Book Club, "Born on a Blue Day"

Last Sunday the BHC Book Club met to discuss Daniel Tammett's Born on a Blue Day. It was an interesting tale of a young man with Asperger's Syndrome, a mild form of autism, and his journey. He was fascinating in that he is also a savant who can do incredibly complex math problems in his head, and he also has synethesia, an overlapping of the senses. He sees numbers in colors and shapes, and Wednesdays, the day he was born, are "blue" in his mind.

It was a triumph for him that he was able to travel to other countries all by himself (his amazing facility with language contributed to that) and also that he was able to find himself a lifelong partner.

We discussed autism and the forms it takes. Sheila used her nephew as an example but others among us have known autistic children and young adults so we were able to contribute to the discussion as well. We also talked about the stigma against autism, mental illness, etc. and whether we would be willing to hire a young man like Daniel. I said, because he does not understand human emotions all that well, I would not assign him to deal with people but I would be happy to hire him to a position where his facility with numbers would be valuable.

As always it was an excellent discussion. Kudos to Sheila!