After Bikram, I drove over to the Friendly Place to donate nine pairs of board shorts to the homeless. There was a crowd there. In the past, I've seen one or two people sitting around. When I saw Lisa, who heads the local program, she told me this is what it looks like at the end of the month. She is required to count all the local homeless and file paperwork. I told her I could come back some other time. She said no. She had my receipt from last week in a drawer and grabbed a receipt form to fill out for today's donations. She also remembered that I had dropped off two sleeping pillows previously that were to be included on today's receipt. Impressive. I would be totally overwhelmed.
Next, I headed to Lowe's. Scott had picked up two toilet seats for me, one in bone and one in bisque. When we opened them to check the color, one was pure white, and one was bisque. Neither color was right. A clerk had shelved the toilet seats without regard for the labeling on the shelves. I returned both and went to find a bone colored toilet seat made by American Standard as my toilet was. With Scott's warning in mind, I checked the label on the packaging and the shelf. Sure enough, there was another white toilet seat in the place where there should have only been bone ones. Fortunately, there was one in bone. It matched perfectly.
Scott was still downstairs doing some work for Yvette when I got home. I had washed three of the windows in the guest room that can only be reached from the inside. Or at least, I can only reach them from the inside. Besides, there is a breakfront, usually in the room, making the windows even harder to reach. To wash them from the outside, one would have to set up scaffolding.
I dreaded washing those windows, but this time it was easy. I brought in a step ladder—what a simple solution. I sprayed the window with white vinegar twice, squeegeed off the liquid each time. Then I did the same with distilled water, concluding a good polishing job with a micro cloth. Beautiful. I finished washing the last three across the back of the house, snapped in the screens so Scott could have all the windows open as he worked in that room, screwing down the subflooring. The 500 additional screws for the subflooring arrived a few days ago. He could finish the work in the guest room, but he didn't have time to install the toilet.
I had loaded the car with cardboard bits cluttering up the library and were only of limited use into the car last night to take to the recycling center. It's right on my way home from downtown Kailua Kona. Our recycling center only takes cardboard, brown paper bags, and glass these days since China refused to take paper and plastic.
I had to go to school somewhat earlier than I usually do. I'm generally there around one pm because then I'm sure all the reading tutors have left, and I have a chance of finding a parking space. The parking system at this school is a mess, close to a disaster.
I found a parking space in the upper area, signed in, and went to the class. Since I didn't have much time, I felt pressed to work quickly. Never an ideal situation. N. in Mrs. D's class approached me first and asked if he could work with me. I took R. first. She was unusually distracted, and the situation was hard for me. I sent her back into the room after just a little bit of work.
B. came out next. Mrs. D. had told me that he had a 60 % on his last spelling test, an amazing improvement for this child. This week's spelling was on au, aw, al patterns. Good luck! He was able to state the pattern; at least he recognizes the aw one. The first four words were spelled with au. Hauls, paused, caused, Well the first word was taught. It thought that was pushing it a bit and chose to skip that word until the end. Words five through nine were spelled with aw. I bracketed the words and stated the pattern. He still had trouble remembering what the patterns were. I just worked with the first two. He got many of the words correctly, but it always a struggle for him.
I went into the room to collect N., who had asked to work with me. He didn't respond to the call and was hiding in the reading nook. Excuse me. If he didn't want to work with me, step up to the plate and say so. I don't usually force kids to work with me. I don't know if it does them any good, but it's too hard for me. I'm retired, for God's sake, and volunteering. I'm under no obligation to take flak from a kid. Problems I can deal with. If I think the issue boils down to attitude and very little else, I'm out of the picture. He apologized. He brought out a book on an N level, a mid-year third grade, just about where he should be. He looked at the print to find the answers, reread previous sections of the text, and gave me logical guesses as to what unfamiliar vocabulary meant. He was making improvements.
I went to Mrs. B's class next to work with I. I flashed words from the first story to him individually and out of sequence. He aced everyone, with some problems with the word his. I have no idea why that word became such a problem for him. While he worked on the StoryJigSaw Puzzle exercise for Sassy the Cat, I popped over across the atrium to Mrs. L's class to work with D.
She said while his behavior, ability to pay attention was at a 7 yesterday, it was only at a 5 today. I asked him why he had trouble. He said, "It's hard." What's hard. "math." How do you feel when it's hard? "Mad." Who are you mad at? "Me." That is one self-aware kid. He will be a fairly easy fix.
I told him to release anything bad about his hatred for his anger and keep anything good or anything he still needed. He was more relaxed, almost immediately. Then I had him release anything bad about his love for his anger and keep anything good or anything he still needed. If you're wondering why I don't go right for the anger. Because that doesn't work. It's too scary for most people because they are asked to ignore all the complicated feelings about themselves, others, life, math, etc. This procedure is an adaptation of the Buddhist idea that our craving (wanting, loving) and aversion (Hating, wanting something, a feeling a person, to go away.) is the source of all our unhappiness. It is those two feelings, craving and aversion, that create the problems in our lives. Those feelings can accumulate like layers on an onion. The trick is to find the one that is the furthest out and work on that one first. Then, and only then, start moving in, slowly, carefully, respectful of the person's feelings of discomfort and downright danger.
Then I was off to Randee's at Salon Muse to get my hair cut. It's its own little community. Randee is always great to me and gives me fantastic haircuts that look like they were done yesterday, no matter how long it's been. Susan, another operator, is warm and loving. She lost her husband eleven years ago and is still struggling to let go of him. She sympathizes with my situation. Now Susan was much younger than I was when she lost her husband, and she was left with a two-year-old child. Her situation is very different from mine. I think of Shivani in the same way. When you lose a young husband, you lose dreams, as well as comfort and support. When you lose an old husband, you lose comfort and support, but not the dreams of youth. Mike and I were retired together.
Now, this doesn't mean that we didn't have any more dreams, but they weren't the fantastic dreams that come with youth when anything seems possible. If you don't understand the limits of life by your late seventies, there's a problem.
Again, I hadn't eaten all day. I didn't have the time. Randee recommended one of the sandwiches from Tealicious across the parking lot. She told me to go treat myself. I did. It was wonderful. They bake their own baguettes. The limeade, however, was disappointing. I'm used to my own, which I love.
I only had a salad for dinner. I had had a full meal with that sandwich. I watched more of Schitt's Creek. It is funny. Judy had recommended it. I worked on packing up the rest of the useless cardboard to take to the recycling center tomorrow.
No comments:
Post a Comment