What happened to my little boy that use to terrorize worms?

It doesn't seem that long ago that my little boy Andy used to get so excited to find worms in the garden - just to terrorize them. He used to think it was cool to cut them in pieces, smash them, drown them and anything else that caused them terror.

This afternoon as I was planting peas, he spotted a really fat worm and asked for it. As I handed it to him, I wondered how long the worm would live. It seems that the little boy that took great pride in the number of ways he could harm a worm has grown up. Today he studied the worm from all angles, stroked it gently and them put it back in the garden alive and unharmed. "Go and dig some holes for oxygen for roots, Wormy" the boy said.

Hard to believe that the little boy who was in preschool when I started this blog is now an 11 year old fifth grade middle schooler. Where has the time gone? The middle school that he attends is an E-STEM designated school - the E stands for Environment. He is really learning to take good care of the earth. The T stands for technology and the school recently handed out iPads to everyone of its students - good bye books and notebooks. The iPads are school property and have to be returned at the end of the school year but it is really cool to not lug around all those books and be able to record all of their data right on their iPads. So very different from when I went to school in the dark ages.

The boy still has autism and still has a severe learning disability. But it is harder to see those issues as he grows. I continue to hope that he will grow into a self sufficient adult.

I think the worms are safe in my garden once more.