I weigh myself every morning. I have gained three pounds and lost an inch on my waist. I’m learning to engage my core muscles in a completely different way. I think I can teach what I’ve learned to others who are not used to exercise. I think I can teach the elderly and couch potatoes. Let me at ‘em.
This PT is so much better than a yoga teacher because she looks at how I’m using my body, recognizes that I’m asymmetrical, and shows me ways to strengthen the weaker parts: use the strong side a little less, emphasize the movement on the weaker side. Love it!
When I walked Elsa this morning, I couldn’t believe the way I felt. I haven’t felt such mobility for 15 years. It may be because I did a hip opener exercise the PT gave me and experience something different. Lying on the floor, I rotated my left leg inward while keeping my hips stable on the floor. This caused cramping in Michael’s muscle, the one he pulled, wrenched, 15 years ago. The cramping was so deep it was scary, but it released when I moved the leg back into neutral. This is very exciting. I will proceed with caution. I don’t want to be lying on the floor screaming in pain, but I do feel this is a way to fix that damaged muscle. I walked further than before with great ease. Wow!
I heard the young man in the house. I said good-morning. When I saw him, it was clear that he was not just getting out of bed. When he left last night, we agreed that the front door would be locked; I would leave the side door open. But that made no sense. The access to my bedroom is easier from the side door than the front one. I had texted him to tell him I had switched the locks, leaving the front door open and the side door locked. When he came home and discovered the side door was locked, he assumed I felt safer with both doors locked and just slept in his truck.
On the way to church, Judy told me she was still reading my blog entries. She said she enjoyed them. She commented on how busy I was. Busy? This woman is out several times a day for church activities or something for her children or grandchildren. And she thinks I’m busy? I told her it was just that I write about my day in detail. It makes it look more active than it is.
I do hope that what I write will invite others to look at their daily lives differently. Everything is an adventure. I know writing it helps me see my life that way. I don’t know if I can ever give it up and stay mentally balanced. Life can seem so empty. In the past, I have wondered, “Where did this day go? What did I do all day?” Then I can remember one activity that perhaps took an hour.
Fr. Lio said the mass at Holy Rosary today. That was a surprise; he’s usually at St. Michael’s. Coincidentally, it was the last day for a couple who have lived here forever and been important participants in our parish. They are moving to Oahu to be closer to the children, and more importantly, to their grandchildren. Fr. Lio cried as he said his good-byes. I was a little jealous that he had that reaction. Did he do this for all parishioners? When he cried at Mike’s funeral, I thought Mike was something special to him. I know Mike was a special person for him in my head, and these folks are too, each in their own way. I suppose this would be something to confess if I ever went to confession. I confessed my reaction to Judy and Paulette. Does that count?
When I got home, the young man was vacuuming away. He was cleaning the room he stayed in and the bathroom he used. He said he saw some dust on the floor in the living room and snatched that up too. I said, while you’re at it, vacuum this hallway. Then I thought, while you’re at it, let’s throw some water on the floor and vacuum it up with the Rainbow. He said he wasn’t planning to do that much. I eagerly took over. I love vacuuming up the water. For those of you who don’t know, I do enjoy watching paint dry. What can I tell you?
I found the new floor attachment and used it. It didn’t work quite as well as the old brush did. Was the problem that it wasn’t a Rainbow product or that the extra-large size of the brush undermined the power of the vacuum? The young man suggested that the new bristles were longer than the worn-down ones on the old attachment, making the power weaker because the opening is further away from the floor. It was good enough. I wonder if the Rainbow attachment has shorter bristles because it increases the suction power by getting the end of the suction tube closer to the ground. If I decide that I want something more powerful, I will have the lady at the carpet care store order a Rainbow attachment.
Jean called. She had asked me the other day not to call daily because she didn’t have the energy to talk that much. I’m glad she felt she could speak up. While I am enjoying our conversations, they enrich my life, I don’t need them. We must have talked for a good hour. We’re talking about our childhoods, sharing stories about our own experiences in the Bronx, where we both lived as children.
I threw a bunch of Mike’s tailored shirts into the laundry with plans of giving them away. Yesterday, Judy was at a children’s party at Ula Wini, a low-income housing unit, and had asked the social service people there if they could use donations of aloha shirts. They said they could use anything. I don’t think this includes Mike’s ties and his leather dress shoes. I have never seen anyone wearing them who lives here. Those I will give to Memory Lane collects money for the hospice care here on the island.
The young man left; I read some of the NY Times, and I took a nap. When I got up, my back was in trouble again. I had to crab walk. I can go from one extreme to the other in a matter of minutes. If I follow the current pattern, I’ll be fine by tomorrow morning.
Over dinner, I read more of The Master and His Emissary. The book is my dinner companion. I consider it a good one, except I wish the print was larger. He talked again about how the left brain works to focus on parts, abstracting something from the whole. The right brain, on the other hand, always focuses on the whole. It works to understand a single object in its broader context. Relationship is king for the right brain.
McGilchrist says the ultimate goal is integrating disparate parts, seeing everything as part of a great whole. Holy cow! I have to read more about the philosophers who see the world this way. I remember in my late twenties feeling that there was a larger Gestalt that I hadn’t grasped yet. Until I finally figured out what the greater unity was, I felt like I had a steel plate in my head that I had to breakthrough.
Before that breakthrough, I would sing, “I’m a Poor Wayfaring Stranger,” feeling the full weight of the verse that went, “My father lived and died a farmer. I’m just a traveling over Jordan, knowing less than he did know.” But after that breakthrough, I didn’t feel that way anymore. My dad was stuck in some thought pattern that kept him desolate and depressed. I don’t know how much of this resulted from his being rejected by the German people he loved because he was Jewish or how much was a result of his natural temperament. Either way, I felt I had somehow, after much effort, moved beyond whatever his limitations were. I don’t even remember what the change was about; it is a part of my thinking now. But I do know that it had something to do with finding a way to fit conflicting ideas into a larger unifying pattern. It was a great relief.
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