You had already shown me how cool you were when you called out the woman who cut in front of me in the snack bar line. I very much enjoyed the laugh we had at her strange, and obviously off the cuff, excuse. And when I shared my story about the dedicated bowler I dated in high school, your witty defense of his love for the sport had me in stitches. My concern that the girl at the desk put someone in the lane next to ours, lessened with each joke you made while we stood there.

Still, as you all settled beside us with your surprisingly stylish bowling bags and your own punk rock pink bowling ball, I was a bit concerned that we might annoy you a little bit. And then midway through the third game, you actually became even more wonderful.

"Your little girl is really great around adults," you leaned over and said to me over the blaring music. "She knows how to take her turn and wait, and she's very polite. That's nice." You said this after the pizza eating contest, after the Cha-Cha Slide, after all the hysterical cackling and laughing. You have no way of knowing how much I could have hugged you right there.

You didn't stop there, however. When I called her over and told her what you said, you leaned in and told her yourself. You said more that I couldn't quite hear over the music, and whatever it was it made her smile. She has such a beautiful smile. Thank you so much for bringing it out with your gentle words and loving kindness.

You see, my little girl, Ahava, has an anxiety disorder and high functioning autism, and has come an incredibly long way to be the girl you met on lane 12.

In that moment, I wanted to tell you all about her. I wanted to tell you all about the miracle that we both survived her being born. I wanted to share the awesome way that God provided everything for her first year. I was tempted to tell you about how Jaeli, the one line-dancing/bowling with the blue hair, slept under her crib at night when she was a baby, or how my middle girl, Mahala, had to sing to her to get her to stop crying in the church nursery. I almost told you how we had to ask people not to make eye contact with her when she was a baby so she wouldn't scream. Even then, she only wanted her sisters, unless it was time to nurse.

I nearly told you about how she would have nothing to do with her Nana either until she was four years old, and one day just climbed into her arms. I was going to tell you how she couldn't go out into public places like malls until she was almost five because the stimulation would have her shrieking and crying the entire time. I wanted to tell you how Mahala taught her how to be "normal," and do things like look people in the eyes and laugh when she didn't find things funny.

Instead, all I said was, "Thank you!" I explained that her oldest sister, Jaeli, was home for a visit. Then their Nana showed up and suddenly we were bowling. Bowling, because Jaeli worked in a bowling alley once and Ahava loved it. The girl could bowl all day if we let her and ended up bowling until midnight the day we met you.

You see, your words resonated in my heart, a deep place that was hollowed out in the struggle not to take her behaviors personally from infancy to now, to lay down my preconceived parenting skills, and to assist and encourage Ahava to have an excellent quality of life. Its walls were reinforced by my gradual understanding of the Autism spectrum and where my child is on it, our determination to help her navigate the world around her, and my willingness to let her take the lead.

Would you believe that people who've known me longer than Ahava has been alive, have less grace with her than you, a complete stranger did? Would you believe that people I know, who work closely with children like mine, treat her like she's just a brat with a smart mouth? Would you believe that professionals within two of our local school districts failed her completely when I begged them to offer her emotional and behavioral support? Would you believe that it took the behavior therapist, she has come to love and trust, to realize that we taught Ahava to pretend to be like everyone else so well that she nearly faked out the assessment?

Somehow, I believe you would.

I'm speaking for all parents with children like Ahava when I say, "Thank you so much for seeing the fruit of our love and determination."