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Beany Brain Newsletter #29: The Reason I Write
Abigail Munday
February 18, 2025
Beany Brain: loving our jumping-bean brains!
Welcome to this issue of the Beany Brain! I hope today’s newsletter will bounce us up as we contemplate the upsides and challenges of being neurodivergent, a little beauty, some creativity, and just general yeehawesomeness.
Table of Contents
Photo by Abigail Munday
The Reason I Jump
Have you ever read Naoki Higashida’s brilliant book, The Reason I Jump?
Naoki was 13 when he wrote it in 2007, and it was translated into English from Japanese in 2013.
I read it years ago, pre-diagnosis, and wanted to dig back into its pages again recently.
Our prefectural library has it in English, so I jumped on it!
Again.
This is one that I could put into my rotation. My spinning stimming rotation.
The format of the book is 58 questions that Naoki answers, and please bear in mind that he’s autistic and mostly nonverbal, so he’s answering in writing on his computer.
I am verbal and I’m not a teenage Japanese boy, but I could relate to many of Naoki’s answers.
Question 11: “Why don’t you make eye contact when you’re talking?”
Naoki’s answer:
True, we don’t look at people’s eyes very much. ‘Look whoever you’re talking with properly in the eye’ I’ve been told, again and again and again, but I still can’t do it. To me, making eye contact with someone I’m talking to feels a bit creepy, so I tend to avoid it.
Then, where exactly am I looking? You might well suppose that we’re just looking down, or at the general background. But you’d be wrong. What we’re actually looking at is the other person’s voice. Voices may not be visible things, but we’re trying to listen to the other person with all of our sense organs. When we’re fully focused on working out what the heck it is you’re saying, our sense of sight sort of zones out. If you can’t make out what it is you’re seeing, it’s the same as not seeing anything at all.
What’s bothered me for a long time is this idea people have, that so long as we’re keeping eye contact while they’re talking to us, that alone means we’re taking in every word. Ha! If only that was all it took, my disability would have been cured a long, long time ago…
Naoki’s answers are all enlightening and profound, and I exactly understand “looking at the other person’s voice.” This is why phone calls and face masks (in English or Japanese) make my understanding of the conversation that much harder for me. (And yes, I wear face masks as needed. I’m not against them by any stretch.)
Question 25 is the jumping question that connects to the book’s title: “What’s the reason you jump?”
And Naoki’s answer is also the reason I write. He says, “But when I’m jumping, it’s as if my feelings are going upwards to the sky.”
In his introduction, he writes:
You can’t judge a person by their looks. But once you know the other person’s inner self, both of you can be that much closer. From your point of view, the world of autism must look like a deeply mysterious place. So please, spare a little time to listen to what I have to say.
And have a nice trip through our world.
Thank you, Beany Brain readers, for sparing a little time to read my words every week.
(And don’t miss the fantastic swirly and geometric artwork by Kai & Sunny in Naoki’s book.)
Photo by Abigail Munday
Book? Books? Or Books Books Books?
What the hey.
Let’s just make this whole newsletter about books, shall we.
I’ve always escaped into books, even when I was young. Libraries were my happy place, then (and now), especially the big downtown Orlando library near Lake Eola and our local neighborhood library in Orlando on Edgewater Drive. It was a storefront, and not attractive, but it was what was inside that drew me in.
I thought the librarians were superheros. (I still think that.)
Orlando’s Edgewater Drive library branch, 10 years ago, Google image
What is breaking my heart right this second is that when I searched for my beloved library, Uncle Google tells me that it’s permanently closed. When I look at the Orlando library branches, there are fewer now than when I was younger.
That’s really sad.
Libraries are a public institution. What happened to the billionaires who paid taxes and built libraries?
Libraries are a public good.
Libraries grow minds, provide safe spaces, and inspire children and adults.
I meant to focus just on books for this section, but I need a moment to grieve…
In my younger days, I used to flip through the card catalogs at that Edgewater branch for my essays for school. I borrowed stacks and stacks of books to read for pleasure and for projects for school. (And sometimes those two kinds of books overlapped.)
As a single adult and high-school English teacher I went to book talks by authors there.
