Tuesday, July 14, 2020

I heard a TED talk about grief that resonated with me, not about moving on, but about moving forward with it.  The talk helped me fill my heart with Mike. I know that he is always here for me.  His love for me and my love for him remain satisfying.

On my walk, I saw Josh getting into Mike’s car, which he owns now. For a moment, I thought he was Mike. The moment was ordinary, as joyful as it always was when I saw Mike. I thought it was strange. I didn’t have the reaction of overwhelming joy that he had come back. No, instead, it was just as if he had never left.

During morning driveway yoga, I asked everyone for the names of people who could help me post my audio file on YouTube.  What I need is someone who can do video editing.  Elise does it, but she is off-island and won’t be available for a month. I want to complete it sooner.  Alisha asked me if it was many files or just one. She said she could check how to do it. Maybe I could do it on my own.  I had to contact August, my grandson, who did the work for me.  He said it was one file. This will make it easier to get the visual effect I want. 

August sent me a text about something related to YouTube. I had assumed at the time that it was instructions for downloading my files onto YouTube.  I was waiting for the merged files to come through. August told me that’s what they were.  He sent them to me again.  They had a single static image, not the PowerPoint slide show I had put together.  I was surprised. Boy, we’re not on the same page. He told me that he didn’t know how to do video editing.  Okay. He’s sixteen. He has a life of his own. He has no obligation to me, not even to communicate clearly. I texted Crista, the owner of the Bikram studio, to find out who designed the Bikram Website. She gave me a name.

I worked on my article on my reading method.  I put it off and put it off and then wind up enjoying the work when I do it. The other day, I finally posted two ads on Craigslist, one for the Big Island and one for Oahu.  There was no response. I can’t seem to give it away.  Oh, well. I would love the work just for the stimulation.

After completing some work on the article, I addressed my insurance complaint.  I couldn’t believe that what Progressive is doing, raising my premiums when no claim has been made, is incredible. I need to see it in-writing. It’s mind-boggling if that is true.  It makes them utterly corrupt. They’re stealing thousands of dollars from people. When I respond affirming this, I will not only file a complaint but also advertise that I will file complaints on behalf of others.  It seems unlikely that I will be able to get my money back. Why would I bother putting out the effort if I can’t-  because the immorality of their behavior makes me sick.

I called the name of the IT person Crista gave me.  This woman charges $75 an hour and figures it will take half an hour for each file.  Really!  I have trouble with that on so many counts. The big one for me is that teachers don’t earn that kind of money.  I find the disparity outrageous.  Alisha made it sound like I could do the video editing on my own.  I am prepared to try.

Adam hadn’t gotten back to me about making an appointment.  Judy called to tell me that he was interested, and he was going to charge me a lot less than $75 an hour.  If he can do it, that would be great.  She said he hadn’t gotten back to me because Jazzy was sick in bed with a high fever.  She appears to have contracted something from a family member who visited them. I asked Judy if it could be Covid. She said no, she had no trouble breathing. I then asked Judy if she had difficulty breathing when she had Covid. She said no, just some pressure in her chest. 

It is going to be a while before Adam can work with me.  Once Jazzy is better, I wouldn’t want to contact him before he’s guaranteed for two weeks.  I have been putting off posting the Phonemic Awareness audio file on YouTube until I have it the way I want it to be.  I decided this morning to post what I have. That way, I can tell families that they can use it. 

In the meantime, Adam has his hands full, taking care of her, the baby, and Luke.  Leon knows he can go up to Grandma’s and Auntie P’s house.  Judy was talking about taking Luke off Adam’s hands.  Zion, the new baby, has been crying a lot.  He is also proving to be a bruiser.  He was large when he was born, and he is gaining 2 oz a day instead of the usual 1 oz that most babies gain.   These kids have their hands full. Thank God they live on the same property as their grandmother and aunt, so they have plenty of help.

___ ___ ___

Musings:

For some people, learning to read, or for that matter, doing anything, happens effortlessly.  For others, it requires effort.  Having to make an effort to learn what many can do with ease creates an unpleasant experience.  It suggests that there is something wrong with us.

This tendency to self-judge is ingrained in our brains.  It’s a survival skill.  Yes, self-evaluation, seeing how we compare to others, is a survival skill.  How so? Easy.  When we roamed the savanna in the bad old days, survival, basic physical survival, was everyone’s daily objective. Where was the next meal coming from?  Where was the next attack by animal or hostile tribe coming from?  When survival is at stake, diversity is an unaffordable option. Diversity is a luxury of abundance.

Think of the military culture.  Everyone has to fit into a mold.  People who deviate too much have to be eliminated. Fortunately, these days people who deviate too much are just not accepted into the military and are not abandon in an isolated place to die.  That’s what was done with children who couldn’t conform in our hunter-gatherer days. They weren’t being heartless. They were doing what was absolutely necessary.  If the tribe took on the burden of this child, it might have survived. But if this was a precedent on how all children who couldn’t conform would be absorbed. There would be no tribe shortly. Everyone would die. Everyone had to pull their weight and be a productive member of the group.  We are born with the ability to compare ourselves to those around us. The objective is to encourage us to work to learn the required skills, so we won’t be excluded from the tribe.

