Mike's death; Betty's life...

Tuesday, May 26, 2026

Sunday, Match 31, 2024

It was Easter Sunday. Went to church early. I was there by 8:45. The street leading to the church was jammed, but it is often high traffic. Ali’I Street runs along the waterfront and is the one the tourists get to see lined with restaurants and shops, it is the one tourists getting off cruise ships get to see. I assumed the church parking lot would be jammed, but no. When I pulled into the driveway, I saw the grassy area for the overflow parking was almost empty. I like to go around the church to approach the grass parking. Otherwise, I’d have to make a right turn. I’m not good a right turns. I continued to the back of the church, intending to go around. I discovered a good ten free parking spaces back there. What??!!

I sat in my usual spot on the south lanai. It was more crowded than usual but not to overflow. The pews were full; it was a good attendance. When it came time to exchange blessings with everyone, I turned around and got a good look at the parish center. The sliding glass doors which lined one side of the building were open and the center was full of people. Where did they all come from? Where did they all park?

Judy and Paulette had gone to the vigil Mass on Saturday night. Those two had gone to the three Tridium Services, not all are masses, on Thursday, Friday and Saturday. They were not at the Sunday morning one. There was no one I particularly wanted to talk to. I went to the cemetery to visit Mike’s grave. Sadly, I get very little from visiting the grave site. I saw the flowers Judy Shipley said she placed there.

The dancers from the Hulu ministry were lined up on the lanai ready to perform when I arrived. Judy Shipley came over to greet me. She said she visited Mike’s grave and left flowers. I found a small, sweet boutique of plastic flowers next to his head stone. Thank God someone attends to his grave.

The rest of the day was nothing. I didn’t have a single student today. Adolescent D was off-island for the weekend.

Saturday, March 30, 2024

Today is my grandnephew's fifth birthday. Happy Birthday, Sam! His mom, my niece Karin, watched Mike's funeral on live feed while in labor. I hope it distracted her.

I noticed some green coming up in the area where I had seven large Ficus trees extracted and 5 inches of mulch applied. I must wait seven or eight months for the mulch to do its thing and suffocate the remaining roots. Darby warned me that 'weeds' would sprout as the mulch cooled down. They were here. I went out to check.

These were not ordinary weeds. These growths were new Ficus trees coming up. I tried pulling them out by the roots. Some seemed to come out, but I'm not confident I got all the roots. Some of the shoots were already too deep to pull out. I got tools to help me dig them up. No luck! The mulch is hard to dig into. I tried the boiling water trick, pouring eight to ten carafes of boiling water on the weeds.

As I poured water on the lower edge of this area. I looked over the edge and saw four-foot Ficus trees coming up. I put out all this money, and the damn trees are busy making sure they survive.

I still don't have access to older versions of my Microsoft files. I lost 49 days of work. This isn't great, but it's not a tragedy. I'm thinking of people who worked on a novel or a thesis. Now, that's a tragedy! I checked if Microsoft had reinstated the old versions of the files I lost. I did check on 'version history.' It is all gone. The only version that is available for all dates is the 'current version' for all the previous dates. Ah, that was yesterday. Today, there are no previous versions listed.

I met with third-grade M today with plans to continue working on comprehension using Stuart Little. She was in a terrible mood, sullen, but I saw pain behind it. I read Stuart Little to her now. Her oral reading is fantastic. We don't have to do that anymore. She gets as much of that in as she needs in school. Her problem is with comprehension- or even more so, being able to clearly express her thoughts. When I ask additional questions, she always knows the answer. Why didn't she include those facts in her answer?

I asked her if she could visualize what I had just read. She said, "NO!" so abruptly I was left speechless. I sat in silence for several minutes, just praying. What was going on here? I told her I thought she looked sad. I might not be able to do anything to change things, but I could listen. I sat in more silence. Sometimes, that's all you can do.

At some point, I could continue. I read and interpreted what I read. Then, M pitched in. By the end of the session, she had pulled out of her slump literally as well as figuratively. Her analysis of what was going on in the story was spot on.

Friday, March 29, 2024

Hmmm! March 27th and 28th are missing, too.

I called Certainteed this morning at 4:30 a.m. Hawaii time, which was 10:30 a.m. EST. Certainteed is the warranty company covering the solar panels I bought from Hawaiian Solar in 2017. The batch of 35 panels was defective and failing one after another.

It took time for the company to replace them. The company decided to honor the warranty. The company would offer up to 90% of the original cost. I was worn out with the continuing breakdown of the existing panels and the slow replacement. It had been a while since I heard from them.

I called Beth at Hawaiian Solar. She contacted Certainteed. Certainteed emailed me to say I had to return a signed document to them. I had sent that document back to them. The other day, I sent it again by certified mail. I spoke with a colleague who was responsible for my case. He gave me his email address. It was my fourth attempt.

I ironed this morning. The ironing board has been sitting on the lanai since I ironed the linens for the church silent auction three weeks ago. The ones I ironed this morning had rust stains I thought would never come out. They did; all they needed was a washing and a time in the Hawaiian sun. They came out free of all stains.

Microsoft did it; it deleted 47 (forty-seven) days of file updates. Yep. Forty-seven days. I Googled missing Microsoft files and found a slew of people with a similar problem. Forty files were lost, and no previous files were available. On the version history, each one was the current one. Ow!

The good news was I used the time to do other chores. I washed the floors.

I only had a few students today. I had Mama K's twins at 8 a.m.

Twin A worked on reading Reading Roots story 23. We worked on reading speed, which her Sped teacher said she needed to work on. When she read to me earlier in the week, I intuited she was reading slowly because she was consciously decoding every word. I pushed her to use automatic processing: 'What does your mind say the word is?' After several readings, we could both see her rating rate increase, and she sounded so much better. She was reading with 'meaning.'

Twin E worked on reading the word lists. I hadn't seen either girl since the last weekend. Twin E sounded better. She said she had been working on this list in class. She almost mastered the first 1-100 words of the Fry Sight Word Lists, which puts her on the first-grade level. She is in fourth grade.

It was a Darby night. She brought over an Easter basket.

