As I walked this morning, my left leg felt achy; achy signals nerve pain. It's the worst. A friend recently complained of leg pain. I asked her does it just hurt or does it feel like agony. I associate agony with nerve pain. I had to drag myself through my morning walk.
B. texted that water would be shut off at 10 am. The pipe I hit was still leaking. He had fixed it once but probably didn't leave it set long enough for the glue to set before turning the water back on. He had to start from scratch, ripping out the piping he had already put in replacing the pipe I ran over. He told me that the instructions said to let the glue sit for 24 hours. That would mean that Josh wouldn't be able to shower in the morning. I usually hear the water go on at 5 am regular as clockwork. We arranged for B. to turn the water back on just before he went to bed.
Dorothy called. We didn't speak during my morning walk because she needed a nap. I dusted the house as we talked. I had been putting off the task with my excellent procrastination skills. The whole job took only a few minutes. From whence comes the resistance? I don't get it.
I was feeling lousy, so I meditated. My neck kept falling to the left. I often have that problem. Today I realized that I have to lift my head with my upper back muscles, not my neck muscles. When I pulled those back muscles down, my head came up.
I had a tutoring session with D. Wonderful. He still has problems reading each word accurately. He often guesses the word based on the first letter, ignores the other letters, and sometimes is even unperturbed when his reading produces a nonsense sentence. But if he decodes a word, holding on to all the consonants and pronouncing the word with one of the possible sounds for a vowel letter, he can infer the word. Today, he misread two words in the sentence and still came out with the correct meaning.
I had chores to do. I was so glad to get out of the house. I don't know if my life would be much different than that of many retired people. Of course, in my case, I would have gone to Bikram every morning and then off to tutor at the local elementary school. Then I would have run some chores in town besides.
At the Post Office, I mailed three boxes of books to St. Patrick's seminary. I had stopped looking for books for a good while. I will miss the library when it's gone; it was so Michael. I had tried to talk him out of bringing his 3,000+ books. He said, "There are only two things that must go to Hawaii, my books and you." Well, when he put it that way. So now I have 4,000 books to get rid of in ways that bear some resemblance to what Mike had wanted. He wanted his whole collection kept together. His first choice was the seminary he taught at in Ohio. As he was dying, I told him I was already in touch with the seminary's Rector. Yeah, I was in touch, and I had a pretty good idea of what the answer would be. It was worse than I expected: they didn't want one single book. Oh, well. Off to other seminaries. To keep all the books together, I would have had to build a Ross wing onto their already existing library. When I took a break, Matthew Horowitz, the seminary librarian (yeah, another convert from Judaism), said he needed a break too. It was taking time to catalog all the books I was sending.
Besides the books to the seminary, I sent two copies of my daughter-in-law's picture book, The Bookstore Cat, to Ohio schools where I had worked. It's become my tradition to send them copies of her books. Most have been written for young adults. The librarian at the middle school has told me repeatedly that Cylin's books are always checked out. They are well-liked.
After the Post Office, I went to Target. I was looking for some reflective something or another I could wear at night as I walked. Yvette came around a corner the other night and freaked out when she caught a glimpse of me at the edge of the road. She felt she felt she nearly hit me. Dorothy talked me into getting it; she said it is a courtesy to drivers. When they catch a glimpse of someone at the last minute, it's a shock, even if they were nowhere near hitting the person. I found strips I could wear on my wrists. Perfect! I don't have to put on one of those crossing guard straps. I was doubtful that I would use that regularly. I bought an extra pair for Darby, my frequent evening walking companion.
When I got home, I needed a nap; I was exhausted. I set my alarm for just before 4. I had an appointment with Et., a five-year-old with speech problems. I spend more time with his father than either Et. or his mom. When I asked the dad how Et. was doing. He said he was doing better in Preschool. I asked why. He said he thought he knew the kids better. I suggested his parents being less afraid might have had an impact.
I started working on leading them through the blending exercise. I had told dad how to use crossbody blending. Start saying the individual phonemes, touching each shoulder. After saying them separately three times, hold the vowel sound until your hand comes to the other shoulder and then, with a flair, pronounce the final consonant.
Dad told me how they had used the crossbody blending with the word run. They started with the r and combined it with the u. I told him not to do this with this boy. I see too many children have trouble reading because they start with the first consonant when they don't have the 'word family,' the rhyming piece, in place. He should start with the u, then add on the n. I told him to steer clear of adding on the initial sound for now—one step at a time.
Then he told me that they were seeing improvement in his speech since I started with him. His preschool teacher commented on the progress. Why didn't he tell me that from the beginning? I have no idea.
I recommended that he work with 'word family' blends, vowels with the following consonant, using only the consonants formed toward the front of the mouth. He has trouble forming sounds in the back of his mouth, for example, g, k, l, and r. Save those letters for later.
I emailed him a list of the letters classifying them according to their formation in the mouth and whether they are voiced or unvoiced. Voicing is the growling sound you make in your throat, which changes a t to a d.
