The journalist Sean Trende spends most of his time dissecting the details of American politics. As senior elections analyst for RealClearPolitics, he’s normally diving into vote counts, redistricting maps, and polling crosstabs. On Friday, however, he published a very different kind of story. It’s about his oldest son, Judson, who is 18 and has profound autism. It’s a beautiful account of fatherhood, family, and why a less than perfect life is still very much worth living. We’re grateful to Sean for letting us share it with you. —The Editors
Friday was a day I’ve dreaded for over a decade. At around 6:20 a.m., we got my oldest son, Judson, up, gave him a bath, put his safety harness on (don’t worry, we dressed him first), and then watched him amble down our driveway to the school bus, as we had almost every school day since fourth grade. He went through whatever class activities he had, came to the end of the day, and got ready to ride the bus home, as he had almost every school day since fourth grade. His teachers and aides wiped their eyes, put him on the bus, and off he went, just the same as he’d done almost every school day since fourth grade.
Judson was a senior in high school. He also has profound autism. He’s 18 years old, and while he blessedly has some capacity for speech, I’ve never had what you would call a conversation with him. And I assume (though I can’t really know) that he had no clue that Friday wasn’t just any old school day like he’s had since fourth grade. Two days ago, Judson Hancock Trende had his last day of class. He got off that bus, and he’ll never get back on. When his schedule-obsessed brain prompts him to seek reassurance by asking “School tomorrow?” today, the same way he has every Sunday for well over a decade, we will have to figure out a way to let him know that, no, there’s no school tomorrow, and not the next day or the next one. Not ever.