Monday, July 13, 2020

            I had a dream about experiencing calf cramps last night. In my dream, I doubled over, and no one came to me.  I never woke up completely, and I don't remember my legs actually hurting me, just in my dreams.  This has something to do with what is really happening to my legs, particularly my left calf. 

           I meditated again after I walked.  This is going well. Not only did I meditate, but I also worked on the reading article for the first time in a month since Dorothy sent me her edited version. I had done some work on it when it occurred to me that it was the wrong version. I went back to the email Dorothy sent me and started again.

           At 10:30, I had a tutoring session with  D. His memory for the multiplication facts is improving.  It is more consistently correct. Yeah.  Reading was better. He got more correct but had to be walked through the decoding process repeatedly.  He still doesn't use cross-body blending when he runs into trouble, holding on to sounds. Yikes! How many times does he have to be reminded?

           Marissa called from Progressive, and she connected me to someone higher up. I got the runaround.  The Resolution Consultant, Rob, told me to contact the state department. I did.

           The state representative told me everything they did was illegal.  He asked what company I was with. Progressive. He said nothing. I asked if there were many complaints. He scoffed.   He also told me that he used to work in California. He found that there are more problems with the Hawaiian companies in general. I have to file a complaint. The complaint may not win me my money back, but it will add to the list against them and set them up for a huge fine.

           I called Marissa, my contact at Progressive, to tell her what I had found. Marissa didn't deserve what this company is about. 

           Then I took a nap.  B. called. He was stopping at Costco. Did I want anything? Lemons, blueberries, and salad?

           I continued working on my reading article. This has been a great day.  If I do some work to advance my work in education, either writing an article to promote the work, or meeting with a student, it makes for a good day.  While I did some good editing on the article, I still need to write a conclusion for it.

           As I listened to Fresh Air, I sewed. That way, I can have my hands busy doing something other than Free Cell as I listen.

           It was raining for my before-dinner walk.  I feel less driven to get Elsa outside to do her business since I have put down the wee-wee pad.  She hasn't used it for a while; she hasn't done anything else in the house either.

           For dinner, I tried one of the frozen salmon patties I had bought at Costco, served with broccoli. I was disappointed: it was somewhere between fishy and tasteless.  Too bad.  I like salmon, but not this version of it.  However, broccoli with butter never gets tired.

           Watched the Bench, an English legal drama, again.

____ ____ ___

Musings:

           Yesterday, I wrote about the transformation of the Camden Police Department in New Jersey.  Today, I want to address the problems that I think others see within the African-American community that they feel justify harsh police tactics.  These same people, I believe, are opposed to 'mollycoddling' marginal groups. They look at those who make it from those minority groups in our current society and say, "See! There's something wrong with the rest of them."

           These same people say, "Get over it. Slavery was 400 years ago."  Let's start with that argument.  We know now that trauma is passed on epigenetically.  Many things are passed on epigenetically, but here I will focus on trauma because that's what the slaves experienced, and their children passed on in their genes to their 'freed' children. (A belated hats off to Lamarck)

           Does this mean that the genes are immutable? No, of course not. Good experiences can also be passed on epigenetically.  Unfortunately, the bad experiences resonate more loudly in our psyches.  Why? The good doesn't need fixing. The bad does need attention. The enhanced focus on the bad is a survival skill, not some psychological aberration.

           For people to recover from trauma, there has to be relief. The freed slaves barely adjusted to their newfound freedom while supremacists  moved 'to put them back into their place.' Perhaps they could no longer own these people outright, but they could put them in such a financially disadvantaged position that they were effectively trapped. 

           The freed slaves were offered a plot of land. However, that land reverted back to its original owner when the former slave died.  It was not passed on to their children. I also learned that African-American soldiers returning from WWII were NOT entitled to the GI Bill's benefits.  How many returning white soldiers took advantage of the GI Bill and changed their lives and their children's lives?

           I heard someone describe the situation in the following way: You sit down to play Monopoly with someone.  Only you don't get the $200 starting capital, you're not given any loans, and should you be successful in any way, the property you acquire is taken from you.  Sounds like cheating to me. 

           Some argue that there are minority people who become successful.  True. I learned from a dog trainer that those animals trained with harshness will develop into two extremes. Those who survive will be super dogs, but those who don't will be a mess. The rule of the exception says nothing about the conditions in which their lives were forged.

           I believe those opposed to welfare say that there is something inherently wrong with these people. They will make no effort on their own if we dole out support or equal opportunities. I'm sure that is true for some people.  But most of the Afro-Americans I have met in my life go about living their lives as best they can.

           Here's an example of someone damaged by trauma who never completely recovered. This man's mother was a drug addict; he was homeless in his teens. A lovely woman found him and married him. Lucky him! She has provided him with a home and a semblance of a comfortable life.  Is he psychologically normal?  Can he hold a job? Is he a pleasure to deal with?  Not for most people. But his wife is his biggest protector. Yeah, for her. 