Gail joined us as we passed her house. She is so cute. She brings a joyful playfulness. She speaks about her days in a boarding school every time we walk. Her parents sent her there when she was twelve years old. She said she didn't ever get to know her parents. She made it sound like her parents sent her there because she started hanging out with the 'wrong kids.' But she recently told us she sent her younger brother off to military school at the same time.

When we got to our drive, Darby gave me a goodbye hug. She's as good a hugger as Paulette is, someone who hugs for the pleasure of it instead of as a cursory social gesture. Seeing us hug, Gail dove in for a hug of her own. I now have three good huggers in my life—oh, really, four. Let's not forget Elsa, who loves to wrap herself around my neck.

I've been chasing the smell of Elsa's pee. Where was it coming from? I vacuumed the spots on the lanai carpet where I could find them. I got on my hands and knees to check them; they didn't smell. I had put the four by six foot Chinese carpet left here by the previous owners out in the yard, hosed it down, and left it in the sun to dry. When I put my nose down there, I found the source of the smell. I was beginning to despair of getting rid of it short of ripping up the carpeting, underflooring, and starting from scratch. Then, I had to deal with the possibility of Elsa using the lanai again after I had done all that work.

I exposed the underside of the Chinese carpet to let the sun do its magic, cleansing everything it touches. I also sprayed the affected area with Febreze. Wow! What an improvement. I no longer smelled it every time I sat on the lanai. The smell was starting to depress me. Stale pee is not the best scent.

I had an appointment with Adolescent D at 3 p.m. He sounded like he was drowning. He was sick. No, he didn't think it was Covid. I asked him if he wanted to do the lesson. He said yes. He really wasn't up for it. He was running a fever.

He had canceled for Friday, Saturday, and Sunday because he went off the island to visit friends. I asked him where he went. He didn't know. He said it was the island after Maui. That's Oahu. But he didn't know where he had been on Oahu. I found that a remarkable lack of awareness of his surroundings for a sixteen-and-a-half-year-old boy. I guess he wasn't visiting friends alone but with his whole family. Still, it struck me as odd. Do I have unusual expectations of teenagers?

Tuesday, March 26, 2024

It looks like I skipped writing anything on March 25^th. Oh, well.

Today is the 68th anniversary of my dad's death. He died when I was fifteen. Long time no see, but I think of him. While for most of my dating life, I was drawn to people like my mom. (They say we are attracted to the people who are most like the parent we got along with the least.) When I decided I would date anyone who I didn't think would do me physical harm, Mike was my third date. He looked somewhat like my dad. He was an intellectual. He had had some downright weird similarities. My dad had two law degrees; Mike had two Ph.D.s. The first degree they got when they were young. Mike got his first Ph.D. in 1972. He started his second one in 1994, twenty years later, and completed work in 2004.

I don't know exactly when my dad completed his studies in Germany, but he got news that he passed the New York State Bar exam on June 13, 1945. Mike got his second degree to fulfill his dreams. My dad did it so he could work as a lawyer in this country. He had to get a second law degree. German law and American law are based on different systems. They both died at the same age as their mothers': my dad was 52, and Mike was 78. They had similar temperaments. They were both nervous men who had control over their behavior. They were both affectionate. They were both in-charge kind of guys. Mike was not paternalistic with me. We were equals, well, as much as we could both muster, given our backgrounds.

I did some stinking thinking this morning. I tried to curb it. I watched my mind return to the negative thoughts like a moth to a light. Huh? What do I get out of it? I really don't know. I do believe I wouldn't do it if I didn't get a perk.

I had a call from the account yesterday; my taxes for 2003 were done. For the first time in my life, I owed nothing to either the federal or state governments; they owed me. Wow! I felt guilty. I would contribute to the government coffers if I could be assured they were used to help the poor instead of the military. Who says there's no benefit to $30,000 in medical bills?

I had an appointment with twenty-six-year-old S. The flow of her reading was better than yesterday. Yesterday, I asked her if her mind's spinning was better, worse, or the same. In the previous session, she revealed she spoke slowly and took long pauses to prevent unintended words from coming out of her mouth. I chose not to do the spin-release exercise with her. I just told her to observe the movement in her mind. Today, I asked her if her mind had stopped giving her all those extra words. Yes. Holy Cow! I'm so glad I let her solve this on her own.

Judy called. She was on the road heading to the airport, hoping to find plumeria trees in bloom. She needed flowers for leis for Holy Thursday. On Sunday, the priest instructed everyone to bring one. It's too early in the season for the plumeria to be in bloom, so she will have to buy a lei.

Sunday, March 24, 2024

It was Palm Sunday. Not that I don't think of Michael, but today was a special day. I hoped Mike's idea of being with Jesus in heaven came true. My heart ached for him. I loved seeing him happy. I loved giving him what he wanted when I could. I couldn't always accommodate him because I didn't think it was a good thing or couldn't extend myself that far. But if I could, I did, and I loved his joyful response.

Right after church, I drove to the account's office to deliver an envelope with a copy of my 1099 from Social Security and the final account on my medical and charity expenses.

Leaving the church parking lot was a trip. The Costco parking lot isn't the only one packed these days; the church parking lot was getting bad, too. Fr. Lio even talked about it from the pulpit last Sunday. He said more and more people are coming to church.

Now, the increase in Costco customers can be due to the increase in tourists or the increase in grocery prices, which is driving more people to shop at a discount store.

I napped briefly after I got home and then had third-grade M at noon. We continued working on comprehension with E.B. White's classic, Stuart Little. M's getting better at figuring out the language and using context clues to infer the meaning of a word.

The rest of the day was spent working on updates, talking on the phone and a little bit of gardening. My stepson called. We had a nice long talk. He had been through an upsetting experience at work.

A department head was fired for 'inappropriate' behavior. People infer the worst because no one can say what that 'behavior' is. The poor guy is indicted by a rumor for the worst behavior and does not have a chance to defend himself. The chances of him ever finding another job in the industry are probably out. I feel sorry for this guy. He says he never meant to hurt anyone. However, he was warned that his language made his staff uncomfortable. He blew it off. He had one staff member defend him, saying he was a nice guy who meant no harm. That staff member whom he mentored was a favorite. If I know someone really likes me or loves me, I can overlook their behavior, Mike would say outrageous things to me, but I knew he loved me. I thought his limitations were cute, even adorable. That's not to say I didn't blow a gasket occasionally, or he didn't have to tolerate my limitations as much as I did his. Except for that one staff member, no one else felt this guy's loving gaze as I felt Mike's.

