With Earnest Thanks

To those who’ve never thought about it before,

Sadly, despite my alleged skill with keyboard and pen, I have not the words to express to you my deepest gratitude for the kindness shown me by you. Though you might not understand, seeing the world differently as we do, I assure you in the most animated language, of my lasting affection and gratitude for all you are to me.

It is not the effort of this prose, to lavish any reader in undue praise. Though you might think, should you choose to read this inscription of your wonders, that I speak in a manner overly charitable. Drive from your head this thought, know in your heart that I speak only those praises I feel to be true in mine. Thus, liberate yourself from such folly as to think yourself undeserving of all that I say of you.

Often times, you have smiled wanly at an expression of mine. That statement being that connection, friendship, and other such platonic pleasantness is difficult for me. That I have struggled with its acquisition and maintenance in the past, and likely will again in future days, should our paths diverge.

Difficult I have oft been called, and though great in regard to number, those whom I have called friend have been of starkly lesser quality than yourself. Often times, I have seen in your expressions or heard in your sighs, a vexation with me and my limitations; yet through it all you’ve smiled and taught me about the wrongs unknowingly done. A greater friend I cannot imagine, than one who loves well enough to teach with kindly voice and patient hand.

Limitations we all have, containing as we do multitudes which no seeking mind can ever grasp in their entirety. Yet mine are distinct from those others you have, like as not, come across before. Hardly unique, it is well known that my sense of my own intrinsic value would never allow me to claim such an honour, but out of the common way I dare say.

Struggles you have plainly seen. Though it might have taken time to believe. I cannot express enough, my undying love to you for that belief. The first time I have been so by my peers.

Though you likely think it no great thing, to believe one such as I when we explain ourselves and our experience, allow me to say that it is greater than you can know. And when coupled with, as you so selflessly have, an attempt at understanding, love overflows such as I have neither the prose nor verse to describe to my satisfaction. For I have ne’er before encountered such creatures as you, nor yet such earnest kindness.

My friends, though I am often absent, though I do not see the world as do yourselves, though I carry not the kind of tales to which you might easily relate, know that I appreciate all you do for me. All you are to me.

Many times, I have thought before that I had at long last found that for which I earnestly sought. Friendship pure and free from such terrors as are often bestowed upon the likes of me. Yet here, with you, I finally see exactly how this was meant to be.

You, despite there being no obligation to do so, have reached out your hand across the cognitive gap that lies between us, and taken my own as it hung outstretched. The first time this has been done, you must understand; for at first, I recoiled from that touch, from that earnest exploration of our nearer connection. Are we not all afraid of that for which we have no name? Even when the sun does down upon us shines, if we had never felt such warmth before, might we not likewise recoil from it?

A gift you have given me, though unknowingly done in your goodness. A gift that I doubt I can make you understand, though this letter is my attempt at such.

Thoughts are different for me, at least according to the understanding I have of the inner working of others. You have seen the difference, sharp and stark as that been a churning sea and flowing stream. And instead of turning your face away, looking past and through, you held out your hand to me. You took mine, as I strove to leave my intrinsic isolation, and joined me in so far as you could.

Too many things I have to say. Too many instances of your love and kindness and acceptance to express. Yet time, my dearest friends, draws short indeed.

I extend to you my earnest and eternal gratitude, for loving me so well as you do. For the kindness you’ve shown in letting me release the mask I held in place so very long. For seeing me, not as a beast without care for the structures or persons surrounding him, but as a man trying, with every desperate scrap of effort, to see and be seen. To understand and be understood.

Moreover, I must thank you, from the bottom of my heart and the depths of my soul, for being patient with me.

You mean more to me than I can ever express. More than words or verse or prose can write. Thank you for being my friends, for saving me, though again I cannot say how.

Yours always,

Alex’s neurodiversity.