Attention, world.

Will wore his dad’s Buff type face mask for over 20 minutes at BJ’s on Fri 5/1, CoronavirusTrail (CVT) day 47. Unplanned, unprepared, unbelievable.

Here’s what I know about Will: he has a Will. After his glasses fell off his face twice at exercise class that day when I was assisting, I finally remembered to phone BJ’s Optical to see if they’re adjusting frames. The kind optician said the store’s not officially adjusting frames, but I’ll do you a favor if you get here in an hour. I took a breath. This was his first store trip since the pandemic, expressly because of the mask.

With MA governor mandating face masks in public in just five more days, it was time. At BJ’s huge ATTENTION signs highly encouraged face masks. Every single shopper in line already had donned theirs. Will, you have to wear a mask, I said, pointing to the sign. Remember, the coronavirus. It’s a ________.

“Germ,” he said, yanking down Dad’s buff-style mask that I’d just pulled on.

I pulled it up. He yanked down. Ballet de Mask – a pas de deux of the autism power-struggle kind. We’ve choreographed it for years. Today we danced it well, least 10 more times, with the optician entering stage right a few times. He’d flash me an irritated look with those doe-eyes that could slice. The optician would lean forward into our frame, then lean back. Somehow we made it through about 10 minutes and two eyeglass-pairs of adjustments.

I hated to press my luck, seeing at least 15 carts queued to the left behind the big-screen TVs. With no more lettuce left at home, I was hoping to snag 10 minutes to run through the store for milk, lettuce and lunch meat to tide us til Tuesday. Choices, I thought. Give him choices.

Will, do you want to buy lettuce here, or go home.

Home, he said. – OK. The optician said the produce aisle was probably barren anyway. – I was willing to accept his choice. Yet he lives by his daily salad, and the half-dead spinach and romaine leaves at the back of the bin would barely be enough for him let alone his twin.

Will, do you want lettuce for dinner, or go home, I said to his eyes one more time.

Lettuce, he said this time. I tucked his mask up under his now-snug glasses and put his hands on the cart, getting him to push.

Amazingly, three boxes of lettuce were left. Keep him busy, I thought. Count out four heads. Push the cart through the produce, then the deli line. Great job, Will. Let’s walk more. Want sausage? How about salad dressing?

With barely two or three mask-fixes, we endured – even a 20-person long checkout line. Will even told me he needed the bathroom, my fellow shoppers let my cart hold its place, and he even appropriately used the men’s room while i waited 30 feet away toward my cart.

Here’s what I know about Will. Very little. He is far more than what I see. He understands more than I know. He tries. He loves me. He is far more than what I see.

Here’s what I know about me. About autism. About masks I must wear, don’t want to wear, struggle against. About our collective ability to tolerate, and go beyond.

Lots and lots, and yet happily, still very little.