My mom did crap like that to me. I once asked her to stop criticizing me, telling her how much she hurt me. She turned that on its head. She insisted she wasn't hurting me, probably because she never meant to do so, and accused me of saying that just to hurt her. How's that for an upside-down apple cake?

Saturday, March 23, 2024

I hooked up with Mama K's crew this morning after several tries. They didn't sign on at 9 as planned. I tried calling their older sister, who was at home watching the girls. The moment I called her number, the call dropped. I called Mama K. She said her daughter had her phone turned off. Mama K got hold of her, and the Twins connected on Zoom. I was already running late.

I checked Twin E on old word lists. She hadn't made progress. She went through Fry Sight Word lists 1-125 at a good clip, missing one or two words that she always gets stuck on. She slowed down on list 126-150 but read most of the words correctly. I will return to the game we both enjoy after another session. I wanted to stop and appraise her progress.

I finally got time with Twin A. She read slowly. I asked her if she consciously decoded each word. She said she did. No wonder she reads slowly.

I pushed her to use automatic processing. The problem is that she doesn't evaluate if a word makes sense in a sentence or accurately resembles the word she says. She grabs the first letter and perhaps one additional one and makes a wild guess—truly a wild guess. The word renders the sentence meaningless. How can I combat that tendency?

I spent most of the day on the sofa, happily catching up on updates.

This is the most writing I've done in a while, and it felt good. Besides that, I spent time boiling water and killing the weeds with it.

Lutz stopped by in the late afternoon to check out my microwave. He thought I might not be working because of a fuse in the appliance. I told him I checked the fuse in the house fuse box. That wasn't the issue. I also told him I used to get it to work by spinning the 'plate' in the oven. Ah, then he knew what the problem was. There was a switch in the middle of the turntable. If I turned the table gently, it would be okay. So far, I've been giving it a mighty spin worthy of a roulette wheel. I could be adding to the damage by doing that.

He was also concerned that the under-the-counter microwave had no circulation. It was right up against the back wall. I noticed the counter was deep. I got out the measuring tape, got the measurement off the new microwave I bought, and the measurement of the counter. The counter was a good 10" deeper than the microwave. It had room to breathe but perhaps not enough ventilation. That space behind the microwave is closed. Lutz moved the microwave out an inch. I don't know if it will make much of a difference.

Friday, March 22, 2024

I was supposed to have the Twins at 9 am. Mama K started work at 4:30, manning a coffee booth in an exercise club before she went to her other job. I sent a link at nine, as requested. Nothing. I tried to call the twin’s older sister, who was home watching them. The call was dropped seconds after I dialed it. I called Mama K. She got hold of her daughter through FaceTime.

Twin E signed on close to 9:30. I had to be in a shower by 10:30. I had to cut things short. Instead of doing the handwriting exercise to strengthen her ability to focus on the letters in the words, I went over a list she hadn’t seen in a while, Fry Sight Word #101-150. She did well on the first twenty-five. She did better on the second set but not as well. She did some off-the-wall misreadings, reading through as other. I forced her to make the sounds associated with the words, th, r, and give me a sound for the ough. She did well on the first two and gave me an /uh/ for ough. I used her pronunciation of through in a sentence. She was able to infer the meaning! It was a first for this! It is huge progress.

I told Twin E to call Twin A to the session. She didn’t come and didn’t come. I called Mama K. I don’t know what the problem was. When she did come on, something went wrong with the Zoom connection, but not before I got some valuable information. The Sped team said A had problems reading at an appropriate rate. As she read today, I asked if she consciously decoded every word. There is no way one can become a good reader decoding every word. She said yes. She was being cautious. She must have a functioning memory since she had completed the sight word lists up to grade level. But the sight word list is predictable. When reading text, the words aren’t. I pushed her to use the same memory process when reading text as when reading the sight word lists.

It was tricky. On occasion, her mind gave her the wrong word. I can see where she’s coming from. How could she rely on such an inconsistent memory? On occasion, she read a word that made no sense and was unperturbed. Does she pay attention to the meaning while she’s reading? Does she have to concentrate too hard on the decoding to pay attention to the meaning of the sentence? There are lots of questions. It’s a good place to be in the teaching process.

After I finished with her, I loaded another trash bin with palm fronds to take to Darby’s. I planned to take it over tomorrow when I had the time.

I jumped in the shower to get ready for lunch at Don and Brenda’s. When I arrived, I was surprised we were going out. Their previous invitation, which I had to cancel because of nausea, was for a restaurant.

I assumed this one would be lunch in their backyard. But no. I followed Brenda on her scooter to the View restaurant at the golf course.

The View is on the golf course grounds, although it is privately owned. It offers a fantastic view of the Pacific Ocean and a small harbor nestled in the bay below. I ordered a hamburger. I kept hoping to find a restaurant serving a hamburger comparable to Annie’s. I lust for their burgers. Sadly, that restaurant closed during Covid.

We talked about long-term health care and the changes at the Kona Inn. Sadly, Brenda’s mom has dementia and lives in the Life Care Center. Brenda visits her daily and has nothing but praise for the care there. I was shocked that her mom pays $16,000 monthly for a double room. That’s more than it costs to stay at the Regency, a privately owned graded retirement community. The Life Care Center provides round-the-clock nursing care for all its residents. The Regency does, too. I don’t know how much full-time nursing care costs there. The price is probably comparable.

However, I was surprised at the cost of the Life Care Center because I know that the residents there are covered by Medicare. That’s where they wanted to send me after my accident in June. I didn’t wind up there because they had no vacancy. Kaiser would have paid for my stay. Because no skilled care nursing facility was available, I had two choices; stay in the hospital or pay for my in-home care. I chose the latter. I think it was the best choice, assuring my quickest recovery.

Don, Brenda, and I all found the service at the Kona Inn disappointing. The prices were higher and the quality of the food lower.

