My Brother's Guardian Angel

My brother Tim was born in November of 1958. Although his arrival was a joyous occasion, the joy soon faded to fear and often heartbreak. A hormone induced labor and a mid-forceps birth left my parents newborn baby with injuries that would follow him for a lifetime. Now fifty-two years later he lives in a state home with other special needs adults.

Autism is a word we hear quite often. It is often applied to children who have idiosyncrasies that make them slightly different from the rest of society, but my brother was born before most people had ever heard the term. His is a severe, nonverbal form of this disorder.

My parents raised five children. I don't know whether we all had guardian angels or shared the same one, but I know whoever kept watch over my brother worked over time. Two stories in particular come to mind. When Tim was small for some reason my mom had some Castor beans. Knowing they were deadly poison, she buried them in the bottom of a container full of other seed packets. They were on the very bottom. As she vacuumed her carpet one day, she heard a voice call out to her, "Arlene!" Thinking she was hearing things she continued to vacuum but the voice called out again. "Arlene!" Mom rounded the corner to the other room just as her little boy started to put a Castor bean into his mouth. He had emptied the container and found the bean-like seeds at the very bottom.

Another time there was a loud knock at the front door where an angry neighbor stood with my brother by the arm. The man was visibly shaken and relayed the story of how he had come out of his house and gotten into his car to go to work. Somehow he had been unable to turn the key in the ignition. "I was compelled to get out and walk around my car," he said. On doing so he had found my brother sitting behind the rear wheel. I don't know whether you believe in God or not, but I find it hard to believe that evolution could come up with an explanation for stories like this.