D.4. Art Therapy
I was asked to write about Art Therapy. Here are my thoughts: Evidence of art therapy goes back to the Paleolithic Age in Spain and France, approximately 40,000 years ago, when horses were a popular form of self-expression on … Continue reading →
D.1. What is abnormal
In Abnormal Psychology, we read about the case of Mr. Zell Kravinsky in light of how each define behavior as “abnormal.” His case is available online. Here are my thoughts about labeling him: Power lives in the gift of … Continue reading →
Term Essay – Sound, Light, and Health
This paper explores intimately profound experiences in dimensions of sound and light and how they relate to stress. Now that I hear through both ears, I am operating as a different person. I am quietly discovering new ways to hold … Continue reading →
This Morning You Woke With Autism, and You Can’t Speak – Pt 4
With every autistic nonverbal communicator who uses words to communicate rather than the silly pictures forced on them in life skills, comes a keyboard. Is a simple keyboard just letters in a pattern? For kept-silent mutants of autism, it is … Continue reading →
This Morning You Woke With Autism, and You Can’t Speak – Pt 3
Great love develops patiently within what lost humanity has sorted as so much impossibility. By God’s grace, someone discovered your ability to communicate by typing. Now you want to be known within the family of talkers as able, but the … Continue reading →
This Morning You Woke With Autism, and You Can’t Speak – Pt 2
Yesterday’s traumas of assault on secured rights to an education inseparate from others are operative from the day of your diagnosis. While quiet incompetence is demonstrated by most speakers, what your subculture has is behavior reports and weak potent testing … Continue reading →
This Morning You Woke With Autism, and You Can’t Speak – Pt 1
An Essay by John Smyth, October 11, 2016 Your body doesn’t work as it should. Only your senses inspire confidence. What sounds or smells normal is magnified ten times with no buffer from effects. Sight sees shiny brightness and glare … Continue reading →
The Nonverbal Autistic’s Guide to Aeronautics and Love
An Essay by John Smyth, September 19, 2016 1. Who Says You Can’t Fly? Nonverbal autistics always hold a “trapped” perspective about life. We are generally oppressed physically and socio-economically, denied educations, and prepared for institutional warehousing until our deaths. … Continue reading →
A Model of Christian Faith
Wonderful Father John Duncan is a model of Christian faith for me. Kind, sincere in his words, restful of sensitive service to others, and always quietly praying for holiness, he is my life’s best model. Seasoned with dear love, sincerely … Continue reading →
A thank you to my high school autism support person as I head to college
As I was preparing to start my college life at Marian University in a few weeks, I wanted to send out a big Thank You to one of people integral to my achievements, my support person at Brownsburg High School, … Continue reading →
A Place to Work From – The Civil Rights Movement
In this presentation I relate how African-Americans’ fight for their Civil Rights 50 years ago mirrors the autistic community’s fight for equal opportunities and the “presumption of competence” today.