This was the first time I met with Don and Brenda without Mike. I had a lovely time. I enjoyed Brenda’s high energy level. It was energizing for me.

When we parted, it was time for a nap. I headed home. Adolescent D cancelled for the day. I had Mama K’s Twins at 4:30 when she got home from work. That woman put in a 12-hour workday to come home to four kids.

I had called Lutz earlier in the day to say I was free if he wanted to come over and check out my microwave. When he heard mine was broken, first he asked if he could have it. He wanted to cannibalize it for parts. Then he thought he might be able to fix it. I didn’t hear from him until the end of the day. He apologized. He spent the afternoon with his adult daughter, who was getting her driver’s license for the first time at thirty. She could drive and had been driving for years, just without a license.

March 19, 2024- March 21, 2024

I opened my file one day and discovered I had lost all my entries between February 9 and March 21. When I browsed ‘version history,’ all the earlier versions showed ‘open version’ only. I Google lost files online and found others suffering from the same problem. I was surprised the Internet hadn’t exploded. I lost 38 days of work.

For me, it’s not a big deal. I emailed my updates through March 19, and I can easily recover them. What happens to someone writing a book or a graduate school thesis?

Monday, March 18, 2024

I sat in mental chaos while I meditated. It was like an Olympic volleyball game on steroids. I didn’t hear words; I just felt sections of my brain firing rapidly. Most annoying. Inspired by Fr. Greg Boyle’s talks about his model of loving self-compassion that he teaches the ex-L.A. gang members, I tried sitting with my wounds, loving them, and promising to protect those aspects of myself. My mother often expressed contempt for me. “You, you, you. Leave it to you.” Or “You’re nobody.” I have to overcome her internalized intolerance for myself.

The twenty-six-year-old’s word recognition was good today. We worked on fluency, which is the ability to read aloud so it sounds like conversational speech instead of a list of words. Conversational fluency and singing have much in common. You don’t stop after each word; the words are strung together as in a song. I modeled, and she tried to copy me.

Microsoft files disappeared again. I lost the latest version of Blog book 2023-1 and all the files for ‘updates interim.’ With the interim files, I was able to download a previous version. There was no previous version available for the blog book file. Hopefully, it will reappear as some files that disappeared the other day did.

Today was a banner day. Adolescent D said, “This was a good session.” We didn’t do anything differently from what we had been doing. I continued giving him words from New Yorker articles. Some were multisyllabic. I also picked words that emphasized some phonics principles he might have trouble with. Today, he tried to sound out the final -e in a multisyllabic word. Oh, boy. That’s deep. From what I’ve seen so far, the single letter e at the end of all words longer than three letters is silent. I’ve told him that repeatedly. This poor boy.

I wish I had a diagnosis from a neurologist. His mother won’t make the effort. In the past, she just said no. Now, she argues there’s no pediatric neurologist on the Big Island. They would have to go to Oahu. I don’t

know if she’s wrong. I don’t know if a neurologist could do anything other than recommend an Educational Therapist. From what I’ve seen, they don’t have more to offer than I do, and maybe less.

Sunday, March 17, 2024

I woke before the alarm went off. I was plagued by grief. While I am touched when I get a massage, I am rarely touched with affection. I get occasional loving hugs from Paulette and Darby that are both satisfying and reminders of what I've lost with Mike's wonderful hugs. We were both affection junkies. Thank God we found each other. This morning, I had to sit and feel the vibrations of need peel off my body. I thought of atoms looking for their complements.

I had a remarkable experience in church today. I was moved by a reference to God's mercy. I'm not sure why. Is it because I need mercy, or do I need to give it more freely? Then the priest, Fr. Lio, did something remarkable.

He interrupted the mass. He said it was the first time he had ever done that. (That is not quite true. He did it when someone passed out in church. He told everyone to stay seated except for the medically trained to take care of the situation.) But today the emergency wasn't medical; it was canine distress.

He announced that a dog in distress was in a car in the parking lot. The owner should go out, put the dog on a leash, and bring it into the church. I wasn't sure if he was saying the dog should come inside the church or onto the lanai, but it was to be part of the congregation either way.

He continued: this is a pet-friendly church. It has been ever since some priest was here. He had a dog named Thumper who went with him wherever he went. Thumper processed with the priest. He came down the aisle to the altar at the beginning of mass. During the mass, he sat to the side with the altar servers. When mass was over, he joined his master and processed back down the aisle. The church has been animal-friendly ever since.

I laughed with delight upon hearing this wonderful story. I felt a kind of joy I hadn't felt since Mike died. I felt my face form a smile I hadn't had since Mike died. God, I loved that man.

A woman who feels compelled to include me in her life occasionally and who criticizes people with abandonment invited me to lunch. She will set you right whether it's your behavior or your opinion. She's incredible. Judy questioned my rejection of her. She said her mother criticized her endlessly but knew she was loved. My mother also criticized me endlessly. Aside from being my mother, I knew she loved me for most of my childhood. It made her behavior toward me confusing. How can someone who loves you and not only find constant fault with you but speak to you with contempt? She would tell me I was nobody. The two didn't go together.

While I knew and believed that my mother loved me, I also believed this woman did not. Judy said I should love her. I can love her from afar. I do indeed wish her well. I rejoice in all that goes well in her life. But does that 'love' mean I have to suffer her abuse? I don't think so. I don't think it's even good for her.

Relationships are mathematical. There's a ratio of good to bad moments in a relationship. Of course, these moments aren't strictly quantitative but also qualitative. Not only are they qualitative, but the quality is measured by the degree of emotional satisfaction or dissatisfaction, making the ratio complex.

Mike used to say he would fire me if he were my boss. Those words could have, should have, been devastating, but they weren't. I trusted his love for me completely. Mike wasn't in a position to fire me; no one fired me for my maverick ideas, practices, and, on occasion, behavior. Rather than be angry with him for his most irritating behavior, I thought it was funny. Mike was my funny Valentine.

My sister once said, "The face of a loved one is always interesting!" Ain't that the truth?! I wish I felt that way about my own 'face.' What does that say about my self-love?

