At bedtime today, Myron demonstrated a couple of new developments.
First: play cooking / feeding! He started by picking up a lotion sample and feeding it to his dog lamp.

Later, I tried to read a book to him (Corduroy) while he was repeatedly climbing up and down a stool in his room. He half paid attention to the book. I finished it and he was still doing his climbing.

Then he went over to his storage shelves and said “make some”. He did some hand waving over there and then ran back over to me.

And he flung his hands forward as if he was throwing something at me. He was very aggressive with his table service at some points.

Click through to the post to see a video of the service. This part was relatively gentle flinging, but you can get the idea.

Then he said “oatmeal”, so I realized he was play cooking oatmeal for me. I pretended to eat it and said it was delicious. He brought me at least 10 servings of it. I lost count. People have mentioned he has a long attention span. I understand this! It is an exciting thing to see him express, because my tendency for extreme focus is a part of me that is sometimes hard to fit into a balanced lifestyle. I hope to help him lean into it and also find some balance with it.

Once I heard a podcast about the composer Maurice Ravel and some degenerative neurological condition he had, which was debilitating toward the end, but when it was starting to take effect, it had this wonderful impact on his work which allowed him to focus on a repetitive element and express it in its full glory. This is when he composed Boléro. If you know that piece, you will know exactly what I mean.

The second development (maybe – it’s hard to say if he was doing this intentionally. It’s also hard to say if it is new or he has been doing it for a while) was delay tactics.
When Myron was making oatmeal, I also asked for raisins and then bananas and strawberries. He thought about each one and went to a new place to get each ingredient.

Eventually Em used the radio on his baby monitor to say, “it’s time for bed”.