           Where's the problem? Well, for me, this man presents the same problem that some Afro-Americans do.  Most of the problematic people come from abusive homes. Like the man I mentioned above, who is white as the driven snow, they don't seek ways to heal their wounded souls, and they pass on the damage to their offspring. 

           Someone once told me that a professor of his said, "Once you have decided on your belief about the nature of man, everything follows from that." I certainly haven't done a broad survey. From what I've seen, some people believe that an individual's nature is just that. I am not in that camp.  I believe in transformation.  If I hadn't, I would probably have killed myself sometime in my early 20s.  I thought I could transform and find a way out for myself and others.  I remember thinking, "If there is a way into this mess, there has to be a way out." I committed myself to finding that way.

           Some take a more fatalistic point of view, not only of minority groups that they criticize, but also within their own families.  Their point of view is, "That's the way they are; oh well, what you do about it?" 

           I don't disparage that point of view.  I had to learn to be more accepting of others as they currently were, and forgive myself for what I was at the time.  But there is a balance. 

           Mike and I achieved that balance with each other, or at least to some extent. We were able to ask each other to change things that were difficult for us.  In doing so, we both had to look at ourselves as well as each other.  Being able to do that was very enriching. 

           On the other hand, some things were too hard to change easily. We both worked on them. In the meantime, we had to accept each other's good intentions and enjoy each other. That worked.  There was more good than bad in the marriage.  For some, anyone in their in-group is considered basically good, with some problems. Those people get unconditional acceptance. Then there are the 'others that are not part of the in-group.  They are considered basically bad, with some exceptions. The best they get is conditional tolerance. 

Sunday, July 12, 2020

            I decided not to go to church today. The incidence of viruses is higher.  The priest wears a high-end shield while he consecrates the host, but no mask. For me, that means that his breath is being forced straight down onto the serving plate.  That was forgivable while we had zero new cases on the Big Island, but now that the numbers have increased, no. 

            I am still feeling sluggish. This is a familiar feeling. It's the way I feel after a ten-day silent meditation retreat.  It is a result of under-stimulation.  I remember thinking years ago that I would go on one of these silent retreats if Mike died.  Of course, I didn't do that. I had too much to do after he died to get my life in order. Now, this COVID virus has forced a retreat on me. Odd.

            I texted Adam this morning, asking him to set up an appointment to work on my computer issues.  I want to put the audio files on YouTube.  My grandson may have set it up, but I didn't have a chance to review the videos before posting them.  No, no, no.  And my sixteen-year-old grandson, who has been doing work for me for free, has other things to do with his life.  Adam was busy last week because his brother was visiting with his wife and two children.  His brother lives on a different Hawaiian Island, Lanai.  There is not a single case of COVID on that island. It is the only inhabited island that is free.  Hopefully, they won't pick up something here and take it back. Adam's brother and his family left yesterday. Hopefully, he will get back to me soon. I am anxious about getting this material posted.

            I have had great success with my work. I have been called a miracle worker. However, no one is interested in learning what I do. I have neither colleagues nor acolytes interested in acquiring my methods for teaching reading. It is very frustrating.  I am interested in getting at least these audio files out, so they are available before I die. Death is not such a far-off possibility with COVID hanging over my eighty-year-old head. 

            I have been putting out information that I'm willing to work with people for free. My main target is families that are suffering financially at this point and want help for their children.  Even here, I am having trouble finding interested people. Really weird.  D. was recommended to me by one teacher.  

            I have people who admire my work, consider me a miracle worker, those who scoff at my work, and those who think I should be mocked or fired. One person who thought I should be fired was my husband, Mike.  He told me at least twice over fifteen years that he would fire me if he were my boss, and he knew my methods were successful.  Shortly before he died, I reminded him of what he had said.  He said he was just responding out of fear because I represented chaos to him.  He was terrified of chaos.  Now, why would he have attached himself to me if he was afraid of chaos?  He must have wanted to be challenged on that front.

            I have told this story at least twice before, but I think it's worth repeating. Mike was always disturbed about the way my mind worked.  He told me he thought I was one of the smartest people he ever met on our first date. That was saying something given the people he had known in his life. Steven Jay Gould was a good friend of his in college. But then he told me that I wasted my mind because of the way it worked. 

            Mikes' mind was into elucidation.  For example, he read Plato and spent his life working on understanding his ideas better.  My mind makes connections, new connections between things that seemed unrelated to Mike.  We went to a therapist with this problem, Mike, complaining that I couldn't stick to a topic.  I said to him, "I use primary sources," meaning I look at what is before me in life to figure out how things work. 

            Well, he was outraged. He said, "I use primary resources. I've read the original Plato and Aristotle." The therapist, thank God, has some background in philosophy. She said, "Betty is a phenomenalist." With that, Mike had a neat category for me and let go of his fear, and followed my line of thought.  Shortly before he died, he said how much he enjoyed me. "I never know what is going to come out of your mouth next. You are endlessly interesting and fun." It took over thirty-five years to get to that point.  Well, we were a work in progress. 

