Mendocino Botanical Gardens

Over the 4th of July we took a trip with some of our friends to an RV park near Ft. Bragg, on the coast.  We have made this trip before, and each time one of the highlights for me is meandering through the Mendocino Coast Botanical Gardens.

I will include here just a few of the photos that I took there recently.  It is an ideal climate for lush gardens of beautiful flowers.

 
I happened to catch this flower just at the right moment, when a ray of sunlight was illuminating its center.  It looks like it's glowing from the inside.

At first I thought it must be some exotic species, but it's common enough.  This is a variety of Hypericum (St. John's Wort).  It was growing along the path in a damp area called Fern Trail.

This is one of my favorites, a fuchsia variety.  They grow profusely over there
--in many colors--in that cool, damp climate.









And here's an "artsy" photo--my tripod lying beside
some dandelions along the trail.

Follow Up - Temple Grandin

After my last post my sister-in-law Marie Gieszelmann pointed out that the July-August issue of Smithsonian has a one-page article written by Temple Grandin.  Those of you who subscribe to this magazine will want to check it out on page 10.

Grandin makes some interesting observations about the different types of thinking styles.  She herself thinks in pictures, not in words.  That is why she is so successful in her business of designing livestock facilities.  She sees the whole project in her mind before she even draws it.


She says that "[I]n addition to visual thinking, there is pattern thinking and word thinking."  Each style has its strengths, and, working together, they complement each other in accomplishing various objectives.

Temple Grandin

Sometimes I have to ask myself, "Where have I been all my life?"  You would think that, with all my reading on various subjects, and especially being involved with persons with disabilities, that I would know something about Temple Grandin, presently one of the world's best-known individuals with autism.

Actually, I believe that her name passed by me some time ago, but it obviously didn't make much of an impression.  So, when I read about her recently in one of Dr. Oliver Sacks' books, (An Anthropologist on Mars 1995), it was like entering into new and exciting territory. 

I have to admit to very limited exposure to and understanding of this condition.  In recent years it is being talked about increasingly in the media, but usually children are the ones featured, very little said about adults.  We know that autism interferes very seriously with the child's ability to learn, to speak, and to function socially.  As for adults with autism, my first thought would be of the strange character played by Dustin Hoffman in "Rain Man."


Now that I have done some reading, I can think of some adults I have known who probably have the characteristics of autism.  Most of us might label them as odd, weird, loners--not able to interact normally in a group.  Maybe we need to learn more.

Temple Grandin was born in 1947 and diagnosed with autism at age 2.  Little was known then about the condition, and at that time doctors were busy putting the blame on mothers for their failure to bond with the child.  Apparently her mother didn't know about, or didn't bother with, such theories because Temple was enrolled at an early age in a structured nursery school and given intense speech therapy, so that she began speaking at age 4.  She was very intelligent, but her middle school and high school years were extremely lonely and difficult because of her inability to relate normally with peers.


Because of the special kinship she has always felt with animals (beginning as a child with the horses and cattle on her aunt's ranch), she followed that line of study, earning a doctorate in animal science from the University of Illinois.  She is now a professor of animal science at Colorado State University and consultant to the livestock industry on animal behavior.  And in 2010 she was named one of Time Magazine's 100 People who most affect our world.

Temple Grandin is quite an amazing person!  She is very much aware of how different she is from others.  She herself is the one who says that she often feels like "an anthropologist on Mars," having to make a conscious study of the ways to fit into normal society.  This has never come naturally to her.  Knowing how to speak and act around others has always been a learned behavior, never something she picks up naturally, as the rest of us do by just living among people.  She cannot internalize the social signals that pass effortlessly between others.

In spite of her differences, she comes across as quite likeable.  She is friendly and talkative, although Dr. Sacks notes that in their conversations Temple tends to speak with an unstoppable intensity and fixity, as though once a sentence or paragraph is started it has to be completed, nothing left hanging.  


Since the mid-1980s she has been lecturing, on the subjects of both autism and animal husbandry.  Dr. Sacks reports that, when she first began public speaking, Temple tended not to have eye contact with the audience, sometimes even looking in a different direction.  She has gradually developed a much more fluent style, although she could still not be described as relaxed, as a 2010 video attests.  The video is 19 minutes long, so you may, or may not, decide to watch all of it.  It certainly shows much about the person she is, though.  And I found it fascinating to see how she ends her lecture.  She simply stops her rapid-fire delivery, saying, "Well, that's the end of my talk.  I just want to thank everybody for coming.  It's great to be here."  (at 15:50 min.)  Then she stops and just stands there.  Here is the video, "The World Needs All Kinds of Minds."


While doing all this research, I was impressed by how driven she is to make a difference in the world for good.  In Dr. Temple Grandin's Official Autism Website, she says that the "true meaning of life is if you do something that makes real change for somebody or for something.  That's what matters." 


As their visit was drawing to an end, Dr. Sacks writes that Temple spoke very intensely, wanting to tell him about something very important to her.  She wept as she told him that she wants to leave something of herself in the universe. 
       
      Most people can pass on genes--I can pass on thoughts or what I write.
      I've read that libraries are where immortality lies. . . . I don't want my
      thoughts to die with me. . . . I want to have done something. . . . I'm 
      not interested in power, or piles of money.  I want to leave something
      behind.  I want to make a positive contribution--know that my life has
      meaning.  Right now, I'm talking about things at the very core of my
      existence.

Dr. Temple Grandin is perhaps not typical of individuals with autism.  She certainly stands out from the crowd.  But she makes us realize that we can never try to fit any person into a mold.  Never see only the limitations of the disability.  You just don't know who, with the right help and circumstances, might be the one to take off and soar.
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There is so much more to say about Temple Grandin.  I learned much from reading about her and watching the videos.  She is someone I admire and would love to meet.  If you have any interest in going further, here are some things to check out:

 Wikipedia article

A film was made in 2010, starring Claire Danes:  Temple Grandin
I haven't seen it yet, but will be getting it from Netflix.

Temple has written several books, including her autobiography, Emergence, Labeled Autistic.