With his very first art show coming up this April 16th (opening is 1-3 Saturday April 18th 09 so hope to see you there!) I interviewed my lovely, shy techie husband, Chris, on his upcoming exhibition, “Wonderment”, at Jarmbi Gallery at Burrinja Cultural Centre in Upwey, Victoria, Australia.  I asked him how his own Wonderment manifests and how he, as a techie, discovered he was also an artist.  Here’s the audio interview.

Enjoy,

Warmly,

Donna Williams *)

http://www.donnawilliams.net

I was a kid who’d fall out of a tree and never cry.  Winded, bruised, I’d get up and try and keep going, puzzled that I was winded or that a bruised limb wouldn’t move well.  Emotionally, I had ’emotional fits’ several times a day when it was like a laundry basket of unprocessed, undifferentiated emotions would suddenly come to the surface, feeling I was eaten up by tidal waves.  I had no words for these and couldn’t tell what moods were in there, what situations they’d come from, so I’d just rage at myself, biting, hitting, pulling my hair or race around in circles like a tortured animal.  Read the rest of this entry »

At 4.31pm I was sitting at my desk just like I was 2 weeks ago.  Then the whole house rumbled, the foundations, the walls, the very earth.  By the time I realised Melbourne had yet another earthquake, a 4.6 this time (last time was a 4.7), it had stopped.  I strode outside and called to my neighbour.  Did we just have another earthquake?  She wanted to know.  Yep, I said, shocked.  Wild stuff.  Melbourne and earthquakes were always such unlikely dance partners.

Donna Williams

http://www.donnawilliams.net

http://www.myspace.com/donnaandtheaspinauts

  I was reflecting on what it takes for me to be friends.  I’m friendly to all and friends with far fewer.
Sometimes someone will ask what it takes for me to want to be friends especially because I’m very solitary and autonomous.
So, for what its worth, here’s my basics: Read the rest of this entry »

  I do not support thrusting health treatments onto any person without health conditions though I support the right of those with health disorders to treatment.  Health treatments of a person with autism should be based on relieving their health issues – gut, immune, metabolic disorders and perhaps the neurological and psychiatric fallout of these disorders.   Trying to alter an autistic personality through health treatments is ridiculous but one can have an autistic personality with or without serious health disorders and their associated challenges. Read the rest of this entry »

  So many websites have ‘captchas‘ now… those combos of jumbled letters and numbers.  What of the dyslexics who tumble them both?  3 and E, come on guys, they look the same.  A and 4 and 7.  Where’s the difference?  2 and 5 and s?  8 and B?  d and 6 and 9 and b and p and q?  W and M?  Z and N?  I and 1?  F and H?  O and 0?  u and n?  Anyone else have this alphanumerical soup?  When I was 9 I was struggling with lots of these and got through that enough to read even though visual verbal agnosia means I still read without meaning unless I use gestural signing and I still use my BPI tinted lenses for Scotopic Sensitivity so the print doesn’t swim about on the page.  But these ‘captures’, I’m sure I take 3 times longer to get one right than most people.  Ah, they don’t design the world for funky brains like mine.

Donna Williams *)

http://www.donnawilliams.net

http://www.myspace.com/donnaandtheaspinauts 

A reader from Aspergers Parallel Planet, Alyson Bradley, sent me interview questions about the fourth book in my autobiographical series, Everyday Heaven (published by Jessica Kingsley Publishers).  A brave woman indeed for she is diagnosed with Asperger’s, is Dyslexic with learning difficulties and cognitive challenges and not a big reader.  Her questions are interesting.  Here’s our interview. Read the rest of this entry »

  POLITICAL CORRECTNESS IN 3 DIFFERENT AUTISM WORLDS – By Donna Williams.

Whilst there are many political roads one can go in the autism world, I see there are at least three quite BASIC ones : Read the rest of this entry »

  Heidi Everett is an awesome performer so it was a great honor to get this review from her.  Enjoy.  Here it is:

“The gig – ‘Rock and Rebuild’ benefit concert for Victoria’s bushfire crisis, was organised and promoted by Kaine Marsh, head of Finbar Production.  The bands – A very eclectic yet thoroughly charismatic line up of artists who have some sort of connection with the towns affected by the fires. The location – Hurstbridge Oval, an iconic picture of pure Aussieness.

Tigger-dog and I had a visual introduction to Rock and Rebuild as the officially on-time Connex rolled into Hurstbridge station. A sun dried brick of a country oval transformed wonderfully into a fruitful orchard of stalls and country folk milling around a flat bed truck pumping out music with a whole lotta heart. As we lounged around in front of the stage, Donna and the Aspinauts sauntered into their first number and had the audience looking up from their snags to see what the hell had hit them front and centre between the eyes and ears.

A-ha! These were no ordinary folk songs to be kum-by-ya’d around the campfire, no way! As the guys in the Aspinauts band changed gear quicker than a red Ferrari, front-woman Donna kept apace brilliantly with her phonetically charged lyrics and mesmerizing hands shaping the melody like an artist at the easel. I watched, captivated like the crowd around me. Each song blurred deliciously into the next with Donna’s spoken word etching out the poetry of human condition, always so very eloquent and astutely connected to the song the band was about to launch into, such a poignant moment when Donna painted the scene of a blackened landscape, burnt by the very fires this benefit concert set to quell.

The set itself was just the right amount of time for Donna and the Aspinauts own musical genre to be smacked firmly into the hearts and minds of the audience. As a muso myself, I intuitively looked around to see the reaction of people who might not have had the chance to experience such a richly flavoured ensemble before, and as a muso, I can confidently say that The Aspinauts had the crowd in the rather elusive ‘palm of the hand’.

I’ve seen this band a few times now and I thoroughly recommend an audience with a Donna and the Aspinauts event if you are ever given the chance. I say event because they are so much more than just a band playing music, each of your five senses will be buzzing before the end of the first song, and by the end of the show, you’ll be definitely Aspi-fied.”

Heidi Everett

http://www.heidieverett.com.au/Home.html

  Last month, with The Aspinauts, I had the honor of playing with a wonderful performer, Heidi Everett.  This is my interview with her. Read the rest of this entry »