Adolescent D asked to be let off for the day. Third-grade M's session was postponed to later in the week; it was spring break. Mama K texted to say the girls were available. I got on with Twin E. She read try as turn. How do I get her to pay attention to the letters? Her mother yelled at her for playing with something while in session. I told her E was scared and distracting herself. I finally captured her attention. Can you blame her for being scared?

She is 10 years old and still struggling at a first-grade level. She can't remember things even as well as her twin. I told her to give me the sound of a single letter, and she gave me another guess about the whole word. "Please, do what I ask you to do?" Does she ignore me because she doesn't understand the question, fears she doesn't know the answer, or can't bear repeating something that doesn't make sense to her? When decoding a word, figuring out a single sound is unsatisfying. It came out that she really does have problems with sounds. I asked her what sound the letter R makes. She said, "Are." I said rabbit using her pronunciation arabbit. She could hear that wasn't right. She correctly pronounced the initial sound in rabbit on her own. Okay. All my efforts to get her to listen to herself have slid down the drain. She's as stubborn as Adolescent D. Does she really have problems, or has she created them by not following the procedure I recommend? The Twins and Adolescent D do indeed have memory problems. Even that is a question: is the problem self-created or neurological? However, it is understandable they feel they can't trust themselves due to the years of failure to accomplish what their classmates did.

I continued writing the words slowly and had E mimic the strokes with her index finger on a hard surface. She said her handwriting had improved slightly. Despite repeated requests, Mama K hadn't sent me a sample yet.

I write the words on the Fry sight word list. I have three objectives with this exercise: 1) handwriting, 2) encouraging attention to the letters in the words, and 3) memorizing the words on the list. Today, she asked if she could 'draw.'. She meant to write a word. All my other students have learned how to write on the shared Zoom whiteboard. She couldn't. I sure don't know how. Since that didn't work, she had to dictate the words to me as I wrote them.

I used this strategy with a student in the 80s. It took 182 sessions to get him to be a basic reader. (He got his MBA from Yale. He was bright as they come.) I met with him in person. I would select three letter words within the same word family. He closed his eyes. I told him how many letters were in the word and gave him one letter at a time. He had to figure out what the letter was by feeling the plastic letters and then the word by blending the sounds. We took turns. He gleefully picked 8 or 9-letter words from the dictionary when it was mine. He couldn't read the words, but he had to find all the letters and present them to me one at a time. That was the only strategy that worked.

Saturday, March 16, 2024

I left at 7:30 to get to Hawi and the second Gokhale class. I made it without losing any electricity. I must have accidentally pressed the power mode button when I pressed the seat-warmer button. It was cold last Saturday.

I made it to the class just in time. I got a great deal out of this class, too. Lisa encouraged me to write up my complaints about the teacher of the Elements course. It was 18-13-minute online private sessions at the rate of $200 an hour. It was terrible. If I hadn’t had a previous encounter with this program, I would have reported it to a law enforcement agency as a scam. It was that bad.

Today, the main objective was the pelvic position. I was the poorest performer in our class of three. I have no movement in the lower part of my spine. What are the causes?

Some of it is from the instruction I received in my dance classes: tuck your spine. From what Esther discovered in her anthropological research, that is the opposite of what we should do. Our waistbands should slant down from the back to the front, not the other way or parallel to the ground. Besides my dance instruction, there’s my spinal curvature. It gets in the way of everything. It was so bad when I was younger. I can do certain moves I couldn’t do when I was in my twenties and taking several dance classes a week.

I was tired during the class. Lisa allowed me to nap briefly. She is a lovely lady. When she lived in California, she hosted Sunday potluck dinners at her house for whoever wanted to come to share in music and storytelling. She’s a vet who graduated from Tufts Vet school. That’s quite an impressive accomplishment. It’s harder to get into vet school than med school because fewer of them exist. She sounds like an incredibly relaxed person. She is moving to Hawaii and taking over the vet practice of a woman who just retired. She has an entirely relaxed attitude about it. She floats with the tide. Wow! She is as unassuming as it comes.

I’m a little uncomfortable with the group. They’re perfectly nice to me; it’s just that they’re all so California, and I’m so New York. Lisa commented on my New Yorkness, but I didn’t take it as a compliment. I feel I’m not with my tribe. They tolerate me but don’t embrace me. I find myself acting out a bit out of my discomfort.

The ride home went smoothly. I didn’t worry about how much electricity I had.

I met with Adolescent D during the afternoon. He is recognizing words more rapidly. More importantly, he doesn’t zone out anymore. He hasn’t for quite a while now. I asked if he was still doing it at school. He said he didn’t think so. His response confirmed my impression that his zoning out was a fear response. While my main response when scared is fight, his is freeze. This change in him is wonderful news.

There is an ‘however’ here, too. While D recognizes words much more quickly and accurately, he continues to resist/refuse to do what I suggest that would improve his weaknesses and enhance his strengths. I recommend he analyze words he can correctly for their phonetic structure. I did that when I created my recording of the 5 Stories I had written to help my students learn to read. I had no idea what its impact would be on them and less what its effect would be on me.

After recording a 90-minute cassette, reading the individual sounds and all the words in the text, and after saying the word normally, I found a dramatic difference in some of my skills. My reading speed increased. My ability to listen to someone else speak improved. That happened because I became more sensitive to the individual sounds within a word, increasing my sensory data. My speech changed; it became clearer, and my rate of speech slowed down somewhat. Most surprising was the change in the way I listened to music. Music had always been linked to dance; it was what I danced to. I spent most of my youth dancing in my living room to classical music to entertain my grandfather.

I was sensitive to the rhythms and emotional intensity of the music but not the melodic patterns or the interaction of the instruments. My ability to focus on the latter was altered. This is not to say I was anywhere near what someone with a lifelong rudimentary interest in music had. I attribute all this to changes in my left brain resulting from my immersion in phonics. There is evidence that backs up my theory.

Friday, March 15, 2024

I woke up around 3:30 to go to the bathroom and fell back asleep till 4:30. I was up; I might as well get up. The first thing I did was call T-Mobile. I had trouble getting my phone to connect to the charging cord again. I tried both the cords I had. Neither worked. I wiped down the plug on one of them with alcohol and got it to connect. The T-Mobile representative was a delight. She recommended I get a remote charger. You don't have to plug your phone in; you place your phone on the charger. Sounded good.

