Has anybody here read Arday's recent book?: Apparently, it is going to become a smash hit, out of the ballpark. And, YES....it is ALL ABOUT......GRIT.....!!!! Here's what they are saying about it (with permission from the publisher/Amazon): Editorial ReviewsReview"Arday's cinematic story from being nonverbal to becoming one of the youngest professors ever at Cambridge makes you believe in the transformative power of grit and the magic of a mother's love. A most inspiring book."—Chris Gardner, New York Times bestselling author of The Pursuit of Happyness “As the mother of a child on the spectrum, I was reminded once again that there is nothing more fierce than a parent’s determination to see her child get the services and attention he deserves; nothing more inspiring than a stranger with nothing to gain who asks How can I help? and nothing more empowering than intervention combined with positivity, love, and grit. Read this book and prepare to be inspired.” —Holly Robinson Peete, actress, autism advocate, and author of Same but Different: Teen Life on the Autism Express "Some lives are changed by talent. Others are changed by love that refuses to let go. In Great and Unfortunate Things, Jason Arday tells a story of resilience, dignity, and the extraordinary power of those who hold steady for us when we cannot yet hold steady for ourselves. This is a beautiful and unforgettable book." —Steve Pemberton, USA Today best-selling author of A Chance in the World “This is a remarkable portrait of an astonishing life. Great and Unfortunate Things takes us on a spectacular journey of trial and transformation, offering crucial insight into the realities of neurodivergence, told by an author who changed the shape of his life through sheer will. Above all, this memoir is a poignant tribute to fearless mothers like Arday’s, whose love, education, and unshakable belief in their children will always make mountains move.”—Safiya Sinclair, international bestselling author of How to Say Babylon "I love a good story! Arday's story is as riveting and moving as they come. Jason's efforts to overcome obstacles presented by his neurodivergence are movingly matched only by his mother's extraordinary efforts to work with his differences not against them, to see the humanity where others chose to see an inky diagnosis." — Michelle Miller, New York Times bestselling author of Belonging: A Daughter's Search for Identity Through Loss and Love About the AuthorJason Arday is a social commentator, presenter, and public speaker. In 2023, he was appointed the Professorial Chair of Education (Sociology of Education) at the University of Cambridge, making him the youngest-ever Black academic to hold a Professorship at Cambridge and one of the youngest academics ever appointed to a Professorial Chair in Oxbridge’s nine-hundred-year history. Excerpt. © Reprinted by permission. All rights reserved.Prologue Prologue It had been two days of interviewing for the professorship, and on the train home from Cambridge, I was exhausted. After getting off at London King’s Cross station, I took the Tube as far as my stop, Clapham Common, and walked through Old Town, past the familiar shops and cafés, towards our house, the place where I grew up, where it all began. It was already getting dark, and the lights were glowing warmly in the front window. I turned my key in the lock and went inside. In the living room, my mum, Giff, was in front of the television sipping tea laced with evaporated milk. I’ve always called her Giff—never Mum—that’s just how it’s been. She was sitting in her deep, red, velvety chair affectionately known as The Mothership that, over the years, had come to know the shape of her, even when she wasn’t in it. To this day, if you’re sitting in that chair, you’d better vacate it as soon as Giff walks into the room; that chair is her sanctuary, her throne, fit for our matriarch, our queen. Like the Mothership, Giff has always been a constant source of comfort for me. I went to hug her and told her I couldn’t stay long, that I was just there for an hour or so to pick up some stuff, then I had to leave to get the train to Brighton. I was giving a keynote speech there the next morning. Giff asked me when I would hear about the job. I told her it might be a few days, maybe more. As it turned out, I didn’t have to wait as long as that. About an hour after I got home, my phone rang. It was a Cambridge number, so I answered. The voice on the other end of the line calmly explained that they had made their decision: they were excited to offer me the Professorship in the Sociology of Education. After the call was over, I came downstairs to find Giff still in her chair. She saw the smile breaking through my poor attempt at a poker face. “You did it, didn’t you, Jason?” she asked. “No, Giff,” I told her. “We did. We did it…” We hugged as Giff cried into my shoulder. Of all the places I could have been when that phone call came in, it was only right that I was home with Giff. Of course she was overjoyed for me, but she had been overjoyed so many times, at every one of my milestones—not just the big ones, but the small ones too. Given where we had started, there had been a lot of milestones along the way. When I was three years old, the doctors diagnosed me with autism and global developmental delay, which is a term used when children under the age of five have significant delays in speech, cognitive abilities, motor skills, or