Vinny and I walk every day on the boardwalk in Ventnor where we live. This takes from ½ hour to 1 hour according to my stamina. Vinny never gets tired and would literally walk for hours if I could keep up.
The main reason he wants to walk is so that he can eat more food. That is his one and only love. My mother used to say, “Aw that’s all he has!” Well, the problem is he is now 55 and gains weight easily and his health is affected. So, he is on a diet all the time which really keeps him fairly trim.
I found out just recently that Vinny is walking sometimes for 3 hours inside his apartment. I told him that was so great but how in the world can he be that disciplined – O yes, he wants THE FOOD.
The other day I went down the hall to his apartment to put something in there and he was standing in the kitchen holding his huge stuffed dog and when I asked him what he was doing he said, “Taking my dog for a walk.”
From the time we start out on these walks he talks. HE NEVER STOPS TALKING THE WHOLE TIME WE ARE OUT. These conversations revolve around what he will have to eat when he gets home. I used to get so aggravated that I would threaten to just go back home and just start cooking. Sometimes I am more patient and try not to listen but he catches me so I have to be careful.
His other conversations are about EVERYTHING that has happened to him as far back as he can remember, in other words, his whole life story. Because of his autism he can remember everything. He knows dates and times of everything that ever happened around him.
One time we were in a doctor’s office in Turnersville, NJ when we lived there. The doctor happened to be one that 30 years earlier had sought to by my father’s office practice. When Vinny heard the doctor’s name he said, “Didn’t you try to buy Dr. Leonard’s practice?” The doctor was shocked and I said, “Ask him what he had for dinner the day you were there,” and of course he told him. Vinny is an amazing person.
There are more stories I will tell about at another time.
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