Judy called. I told her about my phone issue. She declared the charging cords wear out quickly and need to be replaced. I've heard that before. When I took my phone to T-Mobile when I first encountered this problem, the rep told me that the outlet on my phone was very dirty, preventing contact. I bought a special kit with tools to clean it. That helped.

It's just nerve-racking to think of being unable to charge the phone and having to wait forty-eight hours for a new one.

I have fallen into Fr. Gregory Boyle's rabbit hole. I am listening to all the videos on him I can find. I love his message of inclusion for all and the way he speaks. I also love his attitude toward service and healing.

He said something that struck home for me. A lot of the people he dealt with had mothers who were frightened or frightening. They probably go together. He said children like that never learn to self-soothe because they never were soothed.

I think this is my situation. It is very difficult to calm myself. In the past, that inner disturbance rapidly became outer. I have more control over it now, but I can still suffer.

Self-soothing for me was dancing. I danced my little heart out until anxiety and fear were expunged. This is before the era of expressive social dancing. I did interpretive modern dance, me and Isadore Duncan. I lost myself in dance. Without it, I doubt I would have made it to adulthood with any sanity left. I feel for that little kid, subjected to that frightened, explosive mom.

Note: my mom wasn't like some of the moms the Home Boys describe. She was devoted to her children. I thought she hated being a mom. She was shocked when I told her so at the end of her life. No, she loved being a mom. She sure had me fooled. How can anyone enjoy being dissatisfied with everything your children do and don't do all the time and enjoy it? She was constantly angry. Anger was her way to self-soothe. It wasn't available to me because I had learned that being angry at people hurts them. Her behavior caused her no remorse, no shame. Remarkable.

At one point toward the end of my mother's life, my sister told her that she had ruined her life. Later in the day, when I visited with her, she told me what my sister had said. My mother's response: "Maybe I wasn't hard enough on her." Holy cow! My mom lived in an upside-down world.

Thursday, March 14, 2024

I had a good night's sleep but felt lousy for most of the day. I thought I had a sinus headache, or was it a mild stroke. I had several days of feeling lousy in the morning, perking up in the afternoon and evening. What was going on? I had bouts of mild nausea, which moving made worse. This had been going on for at least a week. I finally checked if there were any negative side effects to creatine. I started using it on the advice of Huberman of Huberman podcasts. He said it was the one must in his life. I took it without question. It's for building muscle mass for bodybuilders. Huh?

I scheduled three activities for nine am: The 80s Club Zoom meeting, a tutoring session with 26-year-old S, and a session with Shelly. I had written 3/9 next to Shelly's name, meaning three o'clock her time/nine o'clock mine. However, I had put her name in the ten a.m. slot. In the name of caution, I canceled my participation in the Club meeting and asked S if she could make it at 11:15. It all worked out, except that I continued to feel lousy.

My appointment with Shelly was at ten a.m., not nine. I was somewhat concerned when she didn't call at nine. I always think something bad happened.

The work I did today was important. Earlier in the week, I felt I could sit with a personal attack without becoming defensive and combative. I have never had enough control of my fear to conceive of doing that. This reactivity is the sole reason I have stayed in therapy for my whole life. My reactivity was the reason I decided at 18 never to have children. I had lived with my mother's reactivity and never wanted to subject a helpless child to that experience; the abuse would stop here. As an adult, I realized I also spared myself. Who would want to be that person? I didn't. Although it never seemed to bother my mom. She thought it was a good way to be. When she lived with me for the last eighteen years of her life, she once wondered if being less combative was a good thing. Oh, boy!'

I worked with a few images with some surprising results. First, I thought of the Gokhale instructor I had for the individual online sessions at a mere $200 an hour. She worked strictly from a script. She was incapable of making adaptations. How was this a personal session? It was a private viewing of a public presentation. I've seen teachers of whole classrooms make more adaptations to their audience. I considered reporting the service. (I stopped the private sessions and used the balance of the money to sign up for in-person group classes. The teacher of these group classes was as good as the other was bad.) my response when thinking of this failed teacher was sadness. I felt so bad about needing to reject her. I prefer being a loving, accepting person. I like people. I find everyone interesting. I find anyone who enjoys my presence a delight to be with. I'm out of there when I find people don't like me. I love working out differences; I learn more about others and myself. It's so enriching.

At any rate, I felt sad I couldn't be a loving, accepting person with the teacher of the individual classes. I struggled for several sessions about how to get out of the situation. I finally realized I could call the Gokhale customer service agent and cancel. I didn't have to shove it in the instructor's face. It still made me feel so sad. I prefer being accommodating. I think I'm enriched by it, not lessened. But this situation, like others in my life, was too much. I was spending $200 an hour caring for someone who was supposed to help me. I still struggle with it.

Next, I had a therapist who was a real doofus. She had me all wrong. I don't mean her judgment of me was wrong, even though I thought it was. I mean, she had the facts wrong. However, she believed she could divine everything. She certainly thought I wasn't a good source of information about myself. I knew why I continued with her; she didn't. But I still chafe when I think of her. I envision running into her. It's not a comfortable interaction.

I look forward to the point where I can be genuinely neutral. I want to achieve equanimity before I die. It's a life goal.

Then I thought of my mom, my poor mom, with all her life traumas.

I felt so sad I wasn't able to be what she needed. Her needs were contained for the last 18 years of her life, and I was balanced; we could be good enough with each other to make a joyful situation.

During our session, I wasn't at my best with twenty–six–year–old S. I had her reread the first-grade story she read on Tuesday. I emailed it to her after our session. She had actually asked me to. Her sister only printed it out yesterday. She had only reread it once. I proposed she work on it for Monday. I hope she will prepare the story to read to her three-year-old daughter. The story is in a published book with pictures. When she reads the story with me, it's just the words. I proposed formatting my printed version of the book so she could illustrate it with her daughter. She said the three-year-old couldn't draw. I said, "She could tell you what to draw." She thought it might be fun to do. Great!