            Scoffers: When I worked at Licking Heights schools, the teachers appreciated my work. However, there was one couple, yes, married to each other, who referred to me as a quack. I announced that I prefer they not refer to me that way.  The wife said, "How should we refer to you?" I said, "Mad scientist." I would often tell them that what I was doing would be routine within ten years. True, I was developing methods on my own. True, I still haven't come across anyone doing precisely what I am doing, either in teaching reading or in brain modification. But some forms of these ideas are already in the air.

      Some programs claim, accurately, that they produce brain modification.  These programs are generally expensive. This one program claims that it fixes people within thirty hours of work.  I can believe that it is effective for many people and all people with a certain type of limitation. However, nothing works for everyone. There is no medical cure that works for everyone.  My program is free.  If it costs nothing.  It requires no new materials. You would think school schools would be all over me.  But no, that's not the way it works.  Of course, I'm not exactly out there banging down their doors, either. Too shy. Too afraid of rejection.  Too bad for all the people who would benefit from what I know and have developed and me.

            My walking is limited because I have been wearing Oofos, which is a spongy flip-flop.  They are too hard on my leg. It doesn't hurt; it aches. 

            I meditated and then napped.  Mediation used to energize me. Now, it makes me sleepy.

            A friend who was going to stop by this weekend texted to say he wasn't coming. His wife's aunt died in the night. They live in a large family compound. I think he told me twenty-five family members are living on the grounds. I don't remember how many houses are involved.  Many.  His wife's family is one of the old ones, of mixed Hawaiian and Portuguese descent. 

___ ____ ____

Musings:

 

            I read an article in the NY Times that blew my mind. The Camden police department in NJ has been completely reorganized.  There is a drastic reduction in police violence; there is also a drastic reduction in community-initiated violence. This suggests that the police department initiates at least some of the community violence.  Not that the police start every shooting incident, but that the police set a tone of violence in the community that the community then follows. 

            I have heard people say police departments can't be changed; there are too many across very diverse communities.  The interesting thing is Republicans say that. I thought they were opposed to centralized control. The Camden police department is proving that the police departments can be reformed one police department at a time on the initiation of the police department and the community. 

            In the case of Camden, it was the community that forced the reformation.  Camden is a poor community; they weren't providing enough taxes to support a heavily militarized police department.  Ten years ago, everyone in the police department was fired. Then those interested in being guardians of the community instead of enforcers were welcome back.  

            Note: I repeat: the murder rate in the community, Afro-American and Latino murders of Afro-American and Latino victims DROPPED.  This suggests that the confrontational policing style was at least one of the causes of violence among the community members.

            You might ask what a confrontational and violent police force would have to do with the murder rate in their area of patrol.  I have an answer from psychology.  When children are raised in an abusive home, some, not all, will seek to be like the abuser. Why! They want the power to be safe themselves. They see the abuser as causing harm but remaining untouched.  They want to be like the abuser. 

            If children are raised in homes where everyone is treated with basic courtesy and see appropriate ways to resolve differences, they will imitate that behavior. If our police behave in nonconfrontational ways and with courtesy and respect, the children of that community learn to do that. 

            Here's a link to that article: ^{https://www.nytimes.com/2020/07/12/nyregion/camden-police.html}  There must be many stories about this police department. When I spoke to my sister, who lives in New Jersey, she said she was familiar with the Camden Police department story. 

            For me, this represents hope.  I want to live in a world where everyone is accepted as equal.  I believe in the basic equality of all people.

Saturday, July 11th, 2020

      I got up at 6.  My alarm doesn't go off on the weekends. I ran into Laurie on my walk. Her husband, Dave, used to walk with her. She told me his knees were killing him.  He needed surgery.  He had been walking to keep her company. I suspected he was that kind of husband. Besides being a generous and considerate man, he is also good-looking. Before the virus hit, there were singles ads on my Free Cell site.  One of the men looked just like Dave.  I told Laurie about it the other day. Today, she told me that Dave got a big laugh out of this.  He wanted to see how much this guy really looked like him.  I told her where I had seen the image, but I hadn't seen those ads for a while.

      There was a lovely breeze while we were doing our driveway yoga.  I appreciate the wonder of seeing green foliage and blue sky while I do yoga. I'm being bathed in nature. I meditated after yoga. I'm so proud that I'm sticking with this.

     As I woke up from my midday nap, Damon called. He was sitting poolside.  He complained about the heat in LA.  He had to slip into the hot tub to cool down while we talked.  I told him I was wearing a sweatshirt. 

B. called from the driveway while I was on the phone with Damon.  He came to pick up the long pole pruner to do some work on my lime tree.  He'll keep it down there.  He passes my lime tree every day as he comes up the driveway.  I can't see it unless I go down to his space.  He had already fertilized the tree.  He is going to get it productive again for me. 

I worked on hemming an old pair of dungaree overalls shorts while listening to my favorite Saturday shows.  I found it wonderfully relaxing.

I called Dorothy while pruning some hedges. I had wanted to vinegar spray my weeds, but the sprayer made too much noise as I pumped it. She found the sound annoying.

