Grouchland
By Katie Blackburn
The first time I hear my son ask to go to Grouchland, I brush off the request with a play-along attitude and try to redirect his attention to school. “Sure, buddy, we can watch Elmo after school today, does that sound fun?” I offer, knowing that one of his beloved Elmo movies takes place in Grouchland. I make sure the enthusiasm in my voice is extra high in an attempt to keep Cannon—my son with limited communication and significant trouble regulating his emotions—calm and happy before I hand him off to his teacher for the day.
He keeps looking out the window of the van and says nothing, but he doesn’t push his own request further either. He asks to go to Grouchland one time, I tell him we can watch Elmo after school one time in response. We pull into the school parking lot, and he doesn’t say anything else about Grouchland.
That is, until the next morning, when we pull in near the school again.
“I want to go to Grouchland!” Cannon tells me again, this time with much more emphasis than the day before. He leans his body toward the van window as far as the seat belt will extend, as if he is going to hop out and walk himself there, to wherever the Grouchland in his mind exists in the world.
“Okay, Cannon,” I tell him calmly. “We can watch Elmo after school again today,” I offer the same consolation as the day before, hoping this will alleviate the tension I feel building from the obvious energy in Cannon’s body as he bounces up and down wanting his answer so badly.
“No!” he tells me, completely unassuaged. “I want to go to Grouchland!”
“Well buddy … ” I start, still with no idea what he means. “Can you show me where Grouchland is? Can you point to it?”
I’m sure a dozen sentences run through his mind in moments like this, when his autism stops his communication, but certainly not his thoughts. I know he is agitated that I cannot understand what he means or what he is really asking, but a spark of agitation can quickly turn into a wildfire of a meltdown, and no one needs a meltdown at school drop off, so I keep trying.
“Is Grouchland on TV?” I probe.
“Nope.”
“Is it at school?”
Silence. I can’t think of another yes or no question—the kind Cannon can answer—to gather any more intel about Grouchland, so I try to redirect his attention.
“Well, Mommy will pick you up after school and maybe you can show me Grouchland.”
He doesn’t say anything, but he seems content with the offer. In nine years of one-way communication, simple contentment is a response we can both live with.
We continue this dance for nearly two weeks: every time we drive near the school for drop off, he asks to go to Grouchland. And with every request, I do my best to engage the conversation, ask questions he might be able to answer, or redirect him with a different topic before he gets too frustrated because I still don’t understand him. Mostly, it’s been working, but I know we’ve got to work together to close this Grouchland loop in his mind.
On a Friday, I pull up to school and hop out of the van to open the door for Cannon, where his teacher waits to walk him inside. When he jumps out, he starts to turn and walk back toward the street, telling both of us, “I want to go to Grouchland!” I look at the teacher, and lift my hands and shoulders in a shrug.
“I wish I could tell you what he’s talking about, but I just don’t know!”
She smiles and gently pulls his hand back toward the school building, then bends low to tell Cannon, “Do you want to watch Elmo in class today? It’s a special Friday and we get to pick a movie after lunch!”
“Yes!” he says, with a big smile on his face.
Thank you! I mouth and wave to the teacher as she turns and winks at me, walking Cannon to his classroom. But I also know I’m still missing it, whatever Cannon wants me to see. Grouchland isn’t the Elmo movie, though he is always happy to watch it. And he only talks about Grouchland when we pull up to school. There is something around here that he wants to show me when he says I want to go to Grouchland, and I want to find it—for both of us.
After school, I wait for Cannon outside the van, where he sees me from the door and takes off running for his hug, the paraeducator close behind him reminding him about his walking feet.
“Did you have a good day today, bud?” I ask as I lift him under the arms in a hug, his feet only a few inches off the ground because he’s going to be taller than me very soon.
“Yes,” he responds with a smile.
“Cannon,” I say, and bend my knees so our faces are level, and wait until his eyes meet mine. “Do you want to go find Grouchland?”
“Yes please!” he lights up. “I want to go to Grouchland!”
“Ok buddy,” I hold his hand as he steps into the van, “We are going to go find Grouchland!”
The teacher smiles at us and wishes us luck, and we pull onto the street where I make sure no cars are behind me, roll down all the windows, and drive no more than five miles an hour down the road.
“Is that Grouchland?” I ask as we pass one home.
“Nope.”
“Ok, how about that?” as we slowly make our way past another.
“No.”
And then, as we pull in front of the last house on the block, to the tune of hallelujah in Cannon’s mind, I’m sure, there it is.
“Grouchland! I want to go to Grouchland!” he bounces up and down in his seat excitedly. I pull over so I can take a closer look at what he’s talking about, where he’s looking.
And I finally see it. It’s so obvious. The desire of my special boy, whose request has eluded me for weeks—that is, until I took the time to slow down and look with him—it’s right there next to a tree, in the front yard of a small, well-loved blue house across from his school. The unmistakable home of none other than Oscar the Grouch, and also, as Cannon knows well, the only way to get to Grouchland.
An aluminum garbage can.
I pull over in front of the house, and before I could even get around to the other side of the van to open the door, Cannon unbuckles himself and jumps out onto the grass with glee in each step, running to the garbage can on this stranger’s lawn.
“Oh Cannon Lee,” I smile wide at him, beside myself with joy at the sight of his happiness. “Is this Grouchland? You saw Oscar’s garbage can and found Grouchland?”
“Yes,” he beams, hands flapping in triumph and squeals escaping his mouth.
He takes the lid off the garbage can in an attempt to climb in, but I stop him and say, “Oh buddy, this is not our garbage can!” I look around to make sure no offended homeowner is making their way toward us yet, threatening us to get off their lawn, but no one has seemed to notice. “But do you want to go to the store and buy one?” I offer, hoping to coax him out of the front yard.
“Yes please!” he says, and puts the lid back on the garbage can. Together we walk, no skip, off the lawn and back toward the car. Because Cannon feels understood, and I feel such incredible delight at finally understanding him. The chasm between the two of us finally has a bridge over it, connecting us in a way we both needed.
It took us a few weeks to get there, and a few wrong guesses along the way, but maybe that’s just being human. We don’t always understand each other the first—or tenth—time around. Sometimes it takes a lot of questions, a lot of prompting, and often, a real slow jaunt past the outcome you both want. It’s there—the connection—but if you move too fast, you miss it. But being understood, and understanding someone, well I hope I never, ever waver on the effort it takes to build that bridge.
We drove away from school that day lighter, both Cannon and I.
And now you know why, to the horror and fright of every dream-home Pinterest board in the world, there’s a twenty-gallon aluminum garbage can sitting in the middle of our basement.
Katie Blackburn lives in the Pacific Northwest with her husband Alex and their six little ones, one of whom came to them through foster care. She is saved by grace and runs on cold brew coffee and quiet mornings at her desk. You can read more of her writing on faith, motherhood, special needs, and a good, good God at katiemblackburn.com or via her own Substack, Let Me Tell You. You can read Katie’s Coffee + Crumbs essays here, and purchase her book, Gluing the Cracks, here.