After the session, B. called to say he was at Costco. Did I want anything? Yes, lemons and sweet kale salad if they had it. When he got home, I was reminded of my damaged fruit trees. I had my trees trimmed last February. I asked the guy to trim my lime tree. He cut down a two-story tree to my height. I was in shock. He assured me it would come roaring back. The branches and the leaves did, but not the fruit. It used to be abundant with limes. That was the source of my limeade every night. I had to supplement with an occasional bag of lemons. Now, I have to rely on Costco's lemon supply.
I was devastated by what that guy did to my trees. He also mangled my mac nut, avocado, and mangos trees. If I know you don't treat trees that way, surely someone in the business also knows that. He just didn't care. I guess he figured I was a woman alone, and I wouldn't see the difference. I am planning to file a complaint. It's the contempt that gets me,; the indifference. It actually hurts my heart, literally.
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On divorce today.
Judy knows a woman her son's age who left her husband, even though, as far as Judy could see, he was a decent human being who cared about her and their son. She wondered about people today. Neither Judy nor I know the real circumstances of their separation. However, we do notice a pattern today among young people.
I heard something about this on the radio. They said where once a failed marriage was a source of shame; these days, people were ashamed when they stayed in marriages that weren't wholly fulfilling. Holy cow! I don't know how any marriage lasts if that's the case.
Today's life partners have to fulfill the needs that were initially addressed by a whole village. Back then, no one expected a life partner to be a best friend, a lover, life mate, co-parent, support, stimulant, and comforter. Now, it all falls on one person.
The bad news with these expectations is that no one finds satisfaction in life. This is partially a result of having too many choices. They said back in the day, a girl caught the eye of a young boy on the other side of the watering hole, and that was that. Good enough. They secured each other's place in the social structure, produced children together, and maybe had a conversation now and then- or maybe not.
Having too many choices guarantees dissatisfaction. We can't handle more than five to seven options. Now, we can go to the grocery store and have over a hundred choices in salad dressings. For our possible choice of a life partner - anyone in the whole world. We have access to everyone through the Internet. There may be someone out there who is better than the mate we are currently stuck with. People feel ashamed if they are not blissful. It used to be it was shameful to allow yourself to be abused. That I get. But blissful.
The problem is that all things being equal, bliss is something the person has to bring into their own life. It's not up to the partner. Maybe that will be the next step in our social maturity.
The good news about this new standard is that people are more careful about selecting a life partner. I think I lived the new modern standard a generation before my time.
The first thing I knew was I had to get myself into shape to select a partner I wanted to live with, no less attract one. I drew plenty of men; well, my body did. They weren't so happy with my personality, but then again, I wasn't that happy with theirs either.
I was just about to turn 33 when Mike and I had our first date. I immediately said, "You know I'm very bright." He said," Yes, you may be one of the brightest people I have ever met." In the first place, Mike hung around with professors in the Columbia University philosophy department. He wasn't comparing me to any slouches. In the second place, he wasn't complimenting me. He was just stating a fact. Most men chose to overlook my intelligence, or is it my verbal agility, as a minor defect. If he didn't actually consider it an asset, Mike was aware of it and not alarmed. Hmm! The first coin dropped.
I don't think I entered into my relationship with him with passion. There was nothing dewy-eyed about it. I entered into that relationship because it felt 'right.' I compared it to the way coins sounded in the old payphones. The coins didn't always catch when you put them in; you had to try several times. They made a sound when they registered. You knew you could now make your call. It was the same feeling.
On our second date, we went to see a movie on the east side of Manhattan, The Way We Were. I remember standing in line with him feeling no sense of urgency to do anything. I could just stand there and do nothing. Ah! I have no idea what he was feeling.
Right before I met Mike, I had decided that I would probably never find a mate I could live with for the rest of my life. I decided I'd better get good at dating. To that end, I set up rules. I would date anyone I didn't think would do me bodily harm; I would only see that person once a month, and they could only call me once a week. I would have sex when I damn well felt like it. We were coming out of the sixties; this stance was novel for its day. Mike was frustrated with all my limits but also pleased that I set them. It assured him that I would take care of myself; it wouldn't all fall on him.
After the movie, we went to a Baskin Robbins for ice cream and then started walking back over to the west side where he lived. He was going to drive me home. As we stepped into the street to cross, he announced that he was $2,000 in debt. Well, that ended any prospect of a long-term relationship. He might as well told me he was an alcoholic. I managed to overcome that glitch in his character. There was too much that was right.
The difference in the way we related to money could have made our relationship very difficult. He believed you pay as little as you can at a time as late as you can. I think you pay off what you owe as rapidly as possible. Fortunately, we had enough money that it never became a big problem.
I can't tell you that all the years were good. We had a few plagued by dead air. We also both had some traits that were irritating to the other. Sometimes we snapped in impatience; I was more the snapper; Mike responded differently. But I can tell you, there was more pleasure than there was pain, more laughter than tears, more joy than sorrow. We were both affection junkies. We loved the good cuddle, the good hug, and the great kiss. It was a good life. God, I loved that man.
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