     I am noticing how unstable I am on my feet. Age is undoubtedly a factor. My bad hip and wobbly leg contribute to the problem.  Of course, I am also wearing Oofos.  Their soles are very spongy.  This is challenging for my legs in a good way, but it also contributes to my instability. 

While I did some work on the updates, I still avoided working on editing my reading article.

Friday, July 10th, 2020

       I stayed in bed when the alarm went off, even though I was up.  I just snoozed for a while. I weigh myself every morning. For the last two days, the scale has reported 144 lbs. Where did they come from? I don’t eat that much, except for my chocolates at night.  This has to stop.  I can’t continue packing on the pounds. 

The day was overcast, so it remained cool as I walked.  I meditated when I got home. I had a Zoom tutoring meeting with D at 10:30 am.  We had trouble connecting the auditory. Everything looked okay on my end, but what do I know? Finally, his mother figured out how to fix the problem.

      In our last session, he demonstrated he still had problems recognizing the consonant digraphs sh, ch, and th.  Today, I asked him if he thought English had one letter for each sound. He said yes.  Good luck! This is English.  I told him that while there are twenty-six letters in the English alphabet, there are forty-four sounds. Too many sounds for the letters, so we have to make up other symbols for those sounds. Therefore, we have digraphs.  

     Good explanation, but only partially true. If we have the letter f to represent the sound /f/, why do we need ph to represent the sound too? How do you explain this nonsense to a child who has trouble remembering as much as D. does? He doesn’t only have trouble with his associative memory, remembering 7 x 9=63; he has a problem with his procedural memory: the steps he has to take to accomplish something, like division or word decoding. I have been covering the procedure for decoding words since last August. I still have to start from scratch.  He is not a ‘stupid’ boy.  He has a reasonable vocabulary.  He does seem to be getting a little better at reading for meaning; he substitutes words that make sense into a sentence when he doesn’t know the word—a step in the right direction, for sure. 

After I got off the Zoom with D., Marissa called from Progressive. She was going to introduce me to someone in a managerial position.  She has been wonderful. She calls me back promptly, speaks to me with more than just courtesy, gives good explanations, or says she doesn’t know and passes me on to someone who might know better.  She arranged for me to speak to a supervisor so I could get the best service.  I was connected to Tom, who was an underling.  He was going to connect me to his supervisor. He announced that Rob would handle the matter with me.

Rob asked me what I wanted. I told him I wanted to challenge the premium rate. He said I received notification of my rates whenever the policy was renewed. He told me the matter was closed.  When I told him I wanted to pursue it, he told me to get a lawyer.  It wasn’t just what he said; it was his tone of voice that was suspicious. He sounded temperamental, defensive, and irritable.  He didn’t sound like someone in a supervisory position requiring dealing with the public.  I asked him if he was the supervisor. He said no; he was a Resolution Consultant. I have some questions about his suitability for this job. I said, “Thank you. Goodbye,” and hung up. 

I called Marissa to let her know what had happened. She didn’t get back to me right away, as she usually did. It was during lunch hour.  A few hours later, she did call. I told her my experience with Rob. She apologized. She asked me if I wanted to connect with someone right away. I told her that the first fellow I talked to sounded okay except that we got disconnected, and he never called me back. I thought that since he had started the process, he might be better equipped to finish it. 

I went down for my midday nap. I do love those naps. Scott called my name as I was waking up.  He had bought the fertilizer for my lime tree.  He told me how to apply it. 

     When I did my before-dinner walk,  Mariana, a neighbor, drove past. She was on her way to Matsuyama’s to buy a tub of ice cream.  She sells coffee from her farm out of her car at Costco. I see her car there, but often not her. She’s got the seat leaning way back, and she’s snoozing, waiting for her customers to come by.  I asked her how she managed to tolerate the heat during the day. She said, Oh, she’s used to it. 

     Marianna always has a great smile on her face. It was a delight to speak to someone who smiled at me. My facial muscles are forgetting how to smile. I bet it makes me look a good ten years older.  Given how I am doing with the lack of social stimulation, I can only imagine how it is for others who are isolated than I am. I also feel more empathy for those confined in prison cells with a lack of physical and social stimulation. I have been limiting my walks to the road I live on lately.  I think I’m going to have to mix it up, so I have more visual stimulation.  Of course, I’m limiting it because of the physical problems I’m having. I may have to wait until they clear up. How much of this limitation can I still overcome?

Dorothy recommended a new mystery series, The Frankie Drake Mysteries.  I didn’t find it very satisfying.  A little too lightweight. 

- - - - - - -- - -

Musings. 

This one is about perception in the context of education, a subject that fascinates me. 

      In the reading profession, the big debate has been whether we recognize a word as a whole or break it down as we read it. Competent readers experience reading as something that happens without needing to analyze each word.  We have complete knowledge of the word after a brief glimpse. Obviously, we are not doing a laborious analysis of the word. However, when we describe our experience when reading that way, we only describe what our conscious minds are doing. 

