Motivated by Personal Career
Temple’s priorities seem to be very limited. Unlike most people, she is not very engaged in her personal life. Instead she admits, “‘My work is my life…There is not much else’” (Sacks 260). She puts little to no energy in maintaining relationships, social or sexual, which frees up time and attention to her career. Temple has a number of professional roles; she is an animal science professor, a livestock industry consultant, a spokesperson for autism, and even an inventor of a squeeze machine. Temple dedicates most of her time and thoughts on her career because of the lack of personal relationships and her passion for her work.
She has an innate talent with her livestock. Although she has trouble reading human emotions, she can easily read the emotions of her cows (Sacks 267). Similarly, she has a connection to her enriched pigs, admitting she could not kill them after an experiment (Sacks 261). She formed a strong bond with her animals after spending so much time analyzing and caring for them. In some ways, they fill the void of human relationships in her life.
Her ambition is embodied by her invention of the squeeze machine. When she was a child, she loved and hated the feeling of being hugged. She loved the pressure, which calmed her, but the fact that she was not in control of the pressure, made her anxious. Instead of living in constant conflict between the feeling of calmness and anxiety, she crafted a squeeze machine that would allow her to control the pressure of a squeeze, simulating the sensation of a hug (Sacks 263). This invention is a true testament to her motivated and practical nature. “For her, the personal and the professional, the inward and the outward, were completely fused” (Sacks 265). Whether her mind sets on inventing machinery or researching her animals, she remains unfazed by social distractions.
