Elf hands marker of Autism?

This morning my husband showed me this austistic conjecture of the day blog from '05 about "elf ears" and other possible physical markers of autism. Well, Dave's ears aren't pointy or rotated posteriorly, but he does have long, attenuated hands. As this blogger Susan points out, large hand size is apparently a marker of autism. Throughout Dave's childhood and well into his adulthood he has been remarkably small in stature (another thing common among those with autism). His fingers, though are quite long and graceful and I love them.

Something unusual about Dave that we learned is that he has something called hemihypertrophy. This means that one half of his body grew a little larger than the other, creating a leg length discrepancy that is corrected with orthotics. Is this part of the autism? Did it "just happen"? Is it a result of his mother's alcoholism? Are the autism AND the physical anomalies a result of the fetal alcohol syndrome?

Whatever the case, it's funny when Dave finds Elf in reference to things like this given his Tolkien spiritual path. While he identifies with the spiritual mythos in Tolkien's writings and links himself with the Elven houses, he eschews identifying himself as an elf in physical way like many calling themselves Otherkin do. Yet, when an article like this pops up and with the talk among the autistic forums about autistic genes being atavistic or recalling those of our ancestors, it does make us go, "Hmmm?"

Creating new traditions after the holidays

As newlyweds, my husband and I enjoyed sharing each others traditions this past holiday season. We are a mixed marriage-- he is a pagan and I am a metaphysical Christian. We created a new tradition for both of us which involved reading to each other. First is was the novel The Handmaid and the Carpenter and later a series of Bible readings that traced the lineage of Christ as part of a Joshua tree custom I had found. As spiritual people we both enjoyed reflecting on the metaphysical meanings of the old scriptural texts and the modern telling of the story as well.

Now that the holidays are over, I commented to Dave that I missed the reading to each other so we have started a new tradition in our home of reading to each other in the evening from our spiritual texts. For me it's a chance to not relearn the scriptures that I have been away from for a long time but have always loved and look at them with my new learning. It's also a time to hear the stories that are close to Dave's heart as he reads me The Silmarillion.

 

The Fountain and other food for thought

Image from The Fountain


My husband and I finally got to watch the movie The Fountain the other night and were quite impressed. While the complexities of the triple plot interwoven make it a little difficult to get into in the beginning, the spiritual message and the beautiful imagery make it well worth it.
Like the 1998 film, What Dreams May Come this story uses beautiful imagery to tell a deeply spiritual love story of a man unwilling to part from his wife. These kinds of movies that speak to our hearts and at the same time make us think rather than sell us a little bit of easy pap are few and far between.

Now movies like What the #$*! Do We (K)now!? and The Secret are great movies too, but tend to be somewhat, preachy, especially as they are full of "talking heads" lecturing the movie goer (or DVD watcher as the case maybe). While the information in the latter two movies is great, it's not what moves me or entertains me, nor is it what is going to move the average joe who want to be entertained and perhaps a bit moved. I know that The Secret "offended" my sister-in-law because it neglected to mention Jesus. She will never quite get the message because the message of the Secret will somehow only really get to the people who already know it. It's nice to know that people like the producers of movies like these are making movies like these though.

I much prefer the centuries-long love story of The Fountain have me ask myself what is the meaning of life to the talking heads of new-age philosophers anyday. Even if it is all good soul food.