When I checked my updates the other day, I had lost six days work. They mysteriously disappeared along with entries for February I had already run through Grammarly and emailed. I had mixed feelings about the loss. One feeling was, "Yay! Less work!" Today, they all reappeared. Oh, dear. Now, I was way behind.

Wednesday, March 13, 2024

I did my Gentle Seated Yoga video. I only completed 2,000 steps on my morning walk because I had driveway yoga. As I walked, Casey arrived for the class. Elsa chased his car. She has never done that before. She charges cars from the side but ignores them once they’ve passed. I figured she smelled Casey and knew it was yoga time. She loves our driveway yoga.

We were at a full house this morning. Casey, Carolyn, me, Deb from Seattle, and Yvette, who taught the class, were on video. Yvette announced this would be the last class until her Montessori kids were on break. She teaches yoga online to a group of preschoolers. It was all too much from her. I get a great deal from her class.

I planned to go to the Kupuna meeting at 8:30. I had mixed feelings about going; I wasn’t feeling 100%, and I still had to eat something.

I finally left at about 9:30. I had only made it a few blocks before the negatives outweighed the positives. I turned around and headed home.

I had Ulu Wini at 1:30. The table faced the building. It was a grey day, so I wasn’t concerned about the sun washing out the computer screen images.

I had 5th grade L first. Last time, I covered decoding multi-syllable words. She needed some more work on comprehension. I used the book Hatchet. The main character is 13 instead of 10, but the book is considered suitable for ten—or eleven-year-olds.

I saw 5th grade M watching us. I called her over to join us. She said she had seen some improvement in her comprehension from the work we did yesterday. Both girls have problems understanding the relationship of one word to another in a sentence. They will interpret a word out of the context of the sentence. Working with the two girls together was a blast. I repeatedly asked them if they wanted to stop. They both were eager to continue. I was the one to call it quits. While I had fun, it was exhausting. I must have worked with them for an hour.

First-grade K came next. My notes said he was struggling at a pre-primer level. I worked with him in a Reading Roots book #20. What a difference in so many regards! His focus and concentration were completely different. Before, it was hard to hold his attention for two seconds. Now, he was completely concentrated. He diligently decoded any word he didn’t know. He did an amazing job. It would be hard to know if I had any effect. The Reading Roots program is fantastic. The teacher who works with these kids came by. She said the school is seeing a dramatic improvement in reading levels with the Success for All method. The books are fabulous. They include both phonics and good stories.

I called Zola, offering to meet her in town to help her learn the Gokhale foot exercises.

I am seeing a difference in my mental functioning since I broke my shoulder and elbow. It’s the impact of the 8 hours under anesthesia for the surgeries and three weeks of opioids for the pain. There are two areas where I’m seeing a difference. In the past, I could always write and listen to the radio simultaneously. Now, I can’t hear lyrics without it interfering with my concentration. I can only listen to instrumental music. The second impact is on my ability to make connections. That was a particular mental strength of mine. I wasn’t good at attending to or remembering details. Still can’t do that; if anything, I’m worse at that, too, but that happens with age. But now, I don’t make connections between two pieces of information. Yvette spoke about staying home Saturday to be with Little. I thought she wanted to spend time with her while she sent Masha to doggie daycare. It only occurred to me later that she made these arrangements because she anticipated Dan coming over to cut down the Schefflera tree. He canceled for the day. I finally got it. Yvette wanted to stay home in case Little was upset with the noise.

I watched Oppenheimer. Wow! I had planned to watch it over two nights. I watched it all the way through and headed to bed at 11 instead of 9. I was spellbound.

Tuesday, March 12, 2024

Elaine came walking toward me. She didn’t stop today; she told me Dean and Nina were on their way. I grilled Nina on how MakesNoClaims (Intrasound) was doing. Her scars still don’t itch and continue to get paler and smaller.

I attended a large group Zoom meeting at 9 am, where Gokhale introduced a new program. It was very disappointing. The free videos Esther usually gives include instructions. This was an infomercial for a new format to rival the elements course I had signed up for, individual sessions with a certified instructor. I can’t imagine ever doing anything like that again except with Lisa, who has proven herself a good instructor. I regretted signing up for it, particularly since I had to reschedule my reading session with twenty-six-year-old S later in the day. I had her reading in first-grade material. She missed words but did reasonably well. She had to be reminded to stick to the letters on the page and start with the vowel if she needed to decode the word.

Judy, who observed the session, was optimistic that she would progress rapidly. Her memory is undoubtedly better than Adolescent D’s. She is also eager to follow my instructions on the off chance they will work.

I had a luncheon date with Zola. I was late because I didn’t hear my alarm go off. After showering, I left my phone in my robe pocket. I had gotten engrossed in writing a letter of complaint to Esther Gokhale for the disastrous lessons I got from one of her top instructors. I called Zola to warn her I would be late. She said not to worry. She was sitting in the car in the church parking lot.

We ate lunch at Papa Kona’s. They placed us at the far end by the back stairs. I felt we had been given an undesirable spot, but there were no undesirable spots in this location. All have fantastic views of the ocean. We both had the poke. We had eaten it before her, and we both thought they had a new and improved recipe.

I craved dessert, and Zola needed to move on. I walked down to Lava Java. There was nothing there that interested me. I was looking for a fruit pastry, and they had none.

When I returned to the church parking lot, I discovered the car was still running. I meant to lock my car. I had my computer in the back seat because I was heading to Ulu Wini immediately afterward to tutor. Anyone could have driven away with it and my computer.

I got to Ulu Wini way before the kids arrived. I did a Zoom session with Adolescent D. We just did a few words before we were both exhausted. I worked on the updates with the remaining time.

I didn’t work with that many kids to the kids at Ulu Wini today.

I did crossbody blending with first-grade DE and comprehension with fifth-grade M. I discovered that second-grade Mi had an auditory processing problem. She often responded with, “Huh?” She can hear the individual phonemes but does not process words fast enough to understand what is said. I recommended that she listen to the 5-Stories audio file on YouTube.

I had first-grade B at 5 p.m. She reread a Reading Roots story and remembered most of it. She has excellent recall.