Continue reading →To Kill a Mockingbird Movie Analysis (Revised)
[Note: This essay has been revised to fix typographical and grammatical errors, and to repair or add reference links.] When seemingly busy, upstanding citizens of a small town in the rural southern farming district of Maycomb, Alabama in 1932 make … Continue reading →
Presume Us Competent: Educational Right for the Nonverbal Autistic
April 29, 2015 Lost patiently and past hope are tens of thousands of nonverbal autistics. They have given up hope that anyone will find them in the cold isolation of their condition. Leaping almost destructively from the legal analysis applied … Continue reading →
My Solution to Provide Nonverbal Autistics with Gen Ed School Credits
Education Overview The number of nonverbal autistics is growing [1 in 68 children; 1 in 42 boys]. The professional organizations consider them incompetent and deny them a general education. The parents spend time and resources fighting for their child’s rights, … Continue reading →
From Waste to Wonder: The Journey of Our Souls – Part 2, A Call to Action
This is the conclusion of the presentation my dad and I gave at the Syracuse University Institute on Communication and Inclusion (ICI) Summer Institute on July 29, 2014. Read “From Waste to Wonder: The Journey of Our Souls – Part … Continue reading →
From Waste to Wonder: The Journey of Our Souls – Part 1, A Search for Acceptance and Equality
My dad and I gave this presentation at the Syracuse University Institute on Communication and Inclusion (ICI) Summer Institute on July 29, 2014 From Waste to Wonder, Part 1: A Search for Acceptance and Equality Working with power would have … Continue reading →
Authentic John’s First Book Soon to be Released
“Authentic John” Smyth, an autistic nonverbal, is an expert in isolation and escape from isolation to a life of contribution. In his soon-to-be-released first published book, “From Autism’s Tomb,” John reveals life secrets from from the profound Silence that holds … Continue reading →
Celebrating the Good Times, and the Bad
August 17, 2015 When I eulogized my friend Jake at his funeral and moved so many persons lost in grief to lift themselves with a standing ovation, I was transformed from one who could not really see himself as a … Continue reading →
Unbroken, the Movie
I wrote this review of the movie: While moviegoers struggle with the authenticity of Selma, a legend of incredible depth of spirit waits for every heart in the true story of an immigrant who couldn’t speak English and learned to … Continue reading →
They Wait for Us
This is my response to a kindly teacher who wrote a Christmas note to me- Dear Mrs. ______, Thank you for your kind and thoughtful letter. Assuming awesomeness about your family and songs of happiness in your home. Long writing … Continue reading →
No Voice at CHS- in honor of Andrew Simmons and Peyton Sparks
A famous essay of mine that’s been listed and discussed but never published. From 5-22-2011. In honor of Andrew Simmons and Peyton Sparks’s efforts to be educated in Evansville, Indiana and St. Louis, Missouri. No Voice at CHS I was … Continue reading →
Joking Jake Willmann, a tribute
We are here as a testament to a young man who never spoke a word. The day I met Jake at Little Star School, I was reminded of Saint Peter. To me he was a walking witness, loving honesty above … Continue reading →
A Letter to My Congressman
I wrote this letter a few weeks ago and mailed it to Congressman Todd Rokita. Mr. Rokita is Chairman of the House Subcommittee on Early Childhood, Elementary and Secondary Education. He proposed The CHOICE Act, which would help typers like … Continue reading →
Our Starry Night at TPCC
This is a story for my school newspaper- “When I was planted in a prom for the disabled at Traders Point Christian Church (“TPCC”) as a spy for The Reveille on November 7, wonders about what such a dance would … Continue reading →
Amazing Opportunities to Grow
This is an article for my next story in the school paper: “Patient power, with gifts quietly living in each of us, sleeps peacefully. Its mate, lasting love nurtures each of our beings. Life is in our corner and cheers … Continue reading →
An Autistic’s View of Ferguson
I am working to understand what happened in Ferguson, like everyone else. I work quietly to understand how, with an African American president, attorney general, and heads of so many agencies, we live through looting and sacrificial waste on quiet … Continue reading →
Our Unreal Reality
This is the first draft of my first article for the school paper: We students are trapped in a reality we did not choose. The school system we are in, the teachers we have, the courses we take and the … Continue reading →
An Essay for College Entrance
Assignment- Given your personal background, describe an experience that illustrates what you would bring to the diversity in a college community, or an encounter that demonstrated the importance of diversity to you. My response: Queerly, words would autistically stick in … Continue reading →
My Intro to the High School Newspaper
Awesome salute to my fans from John Smyth. I am the voice of peace, wisdom and love. As a writer, I share the perspective of the voiceless minority of suffering “incompetents” in an incompetent world. Quietly, our inabilities are minor … Continue reading →
My Credo
For English today, I was asked to choose 10 line starters and write this credo for myself: My Credo by John Smyth I am authentic, inspiring, expert about autism and isolation and coming out of it, an advocate … Continue reading →