Excerpted from Chapter 3 of Retarded Isn't Stupid, Mom! Revised Edition, by Sandra Z. Kaufman

Copyright © 1999 by Paul H. Brookes Publishing Co. All rights reserved. No part of this excerpt may be reproduced or reprinted without permission in writing from the publisher.

Nicole remained in high school until a few days before her 21st birthday in June, 1976. To her disappointment, she had to miss her own graduation in order to attend her brother's graduation ceremony at Greenfield Academy in Massachusetts where he'd been a student during his junior and senior years. The entire family traveled east for that event. Nicole now thought of David, who at 18 years old was a lanky 6-footer with a deep voice, as her big brother. She looked up to him, both figuratively and literally. Sniping continued between Nicole and 12-year-old Jill, but the fights with David were over.

As compensation for missing her own graduation and as a birthday treat, Matt and I took Nicole to Disneyland, her favorite recreational spot, when we returned to California. She brought along a boy named Edward who, she said, had been "nice" to her in high school. He'd been in the Educationally Handicapped classroom right next to hers, and every day after lunch, they'd chatted while standing in their respective lines waiting for the classrooms to be opened.

We drove inland to the next town to pick up Edward from his apartment, where he lived with his mother and two brothers. He was a slight lad with dark features — French Canadian, he told us on one of the few occasions during the day when he found the courage to speak. He also revealed that he was 19 years old and a new graduate like Nicole. We saw little of him, however, or of Nicole. She grabbed Edward by the hand and hustled him from one Disney attraction to another, stopping only briefly when she checked in with us every 2 hours at the patio restaurant where Matt and I sat drinking iced tea and reading.

"I just love 'It's a Small, Small World,'" she squealed, when they joined us for a quick hamburger. "It's a small world after all, it's a small world after all ...," she sang and then burst into laughter. The ride through the fantasy of animated dolls from around the world had always been her favorite.

Edward ignored Nicole. He was more interested in the distant Matterhorn, where shrieking passengers were plunging in and out of tunnels on their downward course. From where we sat, the mountain looked like it was made of papier mâché.

"You want to go on the Matterhorn again?" Nicole asked Edward as she munched on some of his french fries.

"Yeah," he mumbled.

"Okay, we'll do that after 'Pirates of the Caribbean.'" Edward ate slowly and finished only three fourths of his food. As soon as possible, Nicole whisked him away.

Matt refilled my iced tea glass, and I went back to my studying. I was always studying. I was so addicted to it, I'd signed up for summer school.

"Anthropology again, I see," Matt commented, glancing down at my reading material as he adjusted the umbrella over our table.

"Margaret Mead writing about her fieldwork in New Guinea." I showed him the cover of my paperback. "Listen to this. She discovered that the Papuans...."

Matt began to chuckle. "That's what's so great about having a major in anthropology. It's so practical. Employers will be falling all over themselves offering you jobs after you get your degree."

"You be nice to me," I sniffed. "I can't help it if I'm fascinated by the idea of studying people in an effort to see the world from their point of view. That's what Margaret Mead did, and that's what I'm going to do one day. Somewhere. Somehow. You'll see."

Matt sat down. "I hope you can, if that's what you want," he said, chastened by my earnestness. "I just hope you'll do it a little nearer home than Margaret Mead did."

We watched Nicole and Edward making their way toward us through the crowded tables. Both were grinning. Black caps with big Mickey Mouse ears rode on their heads.

"What do you think of Edward?" Matt asked.

"I'd like to scrub his dirty nails and teeth, but other than that, he's rather sweet. They seem to be good friends."

"Daddy!" Nicole shouted. Everyone within 50 feet turned to look. Oblivious to their stares, she burst into raucous laughter, delighting in how she was shocking us with the outrageous ears. By the time she reached our table, her amusement was out of control. She was hysterical.

"Stop it," commanded Matt. The laughter continued. "Nicole, stop it," I said, firmly. Her body shook, and the sound disappeared. Her eyes pleaded like those of a drowning woman.

I slapped her across the face. Stunned, she dropped into a chair. The shocked stares of onlookers burned into me.

I held tightly to her hand as the sound returned and then as the uncontrolled giggles gradually died down. Edward stared at her curiously.

"I'm sorry," she said, squelching a last bubble of mirth. "I couldn't help it."

"It's okay, sweetheart. I'm sorry I slapped you."

We all sat silently until she was completely calm. Matt checked where she and Edward were headed next and whether they had enough money, and off they went, Edward shuffling along behind Nicole as they wound their way through the tables. Slowly people's attention returned to their own affairs.

"I'm drained, absolutely drained," I said. "She's always had trouble putting a lid on her emotions, but I thought it was getting better."

"It is. Just a few years ago, she was so excited she threw up all the way to Disneyland and kept it up after she got here. She doesn't do that anymore."

I stared, unseeing, at a toddler trying to take a picture of his amused parents. "Was I wrong in slapping her?"

Matt looked down at his iced tea. "What's done is done. I don't know what else would have stopped her."

After that day, the frequency of telephone calls between Nicole and Edward increased exponentially. When I saw her pulling the telephone into her room and closing the door, I decided the relationship wasn't as platonic as I'd thought. I began to be grateful that he lived a good 5 miles away with enough hills between his home and ours to deter even the most resolute cyclist.