Our nonconscious minds do a very detailed analysis of everything we see in split-second timing, once we have trained them to do their job.  That training can be labor-intensive and hard work. It entails forcing neurons that are asleep to wake up and perform their intended function, connecting with other neurons. 

     The conscious mind gets an easy ride once the unconscious mind is adequately trained. The unconscious mind breaks down perception into minute details: the curved lines versus the straight ones, the tall ones versus the short ones. After the neurons send their specific information to the right place, something combines all that information into a whole again. That reconstituted image is what the conscious mind gets to see and then claims it did all the work. Not. Automatic processing does not become automatic automatically. It always takes some conscious input.  For some, that learning phase is short; for others, it is long; for others, it is very long. This is related to the development of our brains. There are multiple causes.

Thursday, July 9, 2020

I woke up before my alarm went off.  Waking up before my alarm after a good night's rest gave me confidence that I wasn't depressed.  I have been somewhat concerned.  I feel sluggish. Today, my hair stopped looking and feeling good. My mom always said you can tell how people feel by the way their hair sits.  If it seems like it can't be managed, they are not doing well.  My hair is not sitting right. It suggests I'm out of sorts.

It was a two-sweatshirt morning again.  It was a bit warmer by 7, but still a gorgeous, cool day.  I focused as much on the sky and the landscape as I did the postures this morning in our driveway yoga class. There were only four students today. One student called Yvette to tell her she had overslept; another fell going to the bathroom and possibly broke a rib. There was one returning student.  He thought he had been exposed to someone with the virus. As it turned out, both he and his contact tested negative. It was most considerate of him to wait until he was cleared.

Yvette took a picture of me and Elsa during savasana. I was lying down with my knees bent. The image revealed how out of whack my body is. I wrote Yvette about it. She said it wasn't a surprise. Surprise! It was to me. I had focused on my back, not my lower legs. 

After yoga, I meditated.  I have been doing that more regularly. After I meditated, I was tired and slept for a while.  I do love to sleep, and fortunately, I sleep very well. 

At 10:30, I had a Zoom tutoring session with D. He is doing a better job of remembering his multiplication facts. He doesn't always come up with the correct answer, but he does come up with the numbers we have been working on. He will remember that 7x9= 62, and 7 x 6= 46, and 9x4=34.  I can imagine people asking, "Where's the improvement?" Admittedly, I am being optimistic.  He is getting all the numbers in the tens place correct and mixing up the numbers in the ones place. We're only working with five multiplication facts because the objective is to embed the neural pathway for associative recall. 

His reading varies from one minute to the next. He can read difficult words correctly and then read he'd as had, even though it makes no sense in the sentence. On the other hand, he does catch his mistakes more often, and when he does make mistakes, they are substitutions that support the meaning of the text. I am frustrated because he prioritizes getting through the text quickly and sounding good over accuracy.  I can't convince him that he will make better progress toward his goal if he moves slowly.  It is frustrating. 

I spent a good part of the day dealing with Progressive about the insurance premiums.  I initially contacted them to confirm the date I added Adam to the insurance.  I received that information on February 27, 2019.  I also asked for the dates when I dropped Mike from the car insurance policy. I had asked that once before; I was told March 4.  When I asked this time, I got a different date, March 27. This company is driving me around the bend.  While I was on the phone, I asked who to contact if I wanted to challenge the premiums. I obtained the contact information of a higher-level service provider.

Wow! What a difference! I had left a message saying that I wanted to challenge the premiums. Marissa, the Progressive agent,  got back to me later that day. She listened carefully and told me she had to pass me on to someone in the Policy Department. I spoke to Brandon, who was also attentive. Then, we were disconnected.  I don't think he hung up on me, but he also didn't call me back. I have no idea what happened. I called Marissa back after several hours to let her know what had happened.  She suggested that I speak to a manager. I told her I would rather wait until the next day.

I headed out to Home Depot to pick up the pole pruner that Scott recommended.  They come in three sizes: 12 ft, 14 ft, and 16 ft. I was wondering which would be most suitable for my needs. I called B. He said the 12-foot would be perfect.  Great, it was the least expensive. 

I also picked up a house plant to replace the one that died the other day.  I believe the one I got now is the same plant as the one Mike brought home. Let's see if I can keep it alive.

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Musings:

White privilege: I've been hearing a lot about it. Again, I think the term is a misnomer for most whites. White privilege means that I can assume a police officer will be polite to me when he stops me for speeding or crossing a lane inappropriately.  To me,  white privilege means that I can lie in my bed at night and be confident that the police will not break into my home.  It means that I was entitled to a good education. 

When I hear the above described as white privilege, I don't want to give it up.  I don't want to be treated rudely or brutally by people in power.  I don't want to give up "white privilege'; I want everyone to have the same privilege. 

Privilege becomes that only when we have unfair advantages and when our 'privilege' makes us feel entitled to abuse others.  Watching Chauvin's face as he sat on George Floyd is an example of toxic 'white privilege.' He executed a man on his own initiative as calmly as I stepped on an ant.  I have reviewed Floyd's own criminal record, which is publicly available online. The question is, is there anything he did that warranted a death sentence? 