We worked on decoding. I teach that vowels are the cornerstones of every syllable. The kids must know what the vowels are. I went over listing them. I teach the “I owe you” trick for remembering them. It’s the one I used as a child. B said, “I owe you a peanut butter sandwich for all your hard work with me.” Wow! How’s that for awareness. The irony is I didn’t feel I grasped her problem yet. It was somewhat obscured because we were working on the reading selections from her reading teacher, which Judy and I felt were way above first-grade level despite being labeled as first-grade material.

I asked B if she wanted to know what made vowels different from consonants. Yes, vowels come out of the big hollowed-out caves of our mouths, while consonants all have a block.

Later in the evening, I called Zola and offered to work with her on her Gokhale foot exercises. She complained about knee pain over lunch. While waiting to be seated, I showed her a Gokhale foot exercise. It was benign; it might help but would do no harm. I was shocked at the state of her feet. She didn’t even have the strength to curl her toes. Her arches were flat. Her proposed solution was to move less, not more. She’d be in big trouble soon.

When I plugged in my car at home, it wouldn’t charge. That was alarming. Had the charging problem reoccurred. Fortunately, I thought to check the connection. Sure enough, somehow, the extension cord was unplugged. It wasn’t Yvette; it must have been the puppies who accidentally pulled it out.

Monday, March 11, 2024

Last night was the strangest night. I wasn’t the least bit tired when I got in bed, but I had a devil of a time falling asleep. Then I woke up at one thirty. That was pretty much it for the night. I supposed I dozed, but I figured I could nap during the day.

I ran into Elaine on my morning walk. We usually have a brief exchange and then go our separate ways. Today, she asked if we could walk together. We proceeded at a good clip, and I was able to keep up. The Gokhale foot exercises strengthen my feet, and I use them differently as I walk. Elaine and I talked about open and closed-mindedness—in other words, the current state of the nation.

As I made my right turn back to Nehiwa, Elaine continued straight up the hill. I saw three small dogs with one person down the street in front of Darby’s house. I didn’t recognize the dogs or the owner. As I got closer, I noticed the dogs weren’t on a leash, and the ‘owner’ looked like Darby. Darby? As we met, the three unleashed dogs circled poor Elsa and sniffed away. Then, I got the story.

When Darby woke up this morning, she heard snorting in her yard. She thought she had pigs. Yes, we have wild pigs wandering our neighborhood. Upon hearing the list of wild animals ( wild pigs, goats, sheep, chickens, turkeys, pheasants, and partridges), my niece said I lived in a nature preserve. Today, It wasn’t pigs rooting in Darby’s backyard; it was three French bulldogs, a mother, and two somewhat grown pups. They followed her out to the street, where I found her.

We were concerned for the dogs’ safety but were not sure what to do. I called the police and told them about the loose dogs and where they were. I hoped someone would call. They bothered Elsa enough that she begged to be held. I threw her over one shoulder and started down the street toward home. I only had one block to go. Larry, Mo, and Curly followed. I thought I had an area where I could confine them until someone came to claim them.

I asked Darby to walk with me, concerned the dogs would crowd me and knock me over. Since my fall on June 13, resulting in a crushed elbow and shoulder, eight hours of surgery, and two weeks in the hospital, I am understandably leery of falling. Darby joined me as we led the three dogs to my house and secured them. I called the police back to tell them I had them and went to find the number for the Humane Society, which no longer did rescues for lost dogs; I should call Animal Control.

I did. It wasn’t open yet, so I left a message. Within five minutes, a woman from Animal Control called me. The police had called her.

I could bring them to her immediately, or she could come and pick them up later in the morning. I chose the latter. I sent her pictures showing where the enclosed area was. I did a video of the entrance, the driveway, and the gate. I texted Yvette to tell her I found three dogs just the right size for her and Josh. Ha! Ha! Josh would have a cow if Yvette brought another dog into the house. But not to worry. These were three valuable dogs. They cost a pretty penny. Someone must be looking for them.

I got a call from Animal Control saying they were on their way just as I left for my 11:15 am doctor’s appointment. Well, that was another problem.

When I went to sign in at Kaiser, they told me I had missed my appointment. It was at 10:15. I couldn’t sign in at the kiosk; I had to do it with the clerks. They texted the doctor’s office to see if they could fit me in. Yes, right now for a quicky, or I could come back at 2 pm. “Now, please.”

I barely had time to sit down when I was called in. I should come late all the time. It was my twice-annual appointment with the plastic surgeon to get my Botox injections in my forehead. I don’t know if they make much difference in my appearance, but they help my vision, which is why Kaiser covers them for me. My left brow sags so badly that it is hard to see sometimes. The Botox injections help. They hurt but are worth it. One of the nurses tapped my arm as the doctor did his work.

The doctor explained why the tapping works. I thought it was a distraction, but it’s more complicated. The nerve receptors can only carry three types of messages. If they are receiving another negative stimulus before the injections is administered, the nerves are on overload and can’t carry the message of the pin prick. The closer the other stimulus is to the sight of the injection, the greater the interference. While the tapping on the arm helped, it would have been much more effective if I pinched my left ear lobe.

I headed to the Kaiser pharmacy afterward. I discovered I was almost out of my blood pressure meds on Friday. I ordered them immediately. The clerk told me the doctor had to renew my prescription. I thought I had gotten a text telling me the prescription had gone through. While I was there, I checked with the pharmacist. There was no record that I had made a call requesting a renewal. The pharmacist wrote the request while I stood there. Hopefully, this goes through quickly. I would have none for one day. Hopefully, not more.

I saw a text from Yvette saying Animal Control had come to pick up the dogs. Later, I got a text from the woman at Animal Control telling me the dogs were reunited with their owner. While the pups weren’t microchipped, the mama was. The animal control person had a chip reader with him. When he called, the owner told him he was driving around the neighborhood looking for them. He said the dogs were usually ‘good’; they didn’t leave the property. Who relies on dogs being ‘good?’

I had two cancellations for today. But I did have Twenty-six-year-old S. We worked on the same first-grade story we had on Thursday. She did much better. I guided her when she missed words, encouraging her to always start the decoding with the vowel letters and to use cross-body blending when she had trouble putting the sounds together. When she follows those practices, she always gets the word. At the end, she requested I send her the text so she could practice it.