Agitated

Charlie smiled through getting off the bus, snacking and getting on his bike.

He cried and yelped through most of the ride. After dinner, while typing, we knew he was unsettled and this was simply apparent when he cried throughout a second walk.

We ran into two dog walkers, a group of teenagers (who kindly moved aside when I asked so Charlie could hasten down the sidewalk; I smelled their cigarettes), the wonderful neighbor with an Asperger's son who volunteered to be the emergency contact person for Charlie, and an older man in a For Members Only sort of jacket.

We got in the house and Charlie tried to pull down the refrigerator. Jim was there and then we all congregated (if that is the word) at the foot of the stairs, Charlie breathing hard. He tried to grab from where he sat in the brown chair and hit his head on the wall twice. He sat and calmed and he grabbed the red square mat and twice pounded it on the floor.

He said 'bedtime' several times but Jim and I said quietly we would all sit together for some more minutes.

Jim went to sit with Charlie when did go up to bed, after leaving his shoes and sweatshirt in a careful array on the floor. At Jim's request, I brought up a can of soda and the shaver.

It might seem not the most sensible thing to give a kid tapering off from a behavior storm a shave. Jim did: He shaves Charlie every day, not totally evenly as often Charlie says 'no shave' after Jim has just done a little.

Aside from more weather changes -- cool, windy, rainy -- Charlie is fully aware that I am to take a super fast trip to California next Saturday evening as my cousin -- I remember when she was a baby; I was about 15 when she was born; my sister and I were flower girls when her mother married her father -- is getting married. I am taking a red eye there and a red eye back so I'll actually be in California for less than 24 hours and back to New Jersey by around 8am on Monday morning. We've done a social story, given Charlie quiet advance notice.

I'm remembering Jim's Boston trip.

I am sure, despite all efforts, Charlie is convinced I am really going to Greece.