Most white people are like me; we do not use our privilege to actively abuse someone. But we do have the opportunity to overlook the constant threat that people of color live with that colors their every minute and every interaction, probably with every human being. We can forget about it.  We are not 'guilty." The question is, what do we do or not do that allows that form of 'white privilege' to stretch to such an extent that Chauvin could believe he was doing nothing wrong. 

I recommend that whenever we approve of the abuse of people of color before we justify it, ask," What if they were white? Would I have thought that was okay?" Anyone who says, "This is different," says you can assume brown people are guilty. You can assume light-skinned people are innocent. Really?  

Dylan Roof? Suppose he had been a person of color shooting up a prayer group in a predominantly white church. Would those police officers have dealt with the situation the same way? Would he have made it to the police station alive, no less, without a bruise? Would someone have been sent out to buy him a Burger King because he was hungry?  

Wednesday, July 8th, 2020

             I slept well and was up before the alarm went off.  In June, it was light at 5:30, but now, it is not so much.  Being close to the equator, the swing between sunrise and sunset isn't as great as it is further north. There is about an hour difference in the sun's schedule between the dead of winter and summer height.  Paulette, who moved here from Detroit, misses those late sunsets. It is often still light in Detroit at 9 pm in the summer. Not here.

            Elsa and I went for our walk. I'm still walking up and down our street. While my leg is 'improving,' doing that puts a strain on my hip joint. When I came in, I meditated. Then, I went outside to do some gardening. I had a 10 a.m. appointment with my therapist. I had an interesting observation during my meditation, which I worked on in the session.

            Out of the blue, I thought of a friend who enjoys the admiration of men.  It occurred to me that she interprets that as having power. On the other hand, I see that kind of attention as an expectation I can't or don't want to fulfill.  It makes me feel powerless.  I realized that is what is going on with my work.  I want the work out there, appreciated and used, but I don't want the attention. My fear of being unable to fulfill someone's expectations is one factor that made me decide against having children. Where do I get this burden from? Let me see.  I had a father who hoped I would solve the problem of world conflict, and a mother who was afraid of everyone and expected me to protect her. I'm lucky I have any marbles left. I had only two choices: have no boundaries or keep everyone out.  My relationship with Mike worked because he wanted me to take care of myself and not satisfy his demands without regard for myself.

            I left for the DMV to file Josh's title. This was the last piece in getting the car out of my name and into his. Done! When I arrived, there was no one there. At first, I thought they were closed.  But the greeter's window was open.  I got my number and sat down, waiting to be called. I must have taken half an hour. No one's number was called.  No one came out of the office.  No, they were not at lunch.  I can't begin to imagine what they were doing.  When it was called, it took two minutes to get to speak to an agent. Then I headed home, plugged in the car, and lay down for a nap.

            I have been struggling with figuring out how to deal with the Tree man who massacred my lime tree, cutting a one-story tree down to shoulder height.  When I was dealing with the car purchase, Scott told me that he could help me if I needed him.  I called him and asked him if he would help me deal with this guy.  I figured if I called and complained, his only response would be, "Stupid bitch!"

            Fortunately, Scott came down to look at the tree before we made that call.  He told me the guy probably cut it down that far so I could pick the limes more easily, cutting it to the height of the keiki, kids. I should think of trimming the tree like a bonsai.   There is no way I can safely reach the top of the tree.  He told me to buy a pole pruner. B. said Elijah can easily do that work under my direction.  He also said he would contact a friend of his and determine the best fertilizer for a lime tree. He'll pick it up for me. 

            Judy called while Scott and I were at the bottom of the property.  When I called her back, I told her what was going on with the tree. I feel much better knowing that my wonderful lime tree isn't a lost cause.

            However, I am a gardener's worst nightmare. Nothing I plant, nothing I ask to have planted, grows well. It's absurd.  Now, that isn't quite true.  I planted some lavender in a tub, and it is doing beautifully.  Judy said she would help me distribute the fertilizer to deflect my curse.  She said she didn't know if she could do much better. I proposed that Paulette, the good gardener, be the one to put down the fertilizer, and Judy and I stand by singing hymns and shout Hallelujah! 

            Yvette came up bearing gifts: sourdough baguettes, two muffins, and a Ziploc bag with popcorn.  She had made a Costco run and was sharing the haul.

_  _   _ __ __ -__ __

Musings:

  I am reading Spiritual Bypassing by Robert Masters.  Spiritual bypassing results from using spiritual practices to avoid the negative aspects of self rather than facing them in constructive ways to heal. The goal of spiritual practice should always be to be a better person for oneself and others.

            I just read his chapter on Spiritual Gullibility and Cultism. This results from people looking for a shortcut, bypassing the problematic aspects of spiritual growth. (As I write this, I can picture people who wallow in their dark side, punishing themselves always for not being perfect- another form of spiritual bypassing.)  Masters defines a cult as any situation where beliefs cannot be challenged.  There can be a cult of one, where a person believes that their point of view cannot be contested.  Or a group with a charismatic leader who insists that their point of view is beyond question. 