And as a mother of young boys, I took my kids to the Colonial Drive branch and a couple other nearby branches many times for music events like a mini concert for harp, biology events involving baby alligators (yes, a real one peed on the library carpet, much to everyone’s delight, including mine), science/magic shows, and just to browse the tons of wonderful books. (One time I even saw a used copy of a book that I had copyedited on a discount sale table near the door for like a dollar. Oh well. I hadn’t liked it either. I didn’t buy it.)
Libraries are a neurodivergent person’s dream.
At least this neurodivergent person’s dream.
The books they contain provide soul food.
Brain food.
Imagination food.
Of course, as Anne of Green Gables would say if she had had access to a local library, they’re full of scope for the imagination.
Maybe it’s my ADHD, oh have mercy, but I’m currently reading at least 5 books.
Yes, it’s true.
Oh, wait. 6! There’s one I started yesterday that was a free e-book download from Lynn Joseph, an author from Trinidad whose work I love. Have you ever read The Color of My Words? You really should. Anyway, the free e-book is totally different, about Black American young 20-somethings on a college semester in Florence. It’s so well written, but in a romance-travel-Instagrammy genre that I wouldn’t normally try. Too many selfies and too much fashion talk. But as I get nearer to the end, I’m liking it more—it turns out there’s some unexpected depth.
And I definitely need books for humo(u)r.
Have you read the two books by Richard Peck in the photo at the beginning of this section?
One of my sons and I absolutely snort-laugh when we read them, and we read passages aloud to each other to share the hilarity too. Grandma Dowdel is one of the best-written and funniest characters ever.
Shmoop says this about her:
Joey Dowdel may be the narrator of A Long Way from Chicago, but Grandma Dowdel is the star. She's nuttier than a Snickers bar, more independent than a cat, and more full of energy than a Formula 1 car.
In short: she's larger than life.
Grandma Dowdel also has an insistent and profound sense of justice. Read the books and let me know what you think. I’m pretty sure she could fix a few things nowadays round these here parts.
What are you reading?
What’s your favorite library?
Send me some suggestions for your bestest funniest books. I need some more snort-laughs. We’re reaching Critical Snort-Laugh Necessity.
Photo by Abigail Munday
Yeehawesome!
Yeehawesome! is a happy-brain roundup in each issue of Beany Brain. What’s happening that’s good in brain land? What’s bringing me joy?
Old Japanese bathtubs are put to good use as raincatchers in gardens here. In the summer, they’re full of cute croaking frogs, and in the winter they hold snow and ice. Good idea, hey! (I’d rather the bathtubs collect the cold stuff than us having to shovel it.)
America’s Test Kitchen’s Proof podcast episode called “The Lost Crops of Sapelo Island.” I listened to it when it first aired in 2023 and then again when they replayed it the other day. Now I want to go to Sapelo Island in the US state of Georgia and meet the Saltwater Geechee people who live there and are trying to save the crops they’ve grown for centuries, especially purple sugar cane and red peas. The Geechee people are descendants of slaves and are fighting not just for their crops from the encroaching rising sea and ever-bigger hurricanes, but also fighting to save their land from developers on the mainland. If you want to learn more about them or buy some of their produce and products, go to saveourlegacyourself.org. The syrups and dried peas look sooooo delicious, and I definitely want to order one of their T-shirts next time I’m in the US. I don’t know what it is about it, but I’m fascinated by their Geechee culture and tenacity and love of good food and community.
Bowling! It really is one of my happy places. It has to be at a more traditional bowling alley and not a super-modern-flashy-lights-and-screens-everywhere alley.
Beany Brownie Points and Extra Bonus Funniness
Wonderful Wednesday
Wonderful Wednesday was a day once a year in college when they would suddenly and surprisingly call off all classes and we’d play all day. The cafeteria provided special fun food and we’d do stuff outside like slip ‘n slides and jello wrestling in sumo suits. This segment of Beany Brain is dedicated to that memory of silliness and fun—no words, just a photo from the week that I’ve taken or found that reminds me to let the joy in. Since Beany Brain is published on Wednesday every week (at least, Wednesday in Japan), I hope you enjoy this Wonderful Wednesday.
Photo by Abigail Munday
Today’s Beany-full Summary:
Grab a book and you’ll grab some happiness.
Go forth in Beany joy. What will help you feel yeehawesome this week?
Thank you for reading this installment of Beany Brain! You’re very welcome to hop on by any old time.
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