Back to Love

Following on from: On the Radar – Spectrum Singles

Following on from: Following on from PS Love?

I was on the bus yesterday when a couple sat in front of me and another sat behind me – I was trapped. Almost immediately the couple behind me (Couple 1) started tickling each other and the girl sat in front of me was stroking her boyfriends hair (Couple 2). Let me make the point that I am not a fan of PDA, I am not a fan of eavesdropping, lets just say – I am not a fan of couples. But, one of these two couples moved me so much – they were inspiration.

Couple 1 was quite loud, so after the tickling ended they started talking about a talk show on TV and how they would do on it, then they talked about getting dinner which was a whole complicated thing which ended in less than a minute with one of them getting mad and the other trying to baby talk his way out of it. Yes, i said baby talk.

Couple 2 was very quiet, except for the hair stroking. His head was right in front of me, the windows were steamed up – it was all I could see. PDA makes me uncomfortable and I don’t understand why people are so into it. Holding hands – okay; a peck – okay; anything more and it gets a bit awkward. This couple didn’t start talking until the boy saw a truck and got really excited.

At this point Couple 1 were not speaking to each other – the girl was on her phone making alternative plans for dinner – the woo-ing had ended.

The boy from Couple 2 started talking. He was telling his girlfriend about his life-long dream to become a truck driver. Big trucks though – like the ones that carry other cars. The stroking continued all through his story. At this point, I’m looking at trucks thinking ‘Oh, I would have never thought of it that way’. Then, the girl turns to him, while stroking his hair, looks at him with stars in her eyes and says “[Name] you should never give up on that dream”. She said “You have to try and do everything you can to make that dream come true. You have to try even when you’re fed up of trying, even when everyone else tells you that you can’t do it, you have to make that dream come true. You’ll be good at it, I know you will, and I will help you make it real”.
Couple 1 was still not talking but there were intermittent sighs and shoves.

The boy replied to her by hugging her and telling her she is great, he kissed her hand and said “But I don’t know if they’ll let me’. To which she replied “[Name] you can’t let them tell you what you can and can’t do. They can’t stop you if you’re good just because we are Aspies”. And they giggled. And my jaw dropped. And the hair stroking never stopped.

Couple 1 got off the bus, still not talking. The boy tried to hold her hand, she pulled away and walked off without even so much as eye-contact.

The girl from Couple 2 gave the boy a kiss and they smiled at each other. Then they started talking about something that had happened years ago – they’d been together a while.

If you didn’t know and you had these two couples standing in front of you, interacting and you had to pick which one was the ‘normal’ one – which one would you pick? How much would you let spectrum stereotyping affect your judgement?

Learn about Autism – it’s not what it seems.