Book #5: The Reason I Jump

If I never accomplish my goal of reading 50 books this year or even if I do this will be one of my favorite reasons I chose this goal. This book blew my mind. It was written by a 13 year old boy who has autism who is nonverbal. In it he details his daily struggles, his dreams, his writing skills which are translated letter by letter by a teacher. This book was worth every minute not because I work with children who have autism but because my perception of children with autism has depeened. I used to work with a nonverbal student who I always knew was brighter than people had claimed she was and this book reaffirms what happens when we place judgments or biases on people regarding their IQ score or their communication level... Sometimes we are severely mistaken.... And, I am very grateful for that. 

Definitely worth a read even if you know no one with autism it will enlighten you.

The Happiness Project Book Club

Last year I joined a Happiness Project book club off of meetup.com. The club talks about the book so titled by Gretchen Rubin. I went for a few months and loved the group. The stories, laughter, and warmth from the group was amazing. Very rarely have I met people especially complete strangers who I felt close enough to open up to. It was a great place. Then all of a student the group organizers didn't have the time anymore to put in to keep it running. So, the group stopped.

A few weeks ago I was lying in my bed just thinking and I looked at the book on the shelf and thought maybe this would be a good time to see if anyone wanted to start the club up and running again with new team organizers. So, I wrote on the Facebook group page and within a few minutes Kristin wrote back that she would love to get together. I was so excited. Kristin has this amazing calm aura about her that is warm and comforting. She is originally a northern girl like myself and used to be a teacher. Amazing! 

We met last weekend and I invited Caty along because we were going to the movies afterwards and everything seemed to fall into place. We didn't really get to talk a lot about the book but it was nice to be in company with people that wanted to move the group forward and hopefully we will be able to reach out to other people soon.

If you would like to join just let me know and I will invite you to the Facebook group.  :)