{"id":290,"date":"2025-05-26T23:51:09","date_gmt":"2025-05-27T06:51:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/ryk.groetchen.com\/blog\/?p=290"},"modified":"2025-06-08T00:47:20","modified_gmt":"2025-06-08T07:47:20","slug":"knowing-they-are-needed","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/ryk.groetchen.com\/blog\/2025\/05\/26\/knowing-they-are-needed\/","title":{"rendered":"Poem: Knowing They Are Needed"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<p>KNOWING THEY ARE NEEDED<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Organizers can go to bed early,\u2028<br>and wake up refreshed.\u2028<br>Fire tenders, blind to time, tend to stay up<br>all night, crafting, restless.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>That is not their fault \u2013 it is just their way.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Organizers, because they see<br>only one way of doing their thing,<br>are very focused, and work together<br>like bees, in the bustle of day,<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>when the sun is high. It takes a lot of them<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>to get their work of organizing done. They organize<br>themselves into shapes. This is why<br>they are called organizers. On the other hand,<br>only a few fire tenders (who tend to scheme and craft,<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>in the calm of night, by the crackle of the fire)<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>are needed to keep the lions at bay<br>while the organizers sleep.<br>Fire tenders tend to see<br>a million ways to do one thing.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>That is not their fault \u2013 it is just their way.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>They scheme and craft, in the calm<br>of night, by the crackle of the fire,<br>and tend to dream, blind to time,<br>of ways to be helpful when it comes:<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>the time that they know they are needed.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Because there are more of them,<br>and because they&#8217;re so good at organizing<br>themselves and working together,<br>within their shapes,<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>in the bustle of day, when the sun is high,<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>organizers tend to believe it<br>when they think that their ways are best.<br>That is not their fault \u2013 it is just their way.<br>Tradition helps to keep them<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>focused and working together, within their shapes.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Because they are so adept<br>at doing one thing, the organizers<br>are not so good at noticing<br>when the way they are doing<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>their thing is wasting their energy.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>That is not their fault \u2013 it is just their way.<br>Fire tenders sometimes try to share<br>the strategies they conceive, while scheming<br>and crafting, in the calm of night,<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>by the crackle of the fire, with the organizers,<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>who are not so good at knowing<br>what they need, or needing. The fire tenders<br>have become accustomed to hearing,<br>&#8220;that&#8217;s cute,&#8221; and &#8220;you&#8217;re overthinking it.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Organizers can be kind of judgy.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>That is not their fault \u2013 it is just their way.<br>Judging helps them navigate<br>the bustle of day, when the sun is high.<br>Fire tenders tend to feel a little<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>hurt by this, but they love the organizers,<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>and want to please them. That is why<br>they are called tenders. Because<br>they can only scheme and craft<br>in the calm of night, by the crackle of the fire,<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>and because they love the organizers,<br><br>and want to please them, and because<br>they are good at noticing when the organizers\u2019<br>ways of doing their thing are wasting<br>their energy, and because they are good at<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>knowing what the organizers need, and because,<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>when they try to reveal the results of their schemes<br>and crafts in the bustle of day,<br>when the sun is high, they are told<br>&#8220;you didn&#8217;t cite your sources,&#8221; and &#8220;I love<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>the way your mind works,\u201d the fire tenders<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>will sometimes craft maps, that show<br>the way to a new way of doing the thing<br>that the organizers are wasting energy on,<br>within their shapes. They know<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>when they are needed, and leave the maps<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>where the organizers will find them<br>when they wake up refreshed<br>in the bustle of day, when the sun is high.