            At the same time, I am reading a Very Short Introduction to Hobbes.  I knew something about his theories.  I knew he argued for strong central leadership, but I had no idea how far it went.  His theory is that human beings are impulse-driven and are incapable of making decisions that benefit the whole community. The solution is for a leader to determine what people should think and believe.  He argued for state control except in the case of religious beliefs.  He argued that religious leaders should determine what people should think or feel. Huh? Do these leaders transcend the human limitations the rest of us suffer from?

            We need to find a balance between a monolithic social structure that guarantees protection from others and thinking for ourselves. It's the argument being acted out now on a national level, if not a worldwide one. It's which group gets to be the controlling voice, defining reality for one and all.  If that voice can't be contested, it's a cult. As we all know, when a state becomes a total dictator, dissenting voices are eliminated by rather brutal means.    

Tuesday, July 7th, 2020

 Again, I woke up before 4 a.m. and had trouble falling asleep. I figured out I was cold. I put on a shirt and doubled up on my covers. I was out like a light. I have no idea why our mornings have been cold, actually cold, in July. This isn't our hottest month of the year. No, that is August, September, through mid-October. It always breaks right after Iron Man, around Yvette's birthday on October 10th. 

 I put on two sweatshirts for my morning walk. I only did 3,000 steps because my left hip was achy. It was not miserable, but it was not comfortable either. I am straighter, but that means putting more weight on that left leg. Again, we're at a juncture. 

 I called a clinic on Oahu that does stem cell transplants shortly after the pandemic started. They never got back to me.  I want to go through with that when it becomes possible. I will have to pay out of pocket, but I would much prefer that over surgery.

 I went out to check the items on the laundry line.  It had poured, really poured, the other day. The towel was dry, but the wee-wee pad I had hung up after use wasn't.

 Why do I hang out a dirty wee-wee pad? Oh, a multitude of reasons. I don't have that many.  When we first got Elsa, we had wee-wee pads. She never used them; they finally disintegrated.  As a result, it didn't seem worthwhile buying fifty pads for $45. Instead, I bought the ten-pack for $12.  The ones I bought are also biodegradable.  Neat. 

 Next, I hate to throw anything into the garbage. The county ended paper and plastic recycling because China refused our trash. Broke my heart. Then, I learned that the sun bleaches out pee, or at least human pee, out of pillows and mattresses. Here, parents just put soiled items in the sun and let it do its work.  I figured it could do the same job on the wee-wee pads. So far, that has worked fine. Only one problem: it takes forever for them to dry.

 These wee-wee pads are designed to hold liquid, and they do. Boy, do they ever. While a towel is dry after a severe soaking, the pad is still quite wet. This becomes an interesting question for me: how long will it take to dry?  I regularly check during the day to see the progress.  Today is a bright, sunny day with no threat of rain. Let's see if the sun wins or the pad does. Who wants that moisture more?

 There were only four students today for driveway yoga—four students and four dogs. One of the students informed Yvette that he had been exposed to someone who tested positive for the virus. He would be quarantined for the next two weeks. I also discovered that the server at Gertrude's tested positive for the virus and got it from her mother, who was visiting her from the mainland. Let's see if we can squelch this surge. 

 I spoke to Scott about selling the Prius.  He has been handling the sale online.  I want to be rid of it by the end of the month. I must keep it on my insurance as long as I own it. That costs a pretty penny. I told Scott to reduce the price. Then he told me he had many responses to the ad, even without the car's pictures. Wow! 

_____-_____-_____

 Musings:

 There's been talk of late of eliminating terms that remind us of racial discrimination. The terms black and white are two of them.  The terms black and white have cross-cultural significance as words describing good versus evil. The problem is that they have been misappropriated to depict skin color.

 'Whites' are not white, and 'blacks' are not black. 'Whites' are a shade of tan, and 'blacks' are a shade of brown. Even the darkest 'black' is only a very deep shade of brown.  

 These terms were imposed on the races by whites to reinforce their belief in their racial superiority. "Whites' were good, and 'blacks' were bad. It is the application of these terms that should be banned. The terms' white' and 'black' to describe racial differences should go the way of the word 'nigger.'  

 I did some cursory research on the history of white/black symbolism for good versus evil. I did find a reference to it in Homer's writings in ancient Greece. However, it strikes me that the symbolism runs deeper than that. It's the light of day versus the dark of night. A pitch-black night is more dangerous because it limits sight. You can't see your enemy. 

 Black is associated with death, not one of man's favored outcomes. We slip into darkness when we sleep.  When we faint, everything goes black.  Black has many frightening associations, having nothing to do with race.

 White and black also represent clean versus dirty.  A pure white garment without a stain represents purity.  A stain so bad that it blackens the garment is major. 

 I think eliminating the terms white and black from our use presents a huge challenge. We would have to overcome our associations with day versus night, clean versus dirty, and life versus death.  Instead, eliminate the use of these terms to describe racial differences.  We are all shades of brown.