want it to be, so that makes life much more pleasurable. 

Changing police attitudes

I thought I'd report on a small incident that happened last weekend. While insignificant on one level, I found it immensely encouraging on the other and actually wrote to thank the police.

I had been attending the 'Indian Summer' Festival at Curve Theatre, Leicester as part of my work with All-In Leicester https://artreach.org.uk/allinleicester/ We are a group of disabled people who visit venues in and around the city, giving our advice on how they may improve accessibility.

As I was walking away, I became a bit concerned that if I were to walk through to the bus station, I might get accosted or involved in some kind of race riot/anti-racism protest. I'd heard there was some commotion in the centre of town. So I began to consider whether to catch the bus from the stop by the railway station. 

I saw two policemen walking past, so I stopped them. The conversation went like this:

Me: Excuse me. I’m autistic and I was wondering if you could advise me? Is it safe to walk through to the bus station from here?

Policeman (obviously aware of what "autism" means): Well, it could be very loud, if that’s a problem for you?

Me (pointing to my noise-cancelling headphones): Yes. I don't like loud noises.

Policeman (reassuring smile): You might be better off going to the stop by the station, then. But from a security point of view, there are no problems at the moment.

Me: Thank you very much!

I was impressed by how open and receptive the police were and by how they immediately understood why I was asking and the meaning of the words “I’m autistic”. It was really encouraging!

GLOSS: autistic web design, part 1

I've been commissioned by the Percy Grainger Society to review their website named GLOSS (Grainger Library of Sampled Sound) and to suggest ways it could be expanded to make it suitable for use by neurodivergent people. Here is their press release. We established fairly early in the process that I would focus on autistic users, rather than the whole of neurodiversity, because that is the area of my best expertise and because we want the site to have a clear sense of purpose.

I have had a longstanding interest in Percy Grainger (1882-1961), who was an Australian composer and pianist who ended up living in the USA, specifically in White Plains, New York. He is best known for his folksong arrangements and "light" compositions such as Country Gardens, but there is a great deal more depth to his work than this would suggest. In particular, he was a great experimentalist, composing chance-based music decades before John Cage and devoting the later decades of his life to a completely unique form of electronic music that he called 'Free Music'. There's a good summary of his life and work on the Percy Grainger Society website.

I've often wondered why I am interested in Grainger. It's not as though I am a folksong enthusiast, an aficionado of light music, interested in military bands, or a massive fan of all things "Nordic" (which was his passion). What I have come to realise is that he was probably neurodivergent himself, as a read of his correspondence will confirm. I won't give him the label "autistic" (retrospective diagnosis is always risky) but it is pretty clear that his brain worked in a decidedly atypical way. He had several "special interests", some of which have been the subject of disapproval or even condemnation. I'm not going to express a view on that, but I would say that any autistic person would recognise the extreme focus and obsessive nature he exhibited. Most importantly, his dedication to pursuing an alternative view of music based on the sliding tones he saw in the shape of the landscape or the ripples in the water went well beyond the kind of dispassionate, quasi-scientific, enquiries of the people working in the electronic studios at Princeton, for example. 

I have completed my initial review of the GLOSS website and will be reporting to the Percy Grainger Society later this month. When that exercise is complete, I will publish the key findings here. The next step will be for me to create some original soundscapes using the materials on the site, which I will also share. The project is due to end in December, when I will publish a full academic article, but I will also discuss the main findings from a purely autistic perspective here. Watch this space!