<br>The organizers, finding the maps<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>that the fire tenders made in the calm of night,<br><br>by the crackle of the fire, suddenly<br>see a new way of doing their thing,<br>within their shapes, without wasting energy.<br>When conditions are right, they don&#8217;t fail<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>to adopt the new strategy, and claim it<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>as their own. They are not stealing<br>or being vain: that is just how organizers<br>work. The fire tenders tend to be<br>untroubled by this. Blind to time, they know<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>when they are needed. They love the organizers,<br><br>and want to please them. That is not<br>their fault \u2013 it is just their way.<br>Because they have been so often told,<br>&#8220;you&#8217;re wrong,&#8221; and &#8220;just relax and be yourself\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>by the organizers, the fire tenders tend<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>to carry around a lot of shame.<br>Because they are organized, the organizers<br>believe it when they think that<br>the fire tenders carry shame because<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>they are not able to organize themselves into shapes,<br><br>like the organizers. Though that is not<br>the case, sometimes the fire tenders<br>begin to believe it themselves. They tend<br>to love the organizers, and want to please them.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>That is not their fault \u2013 it is just their way.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>What happens when the shame<br>the fire tenders carry around compels them<br>to adopt the ways of the organizers,<br>whom they love and want to please,<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>and organize themselves into shapes,<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>in the bustle of day, when the sun is high,<br>and go to bed early, and wake up refreshed?<br>Who will think of a million ways to do one thing?<br>Who will scheme and craft maps<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>when they are needed, in the calm of night,<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>by the crackle of the fire, to point the organizers<br>to a new way of doing their thing without<br>wasting energy, within their shapes?<br>Who, blind to time, will know<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>when they are needed? Who will keep the lions at bay?<br><br><strong>&#8211; Ryk Groetchen <\/strong><em>May 26, 2025<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-small-font-size\"><strong>MAY ALL BEINGS REALIZE THEIR TRUE NATURE<br>EVERY DAY IS NEURODIVERSITY AWARENESS DAY<\/strong><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>KNOWING THEY ARE NEEDED Organizers can go to bed early,\u2028and wake up refreshed.\u2028Fire tenders, blind to time, tend to stay upall night, crafting, restless. That is not their fault \u2013 it is just their way. Organizers, because they seeonly one way of doing their thing,are very focused, and work togetherlike bees, in the bustle of &#8230; <a title=\"Poem: Knowing They Are Needed\" class=\"read-more\" href=\"https:\/\/ryk.groetchen.com\/blog\/2025\/05\/26\/knowing-they-are-needed\/\" aria-label=\"Read more about Poem: Knowing They Are Needed\">Read more<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[14,16],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-290","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-neurodiversity","category-poem"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/paor1p-4G","jetpack-related-posts":[{"id":641,"url":"https:\/\/ryk.groetchen.com\/blog\/2025\/09\/21\/a-word-to-the-wise\/","url_meta":{"origin":290,"position":0},"title":"a word to the wise:","author":"Ryk Groetchen","date":"September 21, 2025","format":false,"excerpt":"if one aspires to advocate, one is wise to watch the baby. the baby is the perfect advocate,advocating directly for their own needs. (may all our babies' needs be met,directly) one is wise to meet the baby's needs, directly,knowing where a baby with unmet needs is liable to be led.\u2026","rel":"","context":"In &quot;chronicle&quot;","block_context":{"text":"chronicle","link":"https:\/\/ryk.groetchen.com\/blog\/category\/chronicle\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":622,"url":"https:\/\/ryk.groetchen.com\/blog\/2025\/08\/28\/circle-of-gratitude\/","url_meta":{"origin":290,"position":1},"title":"circle of gratitude","author":"Ryk Groetchen","date":"August 28, 2025","format":false,"excerpt":"Certain teachers teach to those who learn easily: Let's applaud such teachers. Uncertain teachers learn from those with difficulty in learning, and teach accordingly. Let's applaud such teachers doubly, and pay them accordingly. There are those who find themselves overwhelmed by the role of teacher\u2013who lose their sense of who's\u2026","rel":"","context":"In &quot;didactics&quot;","block_context":{"text":"didactics","link":"https:\/\/ryk.groetchen.com\/blog\/category\/didactics\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":405,"url":"https:\/\/ryk.groetchen.com\/blog\/2025\/06\/19\/%f0%9f%9b%92\/","url_meta":{"origin":290,"position":2},"title":"\ud83d\uded2","author":"Ryk Groetchen","date":"June 19, 2025","format":"aside","excerpt":"You see an old man in the parking lot, losing control of his cart, and you're right there, and your hand instinctively reaches out and stops the cart from rolling, and you pause, just long enough to show safety with your body, and say: \"it's fine,\" and move on. And\u2026","rel":"","context":"In &quot;chronicle&quot;","block_context":{"text":"chronicle","link":"https:\/\/ryk.groetchen.com\/blog\/category\/chronicle\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/ryk.groetchen.