COLUMBUS, Ohio -- Her resume attracted plenty of attention.
Hospitals, technology companies and a major research organization indicated that Chelsea Ridenour - computer and math whiz, summa cum laude graduate of Capital University - looked good on paper. Some called for interviews.
And then, suddenly, it didn't seem to matter that she is intelligent and dependable and tenacious. Ridenour can communicate with a computer in six languages, but she can't chat her way through a face-to-face meeting with a stranger.
"People try to be nice. They're not deliberately not nice," the Hilliard resident said. "They just don't understand."
Ridenour is among a rising population of young adults whose coming-of-age stories are at best complicated and oftentimes heartbreaking. They are grown-ups with Asperger's syndrome and other autism disorders, conditions that society seems to handle best when boys and girls are young and in school.
But Ridenour is 23. What she needs is a job.
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