09-27-2016, 07:48 AM
Undiagnosed Asperger's messed up my personal life about as badly as alcoholism or drug addiction except for making me excessively cautious and perhaps self-righteous. I would have lived very differently and enjoyed a far richer life had I known about it. I might have made different choices in education and vocation.
I could have been a role model and not an example of how badly someone could waste talent. Today I am lonely, nearly broke, and stranded in a hick town in the rural Midwest. What I thought was individual eccentricity is simply expressions of a syndrome. I am now old enough that I have little to which to look forward except for an Afterlife or reincarnation in one of the most merciless of economic orders. I have cursed God for my plight instead of bad luck and the incompetence of others.
I have a conscience; I am not lazy; I have enough self-control to avoid problems that many 'healthy' people get into. I can be trusted with promises, with assets, with legitimate secrets, with the welfare of vulnerable people, and with safe use of hazardous equipment. I could have found life precious instead of nasty.
Yes, American capitalism since about 1980 has been perverse... but it still allows some opportunities for talented people who apply themselves well. I could have found a satisfying niche had I known that I had a problem, for I had the means of dealing with something that I understand all too late.
I could have been a role model and not an example of how badly someone could waste talent. Today I am lonely, nearly broke, and stranded in a hick town in the rural Midwest. What I thought was individual eccentricity is simply expressions of a syndrome. I am now old enough that I have little to which to look forward except for an Afterlife or reincarnation in one of the most merciless of economic orders. I have cursed God for my plight instead of bad luck and the incompetence of others.
I have a conscience; I am not lazy; I have enough self-control to avoid problems that many 'healthy' people get into. I can be trusted with promises, with assets, with legitimate secrets, with the welfare of vulnerable people, and with safe use of hazardous equipment. I could have found life precious instead of nasty.
Yes, American capitalism since about 1980 has been perverse... but it still allows some opportunities for talented people who apply themselves well. I could have found a satisfying niche had I known that I had a problem, for I had the means of dealing with something that I understand all too late.
The ideal subject of totalitarian rule is not the convinced Nazi or the dedicated Communist but instead the people for whom the distinction between fact and fiction, true and false, no longer exists -- Hannah Arendt.