Life, Animated Page #3

Right.

Pretty excited of what's

gonna happen for you, bud.

Yeah.

You got a lot more chapters to write.

A lot more chapters to write.

- I'll be the tosser.

- Watch how I'm doing it.

If you hold it in your hand like this...

Yeah?

Gus, over there.

Good boy.

Good boy, come on.

- Good boy.

- Come on, boy.

- Come on, Gus.

- Come on, buddy.

- Fetch, Gus. Fetch, Gus.

- Where is it, Gus?

- There's Mommy and Owe.

- Having a little pizza.

Big bite.

We're about a year along

into his silence.

The only thing we seem

to be able to do as a family

is the one thing Owen and Walter liked

to do before the onset of the autism.

They loved to watch

the Disney animated movies.

We realized that was the only thing

that was keeping Owen calm

and making him happy, and so Owen

and his older brother Walter

would watch these together.

I didn't know what autism was.

I just knew that autism made

Owen the way he is.

So autism kind of just meant different...

Drastically different.

So Disney was my chance to have

Owen really light up around me

and was something

we can come together over.

So, one day,

we're up in the bedroom.

We're watching The Little Mermaid.

And, you know, Owen

would be speaking sort of gibberish,

and he had been saying,

"Juicervose, juicervose, juicervose."

He's murmuring something called...

He's saying, "Juicervose, juicervose."

Now, Cornelia thinks

he wants more juice.

She gives him the sippy cup.

He doesn't want it. He knocks it over.

It's gibberish.

Owen's watching the part

where Ariel, the mermaid,

has to trade something

to become human.

Go ahead.

Make your choice.

I'm a very busy woman,

and I haven't got all day

It won't cost much,

just your voice.

Owen rewinds. Weir's like,

"Owen, just watch the movie."

Owen rewinds a second time.

Third time,

Cornelia grabs me and says,

"It's not 'juice."' I said,

"What?" "It's not 'juice.' It's 'just."'

Just your voice.

I grab Owen,

and I say, "Just your voice."

And he says, "Juicervose,

juicervose, juice..."

It's the first time

he looks at me in a year.

Of course, we read

every possible meaning

into the fact he picks

those three words.

"Just your voice."

Silent child.

The first thing he says.

He's still in there.

He's still in there.

We go and see a doctor,

and we tell him about

our amazing "juicervose" moment,

and he's like, "Well,

let me explain this to you.

"This is... You better sit down.

I know you're very pumped up here,

but this is called echolalia."

This isn't like a breakthrough,

you know. It's... It's echolalia,

which is just the repeating

of language that they hear.

And I said, "Like a parrot?"

And he's like, "Well, kind of, yeah."

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