Asperger's / Autism Toolbox
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Asperger's / Autism ToolboxH EO M Toolbox OriginHow This Website Came to Be |
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Welcome! The Asperger's / Autism Toolbox is an exclusively Aspie (person with Asperger's) designed and run Website, done entirely by a single individual, within hosting and a domain I pay for myself, and without the aid of (or need for) any outside funding. I operate my site from the state of New York, but I like to include resources from other nations. In some cases, I think that's where some of the best stuff is to be found. I'm using the name Monkey Pliers as a fun screen name, in connection with this site. It went online August 1st, 2012, so as to make the ASD/Asperger's alert cards I had designed available. The rest of the site remains under construction until official launch, which will not be announced until all areas of the site contain sufficient content. My goal is to have it done sometime in the first half of October, though life often intervenes, in spite of even the best laid plans. I had several goals in mind while designing this Website. It's really an outgrowth of a small resource section at my original Website, which has an entirely different theme. Quite frankly, I needed more room to expand, and I wanted to narrow the focus to mostly serve adults on the autism spectrum and those who care about us. Kids and their parents need lots of help, but adults are frequently left feeling rather underserved. With that in mind, I wanted to make a place where people new to learning about the autism spectrum and those familiar with it who might be interested in additional resources, beyond what they already knew about, could stop in and find what they might be looking for. I hoped to promote self-help and self-advocacy. I was looking to have the ideas and opinions of people on the spectrum become known to the rest of the world. And I wanted a home for that ASD/Asperger's alert card I'd made, as well as links to cards designed by others. Out of much discussion on Wrong Planet came my ideas for my card, as well as the notion that there should be many choices available, all easily located. Some options already existed, but not everyone knew where to find them or was happy with what they could find. I wanted variety, and I wanted at least some of the options to be spectrumite (person on the autism spectrum) designed. That desire tied right into the notion that we should have the opportunity to speak for ourselves. Once my card was made, because it contained the Web address where it could be found, I had to upload my site, so that anyone seeing the address could actually go there to find the card. That meant uploading before anything else was ready, other than the homepage. Work then continued on other areas, gradually building up the collection of resources to be presented. The idea was to present what I felt was the best of what I'd encountered out there so far, during my own search. I didn't want others to have to feel overwhelmed by the task of sorting through all the many results that come up if you don't know what you need and simply go to a search engine, type in "autism" or "Asperger's", and hope for the best. There are different kinds of resources, and you sometimes may not know what you actually need until you bump right into it. This site is intended to save you some trouble by presenting things in categories, so you can see what strikes you and follow that path to find out if it really leads to where you want to go. In considering my own sensitivities, I attempted to make the colors used here be cheerful but not glaring. My use of lines, spacing, and alternation of text colors are intended to break up blocks of text, so that they appear in more manageable chunks and become less daunting to read through. Categories on the homepage are listed in friendly language, offering two different ways of thinking about the area to be explored. My hope is that this will help trigger the minds of people who think in different ways, aiding a greater number of people in deciding which resources they might like to explore. I've put links and descriptions in blocks to separate them more clearly from each other than a simple list might, in order to help prevent fatigue during a search. This site is not graphics intensive, and I hope that will be of benefit to those who have older, slower computers or who live in areas where their Internet connection may be slow. I know my methods may not work well for everyone, but I hope it's at least different enough from the usual that it's more fun to poke around here. The MindWithoutWalls designed "Impossible Cube Entangled In Impossible Cylinder" appearing at the top and bottom of every page, a modification of pete1061's "Square Peg, Round Hole" design, also grew out of Wrong Planet discussion with other spectrumites. Lots of creative and appealing ideas were put forth, and no single design met with universal agreement. My personal feeling is that, while the "Square Peg, Round Hole" design can work for all of us on the spectrum, something a bit different might be needed for Asperger's in particular. Some prefer something like a Möbius strip in rainbow colors, and I can support that. It represents our really neat, unique "twist" of simplicity and complexity, as well as the diversity within our group. Others might like to be represented by some kind of computer part or other technical device, and I also understand that desire. Many of us are technically inclined, and many of us who are not still depend on technology to express ourselves and find ways to connect with the rest of the world. But I chose the MindWithoutWalls design for various reasons. Complexity is one, which the entanglement displays. Impossibility is another. Neither the cube nor the cylinder can exist in 3D space, though, at first glance, they may appear as though they could. But both can exist just fine in a 2D environment. Other people may find us "impossible" at times, but we do just fine in environments that accommodate our needs, whether they are of our own making or made by adapting an environment originally suited for others. The third reason for selecting this design is that it involves relationship. Many of us have managed to enter relationships of different sorts, including romantic. This is certainly not always easy, but some of us manage it well enough to be deeply involved in long term partnership before we even know we're on the spectrum. In fact, some of us are even with partners who are also on the spectrum! (Sometimes this can be more like the irresistible force meeting the immovable object...) My fourth reason is that this design is similar enough to the more simple one that it gets across the idea that we're all on the same spectrum, just in different places. My plan, as I finish work on this site, is to move from creating a resource point consisting largely of links to other people's work to engaging in more active spectrum-related pursuits of my own, somewhere out in the world. Depending on what I end up doing, the site may evolve accordingly. But I hope it will always serve well, meeting the needs of the autism community in a way that is easy to navigate, pleasant to use, and fruitful to explore. Thanks for stopping by! |
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