Differently Abled Mothers and Deadly Butter

Last night I went to my sons school to celebrate it's 40th birthday. We're sitting at the beautifully decorated table eating the catered dinner when one of the moms who sees me opening a pat of butter warns me that it is very, very hard. The words are barely out of her mouth when the butter flies out of the package like a hockey puck and hits me smack on the tip of my nose. I'm still reeling with the force of the impact when it then bounces off my nose and flies onto the floor about 2 feet away. The people at the table (all strangers) couldn't even begin to pretend they didn't see this happen. It was clear to me that they were straining to be polite but simply could not control their impulse to explode with laughter. I was laughing so hard food would have come out of my nose had it not been swollen shut from the force of the direct hit. So much for making a good impression. As if that wasn't bad enough I then had to ask my son's teacher if I could write a bad check for the raffle tickets. Don't buy raffle tickets you say? Honey, this is a Catholic school. Not buying a raffle ticket borders on the sacrilegious. And oh, lets not forget the thought of paying $20.00 for dinner when all my son would eat was 1/2 of a dinner roll. Without butter. The good news was it was a magical night with families of other special kids who are the most joy-filled, tolerant , down to earth bunch you'd ever want to break bread with. Or break your nose with. The kids musical performance was so touching. The art work was simply beautiful. I am in utter amazement of both art and music teachers at this school. How do they get these kids with special challenges to create such masterpieces? How do they tap into the creative energy of a non-verbal or autistic child? How do they get a dyslexic, ADHD child to study Van Gogh or Dali? How is it that every child who leaves the school reads music? The best moment was when my son, who was playing percussion, suddenly left the stage area walks over to me and gives me a kiss. You could hear the audience ooooing and aaaahhing and one dad asking very loudly, "How come our kids never do that?" which brought more laughter. And so is life. You take the good with the bad and after a while you realize something. It's all good.