The summer of 1976 was noteworthy for more than the introduction of a romantic interest in Nicole's life. In August, she joined the work force.

It happened because she'd met a new benefactor. She'd known a number of them during her life, people who gave of themselves so unstintingly on her behalf that they can only be described as saints. One was the cafeteria supervisor who had worked with Nicole at Santa Monica Mountains High School. Month after month, she had patiently taught Nicole how to tell the difference between a 50¢ piece and a quarter and how to carry out tasks in a busy kitchen without becoming unglued.

Daniel Gold was her new benefactor. He was the grandfather of the cafeteria supervisor, and he offered to hire Nicole part time in his restaurant as well as train her. Daniel Gold had a disability, too. His larynx had been removed a few years before.

Nicole donned the prescribed blue tunic with red sailor tie, poked her hair into a net, and showed up at The Chowder Bowl, one of the fast-food emporiums near the fishing pier. She was soon doing battle with a line of toasters, a grill, three deep fryers — and Mr. Gold. He was a man of powerful wrath, and he quickly discovered he'd met his match with Nicole. Her ineptitude and temper tried his patience sorely. Shaking with a rage he couldn't vocalize, he wrote her notes — which she couldn't read.

"Two burgers one hold the onions," shouted a waitress. The day was hot, and business was brisk. Crowds of hungry customers pressed against the front of the 40-foot-long counter. On the other side of the counter, uniformed employees flew back and forth, rescuing shakes from the whirring malt machines, jerking Cokes from the Coke dispenser, spearing ears of corn from the steamer, and ladling bowls of clam chowder. Every few seconds, one of the cash registers clanged.

In the middle of it all, standing with her back to the customers and her feet planted like the supports to the San Francisco Bay Bridge, was Nicole. She squinted in the direction of the waitress and went back to dribbling pickles on a line of paper plates. A few fell on the floor. In front of her, a half dozen hamburger patties shriveled on the grill.

Daniel Gold hung up the telephone. He sped toward Nicole, jerked up a basket of sputtering brown sticks that used to be french fries, and stabbed his finger at the timer.

"I set the timer!" she lied. Dismissing her answer with a wave of his hand, he dumped the brown sticks into the trash. That done, he slapped the hamburgers onto the paper plates.

Perspiring profusely, his mouth exaggeratedly shaping a soundless "two," he held up two fingers, shook them at her, and pointed toward the pickle container with his other hand.

"There isn't time to count out two," she shrieked.

Daniel Gold turned purple enough to self-destruct. Wheeling, he charged into his office. Smoke began rising from the toasters.

"Ham and cheese on wheat," belted out another waitress. Nicole was too busy throwing away burned buns to hear her.

Daniel Gold reappeared, scribbling on a pad of paper that he thrust at Nicole.

"I have told you and told you," the note said. "Either you put two pickles on the plates, or you're fired."

His note looked like chicken scratches to Nicole.

"Nicole! Where's my burgers?" called the first waitress.

"Everyone is yelling at me!" screamed Nicole, clapping her hands over her ears. A fryer timer started ringing, and Mr. Gold gesticulated wildly in its direction.

Fortunately, there were people we could call on for help. As soon as Mr. Gold had offered Nicole the job, I had signed up Nicole at the new Regional Center near us, and a spirited young counselor named Gordon Wade now jumped in to adjudicate. He also mobilized the people at the Department of Rehabilitation. Matt and I were grateful to everyone for trying so hard.

We were determined that Nicole keep this job. Gordon explained that the decision carried hazards: Her eligibility for SSI would be cut off after 9 months' employment, and reinstatement would be difficult, if not impossible, from then on. Although that was a scary proposition, we opted for the wage earning. It was more "normal" than receiving government checks.

Nicole was delighted with Gordon. She called him every day to tell him her problems. The content of their discussions remained confidential, but Gordon told us that she firmly resisted all efforts to lure her into attending classes designed to teach young people with mental retardation "independent living skills." She was already getting too much of that kind of training at home, thank you.

Every day Matt struggled to instruct Nicole in things such as using a bus, taking responsibility for getting herself to work each day, and planning ahead so that her uniform would be washed. He also tried to teach her how to budget her money.

"Where are your receipts?" he asked as they sat in her room.

"I don't know," Nicole giggled.

"How much money do you have left?"

"I can't remember."

"Where is your purse?"

"I'll find it in a minute," she said, sobering because her father was getting angry. She began to paw through the debris on her bed.

"Where is your paycheck?" Matt's voice rose in exasperation.

Her voice rose, too. "I put it somewhere."

Nicole eventually found her purse, and Matt counted the money. She was $16 short. "You're irresponsible," he scolded. "You can't live alone and behave like this. You won't have enough money to eat. Your money just disappears."

Silence.

"Grandma Charlotte owes me a dollar," Nicole offered tentatively.

Silence.

"Oh, I know where it is," she burst out, revealing how little she understood of the task at hand. "I got paid $6 for baby-sitting."

"Then that's $6 more you can't account for."

"No. No. You don't understand. I got $6 extra!"

I was impressed by Matt's patience. I had lost mine long ago.

After many struggles, Nicole manages to find her way in the world and live an independent, satisfying, and productive life. Read the rest of Retarded Isn't Stupid, Mom! to find out how Nicole, with the help of her family and community supports, forged her own path.