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/06\/img_0319-1.jpg?resize=350%2C200&ssl=1","width":350,"height":200,"srcset":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/ryk.groetchen.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/06\/img_0319-1.jpg?resize=350%2C200&ssl=1 1x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/ryk.groetchen.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/06\/img_0319-1.jpg?resize=525%2C300&ssl=1 1.5x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/ryk.groetchen.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/06\/img_0319-1.jpg?resize=700%2C400&ssl=1 2x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/ryk.groetchen.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/06\/img_0319-1.jpg?resize=1050%2C600&ssl=1 3x"},"classes":[]},{"id":593,"url":"https:\/\/ryk.groetchen.com\/blog\/2025\/08\/17\/%f0%9f%92%99\/","url_meta":{"origin":290,"position":3},"title":"\ud83d\udc99","author":"Ryk Groetchen","date":"August 17, 2025","format":false,"excerpt":"i don't knowif it's funnyor sad that people can reada poem from a hundredyears ago and laughbut when their friendwrites a poem they worry abouttheir mental health (whose mental healthare they worried about?) even people wholove the blues,which is often funny and sad:that's the bluesin a nutshell. who doesn't feelfunny\u2026","rel":"","context":"In &quot;chronicle&quot;","block_context":{"text":"chronicle","link":"https:\/\/ryk.groetchen.com\/blog\/category\/chronicle\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":698,"url":"https:\/\/ryk.groetchen.com\/blog\/2026\/01\/02\/audie-aitchdie\/","url_meta":{"origin":290,"position":4},"title":"audie aitchdie","author":"Ryk Groetchen","date":"January 2, 2026","format":false,"excerpt":"an interesting consequence of being both autistic and adhd is the push-pull, fast-slow, act-ruminate, interplay between these two processing styles, that beget strong long-arc themes: pattern-recognition, justice sensitivity, rejection-sensitive dysphoria; and also tolerance for ambiguity, conflict resolution, and a need to articulate the awkward unspoken paradox. looked at as a\u2026","rel":"","context":"In &quot;chronicle&quot;","block_context":{"text":"chronicle","link":"https:\/\/ryk.groetchen.com\/blog\/category\/chronicle\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/ryk.groetchen.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/01\/img_0839.png?resize=350%2C200&ssl=1","width":350,"height":200},"classes":[]},{"id":643,"url":"https:\/\/ryk.groetchen.com\/blog\/2025\/09\/23\/workworkwork\/","url_meta":{"origin":290,"position":5},"title":"workworkwork","author":"Ryk Groetchen","date":"September 23, 2025","format":"image","excerpt":"","rel":"","context":"In &quot;chronicle&quot;","block_context":{"text":"chronicle","link":"https:\/\/ryk.groetchen.com\/blog\/category\/chronicle\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/ryk.groetchen.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/09\/19BF667B-6A56-40CD-80CA-86290A58A092.jpeg?resize=350%2C200&ssl=1","width":350,"height":200,"srcset":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/ryk.groetchen.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/09\/19BF667B-6A56-40CD-80CA-86290A58A092.jpeg?resize=350%2C200&ssl=1 1x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/ryk.groetchen.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/09\/19BF667B-6A56-40CD-80CA-86290A58A092.jpeg?resize=525%2C300&ssl=1 1.5x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/ryk.groetchen.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/09\/19BF667B-6A56-40CD-80CA-86290A58A092.jpeg?resize=700%2C400&ssl=1 2x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/ryk.groetchen.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/09\/19BF667B-6A56-40CD-80CA-86290A58A092.jpeg?resize=1050%2C600&ssl=1 3x"},"classes":[]}],"jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/ryk.groetchen.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/290","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/ryk.groetchen.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/ryk.groetchen.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ryk.groetchen.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ryk.groetchen.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=290"}],"version-history":[{"count":6,"href":"https:\/\/ryk.groetchen.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/290\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":301,"href":"https:\/\/ryk.groetchen.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/290\/revisions\/301"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/ryk.groetchen.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=290"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ryk.groetchen.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=290"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ryk.groetchen.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=290"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}