selling themselves. In many cases, they have a better chance of getting hired if they are interviewed by other computer programmers or draftsmen instead of the personnel department. Likewise, showing a portfolio of work will help convince skeptical employers who are nervous about giving a job to an autistic person. I've known people who are engaged in satisfying jobs as varied as elevator repair, bike repair, computer programming, graphic arts, architectural drafting, and laboratory pathology. Most of these jobs use the visualization talents that many people with autism have. For instance, a good mechanic runs the engine in his mind to figure out what is wrong with it. People with autism who have savantlike memorization skills are good at cataloguing and reshelving books at the library. Piano tuning is another job they are good at, because many people with autism have perfect pitch.
I still remember taking that vital first step in establishing my credibility in the livestock industry. I knew if I could get an article published in the Arizona Farmer Ranchman, I could go on from there. While I was attending a rodeo, I walked up to the publisher of the magazine and asked him if he would be interested in an article on the design of squeeze chutes. He said he would be, and the following week I sent in an article entitled «The Great Headgate Controversy.» It discussed the pros and cons of different types of chutes. Several weeks later I received a call from the magazine; they wanted to take my picture at the stockyards. I just could not believe it. It was plain old nerve that got me my first job. That was in 1972. From then on I wrote for the magazine regularly while I was working on my master's degree.
Publishing articles led to a job of designing cattle chutes at Corral Industries, a large feedlot construction company. I was still living in my visual-symbol world, and I needed concrete representations of advancement in the cattle industry. I wore a green work uniform with cattle pins on the collar like a soldier's rank insignia. I started out as a private, with bronze cattle pins, and as I became recognized in the industry I awarded myself high-ranking silver or gold cattle pins. I was totally oblivious to the fact that other people regarded my uniform as ridiculous.
Emil Winnisky, the construction manager at Corral Industries, recognized my talents, and he helped me to dress and act more appropriately. He had his secretaries take me shopping for nicer clothes and teach me better grooming. Now I wear a more appropriate western shirt, but I still award myself an advancement in cattle rank and put two silver cattle pins on my collar.
At the time, I resented Emil's intrusion into my dress and grooming habits, but today I realize he did me a great favor. With much embarrassment I remember the day that he plunked a jar of Arid deodorant on my desk and told me that my pits stank. People with autism need to be counseled on clothing and grooming. Tight or scratchy clothes make paying attention to work impossible, and many cosmetics cause allergic reactions, so each person needs to find stylish, comfortable clothes that do not irritate overly sensitive skin and deodorant and other cosmetics free from perfume (I have severe allergic reactions to perfumes). Shaving is a problem for some autistic men because of tactile oversensitivity, which makes a razor feel like a power sander. Electric razors are often easier to tolerate.
While I was working at Corral Industries I would visit the Swift meat-packing plant once a week. There I met Tom Rohrer, the manager, who was to become one of my most important mentors in the work world. The main thing Tom did for me at first was to tolerate my presence, plain and simple. I was still talking too much, but he put up with me because I figured out clever ways to solve problems, such as using plastic milk hoses to pad the edges of gates and prevent bruises. Gradually the superintendent, Norb Goscowitz, and the foremen took an interest in me. Several times Norb told me that he was advising me the same way he would advise his own daughter.
A year later, I sold Swift the contract to build a new cattle ramp for Corral Industries. During construction of this project, I learned that being technically right was not always socially right. I criticized some sloppy welding in a very tactless way, and the workers got angry. Harley Winkleman, the plant engineer, gave me some good advice. He told me, «You must apologize to the workers before a small problem turns into a big cancer.» He made me go to the cafeteria and apologize, and he helped me learn to criticize more tactfully.
A year later, I got into more social hassles at the plant, and Tom defended me after I annoyed the president of Swift. I naively believed that every employee who worked there would put loyalty to the company first. The president was embarrassed when I wrote him a letter about mistakes on an equipment installation at another Swift plant. He did not appreciate my finding problems in his operation. From this I learned that loyalty to the best interests of the company was often not the primary motivator for another person's actions. I will never forget that when the going got really rough, Norb told me, «No matter what, you must always persevere.»
I quit the job at Corral Industries and continued to write for the Arizona Farmer Ranchman while I started my design business on a freelance basis. Freelancing enabled me to avoid many of the social problems that can occur at a regular job. It meant I could go in, design a project, and leave before I got into social difficulties. I still don't easily recognize subtle social cues for trouble, though I can tell a mile away if an animal is in trouble.
When a new manager took over the Arizona Farmer Ranchman, I did not realize that he thought I was weird and I was in danger of being fired. A fellow employee told me that he was turned off by me. My pal Susan saw the warning signs, and she helped me assemble a portfolio of all my articles. After the manager saw how many good articles I had written, he gave me a raise. This experience taught me that to sell my services to clients, I always had to have a portfolio of drawings and photos of completed projects. I learned to avoid social problems by limiting my discussions with clients to technical subjects and avoiding gossip about the social life of the people I worked with.
Employers who hire people with autism must be aware of their limitations. Autistic workers can be very focused on their jobs, and an employer who creates the right environment will often get superior performance from them. But they must be protected from social situations they are unable to handle. An autistic man who had successfully worked at an architectural firm for many years was fired when he was promoted to a position that involved customer contact. Another man lost his job at a lab after he got drunk with other employees. Employers need to educate their employees about autism so that an autistic person is not placed in a social situation that he or she can't handle.
But for every Mr. Carlock or Tom Rohrer, there will always be people who make life difficult. I remember the time when I drove into Scottsdale feed yard and walked up to the door that led into the cattle working area, and a man named Ron put his hand on the door and said that no girls were allowed. Back in the early seventies, no women worked in feedlots. Today many do, and many yards prefer women for handling and doctoring cattle, because they are gentler than men. But back then I didn't know which was my greater handicap, being a woman or having autism.
Attempting to get into a man's world was difficult enough. When I started designing facilities at meat plants, I had my car decorated with bull testicles and was constantly given «gross-out» tours. I had to get dressed in the men's bathroom when I worked at the dairy at Arizona State University. At one plant I was shown the blood pit on three separate occasions. During the third walk through the blood, I stamped my feet and splattered it all over the plant manager. He respected me after he saw that I knew how to operate the equipment. What people call sexual harassment today is nothing compared to what I went through.
Though he will never know it, when Ron blocked the door that led to the cattle working area, he instantly transformed a small, insignificant wood door in a fence into a special symbolic door in my pantheon of door symbols. Any event that actually involved a door being blocked seemed like part of a grand plan that God had in store for me. My visual-symbol world enabled me to keep on going. A blocked door had to be conquered. True to form, I was like a bull filled with pure determination. Nothing was going to stop me.
Update: Autism/Asperger's and Careers
I am very concerned about careers for people with high-functioning autism or Asperger's syndrome. Since Thinking in Pictures was written, more and more really gifted students are being labeled as having Asperger's. I am worried that some of these students will have their careers hindered by the label. The students I am most concerned about are the very bright students who are not being challenged at school and who misbehave because they are bored. In some schools these students are kept out of gifted and talented classes due to the Asperger's label.
I was a miserable, bored student and I did not study until I was mentored by Mr. Carlock, my high school science teacher. Over the years I have observed that the high-functioning autistic individuals who became
