Monday, April 4, 2022
I was exhausted when I went to bed. I thought it was later because I was so tired. I checked the time as I turned off the light. It was only 9 pm. I was surprised to sleep well till 3 am. Then agitation hit. I was concerned about being alone in my recovery from hip replacement surgery. I felt lonely and helpless. I wanted Mike.
B called. I was wondering when or even if to expect his rent check. We were both suffering. Me from my loss of Mike and B from losing his son. His birthday was on April 2. He would be 37 now.
I ran into Dave, a fellow walker, wearing a sling. He was without his ‘good dog,’ unlike Elsa, a ‘bad dog.’ The man’s dog is highly disciplined and ignores Elsa. I have to hold onto Elsa for dear life to keep her from lunging at his dog. The man explained he had rotator cuff surgery and couldn’t take the risk.
I was still on the phone with B, and he told me about the two times he tore rotator cuffs. I told him my story, how I fell down a flight of stairs at thirty-six. I dove down a long flight of stairs, possibly 20 feet, and only injured my shoulder. It was a miracle. I had already tried to figure out how far I had fallen, had flown, down those steps in Hunter Hall on 68th and Lexington Ave in NYC. I found information on the angle of stairs and the height of the ceilings in commercial buildings at the turn of the twentieth century. While I was on the phone with B, he searched for blueprints of the building and found them. I have made a rough calculation of how far I fell, flew, maybe twenty feet. With these blueprints, B can get an accurate estimate. It will always be an estimate because it depends on where I was on the staircase when I started the fall. I was pretty high up.
I checked my blog visitor numbers. The Indonesians were the dominant readers. Huh? The Germans had been the dominant group. Their numbers dropped precipitously, as had the numbers for the US. If it wasn’t for the Indonesians, the number of visitors would drop from 251 to 71. Reading the entry from April 4, 2021, I learned I had zero visitors on that date last year. I didn’t think I would ever see zero again. One or two from ten different countries are always reading a page or two. I was aware that the large numbers I was getting could disappear. I suspected it was one English language teacher who traveled back and forth between Germany and Indonesia and assigned my blog.
I had my Reading & Writing Office hours this morning at 11. Two people showed up. Marcia showed up first. Her student was a third-grader who had difficulty with basic word recognition skills. She tested his reading level through Book Nook. He came out on a first-grade level. He needed the most basic instruction, modeling. I emphasized the need to relieve stress to help the student learn. Elliot came on a bit later. His student was a fourth-grader who he thought might be working above grade level. Elliot wasn’t sure what to use to work with him. I suggested he ask his student what books he liked to read. I also showed him how to work with The Phonics Discovery System Phase I for a higher-level student, exploring the language as peers. After all, I learned about the phonemic structure of language in graduate school. This is not just for beginning readers. I also showed him how to apply Word by Word comprehension, again exploring language for comprehension.
I finally got to speak to Jean, my hanai sister. She was feeling well enough to hold a conversation. It was great to make contact again. She was overwhelmed by the post-surgery discomfort, some caused by her recovering body and some caused by her medications.
On one of my walks, I saw an animal I hadn’t seen before around here. We have wild pheasants, wild turkeys, wild chickens, and wild pigs, but this was new. It looked like a duck, but I couldn’t imagine how it got here. I took a picture and texted it to B. He confirmed it was a duck and agreed he had never seen one around here before, either. Maybe it’s someone’s pet.
I was reading High Conflict by Amanda Ripley. She distinguishes between high conflict, which calcifies bipolar interactions, which are dysfunctional. She says some people are addicted to high conflict. It does feel great to give your all for a cause. We feel defined and moral. However, that form of conflict often winds up with dead bodies. The ‘high conflict’ approach is a sure loser if you want to promote peaceful relations. (I suppose it would be good if you saw this as a form of population control.) She listed four ways of responding to conflict: three that promote polarization: keeping silent, walking away, and arguing, and one that fosters reconciliation: curiosity and empathy. Neither requires agreement, just respect. You cannot change someone’s point of view if you approach them with contempt.
I was viewing the world through dung-colored glasses; are we looking at the end of life as we know it? I prepared for the possibility. I bought a solar system with a Tesla battery. Will it work when I need it to? Maybe, maybe not. But I’m as ready as I can be. Today, it occurred to me that having a second charger for my electric car would be worthwhile. I called Kia. They didn’t have my model; they didn’t even list my model. I went online to find a charger that would work with my car. I could only find a model that would work with my port but only handled 110 V. I have 220V. Yikes! Is my 2018 Kia Niro already obsolete? I emailed Megear, a company that sells chargers, to see if they had something I could use. It was too complicated for me to figure out on my own.
I had a brushing session with Elsa. Love the way she relaxes in my arm. The hair on her ear lobes was too matted to brush out. I had a scissor by my side and clipped the hair flush with the leather of her earlobes. I was so careful. The moment I was particularly careful, I nicked her. She yelped. I saw a spot of blood. Oh, Elsa, I am so sorry!! She trusted me and did this to her. Will she ever trust me again? She lost enough blood to leave a visible spot on her ear. Damn!
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