COMFORT
is today's theme at Photo Friday. Maybe you'd be surprised to learn that the little boy in this photo has autism. In fact, my own autistic son, Henry, is so affectionate that this delayed his diagnosis...learned doctors would frown, puzzled, and say "Well, he has many of the symptoms of autism, but he's just too affectionate!" Hmm. Here is my friend Katie getting a reassuring hug from her sweet son J during some fleeting moment of anxiety. So much for the myth of refrigerator mothers and their unemotional autistic children.

IT WAS JUST A HUG

out of nowhere
from my three-year-old.
In the softness
of his encircling arms,
and velvet cheek
pressed to my side,
I thought, please,
in times ahead
of anger, pain,
and disappointment,
when fate crushes,
love wounds,
and friends betray,
let me recall
this moment as
a blanket around my heart.

~Ann Reisfeld Boutte