I'm always complaining about people who make rude or ignorant comments so I thought it was about time I started a thread about someone NICE!
Yesterday dh and I took ds1 & ds2 to a local festival. There were lots of stalls and a few things for the children to play on. Ds1 spotted an enormous inflatable slide and ran off to get to it. By the time we caught up he'd already taken his shoes off and was trying to push his way on to it. We apologised to the staff and managed to lead ds1 away.
As ds1 had been so well-behaved I later decided to let him have a go on the slide as a treat. Each child was allowed 5 turns. I noticed that ds1 kept getting part-way up the steps but then dropping back down to the bottom again anytime someone crowded him. I apologised to the owner and explained that ds1 wasn't just trying to make his turn last longer but that he genuinely couldn't tolerate people getting too close to him, due to his autism. The woman smiled, turned to her assistant and said "We were just talking earlier about it, weren't we? We wondered if he might be autistic when he first came over here."
After that she made sure that the other children waited until ds1 was at least halfway up before they were allowed to start climbing and ds1 wasn't pressured into hurrying. Ds1 had a fantastic time - so much so that he didn't want his turn to end.
He had a meltdown and tried to climb back on for more goes but the owner and her assistant just stood back and waited calmly for us to deal with it. A few passers-by tutted at what they thought was a spoilt brat having a tantrum because he couldn't get his own way but the owner and her assistant just glared at them.
So a huge thankyou to this lovely woman, not only for going out of her way to help ds1 but also restoring my faith in people. She was a timely reminder that although we meet rude and ignorant people when we're out and about, there are also some kind and generous folk out there too.