social skills. My delays were in all of the above. “There’s no one in there,” the doctors told Giff. They said that I was “deficient,” and that I’d never be able to talk, read, or write. One doctor insisted I was “no better than a vegetable” and wouldn’t be able to have meaningful relationships. “He’ll never be able to live independently. Never be able to go to school with normal children. You might want to place him in long-term care or a home for children with similar difficulties because he’s going to need lifelong support.” To them, I was a lost cause. Giff was devastated, as any parent would be, but she was also a person of faith who had already been through many challenges in her life. Soon after the doctors gave their grim prognosis, something occurred to her: These experts don’t have a crystal ball. She decided they didn’t know what the future held. How could they—or anyone, for that matter—measure a child’s potential at such an early stage in his life? No one wanted to listen to Giff, a humble woman from Ghana without a degree or letters after her name (those accolades would come later). The doctors wanted her to submit to their “better” and “superior” judgment, but they failed to see that her lack of formal training actually worked to my advantage because she was able to approach being my parent with an open and fluid mind. Before the word “neurodiversity” had even been coined, Giff understood the concept: that every human is an individual, unique and whole—and that the world needs all kinds of people. God had made me, and so God, in his infinite wisdom, had given her not a burden but a gift. This was an article of faith for her. Giff decided to ignore the “experts.” Instead, she chose to listen to her heart—and the words of the South Asian midwife who had delivered me at the hospital. It had been a difficult pregnancy and labor, and as legend had it, when I finally made my entrance on the 9th of May, 1985, the Tears for Fears song “Everybody Wants to Rule the World” was playing on the radio. After my arrival, the midwife stayed at the bedside, holding my hand and studying my long fingers. Then she looked at Giff straight in the eye and said: “Where I come from, babies with long fingers are special. This boy is destined for great things. You hear? You take care of this child.” “Of course I will,” Giff told her. When her shift ended, the midwife returned to check on me. “He’s going to do something special,” she repeated. “I’m telling you: please, please look after him.” These words made a lasting impression on Giff, and she returned to them again and again when others encouraged her to give up on me. They helped her to envision a future for me that the naysayers couldn’t see. “I don’t know what that woman did to you when she delivered you, Jason,” Giff would later say, “but I always feel like she blessed you with something because you have some truly exceptional gifts, and the things that you’ve done and experienced are inexplicable. So maybe she was right.” But there was another prophecy that has resonated throughout my life—one I didn’t hear until I was twenty-one years old. It was 2006, and I was on a relief mission in Brazil, working with an organization installing water pumps in poor communities. We traveled from place to place, spending two or three days in Rio de Janeiro’s favelas—shantytowns that cling to the hillsides, stacked with tumbledown houses and shacks. It was the middle of the day, baking hot, and the sky was a brighter blue than someone who grew up in overcast South London could ever have imagined. We were in one of the favelas, teaching a group of children how to use the new pumps so they could finally drink clean water. I didn’t speak Portuguese, but I was paired with a local aid worker who spoke some English, a woman in her thirties with dark hair and eyes and a gentle, steady way about her. She translated my words, and together we demonstrated how the pump worked. The children were smiling and attentive, though it was clear they were itching to play football with the makeshift ball made from plastic bottles and cardboard that one of them was carrying around. At some point, the aid worker studied me as I bent down to help one of the children. Then she said quietly, almost to herself but loudly enough for me to hear: “You have a very beautiful heart.” I smiled and swiftly replied, “That’s really kind of you.” Then she moved towards me and rested her hand on my arm before speaking again. “I can tell you’re destined to do great things. But I also believe you’re destined for very sad and difficult things as well.” It stopped me cold. “What? Any more than other people?” I asked, half confused, half unsettled. This woman had just met me. She didn’t know anything about me. She looked straight into my eyes. “Yes. I think so.” We let the conversation drift after that, but her words rattled in my head the rest of the day and late into the night. The next morning, when I saw her again, I pressed her. “Why would you say that about my life? About great things and sad things and difficult things?” She smiled almost regretfully. “Maybe I drank too much the night before.” “No,” I said. “You seemed perfectly sober.” She closed her eyes and then opened them and spoke again: “It’s just a feeling. I could be wrong. But my feeling is that you will face very challenging times, and still, you will achieve greatness. That is God’s will. So you must never lose faith.”
