Friday, February 3, 2023

 Friday, February 3, 2023

  I slept continuously till right before the alarm went off at five-thirty. I completed my exercises, with intermittent dozing, and was out the door for my morning walk by seven. Elsa wanted to go to the left when we left the driveway. I usually go to the right. When we got to the corner of Holoholo and Hiolani, I continued straight rather than turning. At the bottom of Hiolani, I turned left onto Amaama and followed the twists and turns till I got to Kukuna. I walked up to Nehiwa and then home. I complete exactly two miles in an hour. How does my mph compare to the recommended speed for health? Not well. I must complete three to four miles in an hour to be considered healthy. Of course, this standard doesn't consider all the times I stop for Elsa to sniff something and for me to pick up garbage along the way.

   When we got home, I saw Scott sitting in the driveway on the other side of the gate. I knew he was there with Liner Notes, Yvette, and Josh's dog. The poor pup had advanced cancer. They were waiting to hear from the vet when he could come to the house to put him down. Liner is such a sweet animal.

   I was planning on buying a computer carrying case today. While talking to Scott and Yvette, I asked if one of them had one I could borrow. Yvette did. She ran into the house and got it. While she was gone, I told Scott I also needed those little plastic thingies you put on the stem of pierced earrings. If I wear earrings without that protection, I always lose one. Scott said Yvette had those, too. When she came back with the computer case, I asked about them. She ran back into the house and got some. She orders them online, twenty at a time. Why didn't I think of that?

   I noticed I had peeling skin between my fingers, particularly on my left hand around my wedding band. It must be some fungal infection. I have never seen it before. It was probably caused by a combination of sugar, the antibiotic I had just gotten through taking, and not correctly rinsing my hands of soap and drying them thoroughly. I ordered Kerassentials, an herbal remedy for fungal problems, athlete's foot, and fungal-infected toes, from an online advertisement that took me in. When the package arrived, I thought, "I'll never use this stuff." But seeing my problem with my fingers, I started applying it yesterday. I could see the redness and scaling decrease over the day. Wow!

   I washed my linens and hand towels today. Scott will sleep in my bed over the weekend while I visit my cousins in Honolulu. Elsa-dog won't have to sleep alone. I hung the load on the line. The sheets are microfiber. They dry quickly. The sky turned dark. I got them off the line and made the bed. I swept the bedroom and bathroom so it was reasonably presentable for Scott.

   I had a session with adolescent D.  We started with letter tracing. The only thing we can be sure of is he enjoys it, and it does no harm. We do it briefly at the beginning of each session. I asked him if he wanted to continue working on the lousy feeling he gets when he reads or on his homework. He chose to continue to work on his feelings.

  I have a few questions generated by Bloom's talk about memory. He said people often quit too soon. They figure what doesn't come to mind immediately will never come. Uh-uh. Keep thinking. Assume it's in there somewhere. Just pose the question. The answer may come up a few hours or days later, but it will come.

   The other day, D didn't respond when I asked him a question. When I asked, "D, did I lose you?" His attention often evaporates. He said, "No, I was thinking." Today, I asked him if this was an unusual response. He said yes. He had just started doing it recently. Wow! These are some impressive changes.

   The other thing I asked him was if he was compelled to read words when he saw them. He said yes. Another, Wow! His mom commented when he started reading signs after we worked together for about a year. He ignored the printed word when I first started working with him. Reading signs is the behavior of emergent readers. D was almost fourteen. We are seeing some impressive changes.

   I learned something from third grade J that I could use for me and maybe to help D.  When I asked J where in his body his anger started, he said in his hands, they became fists. I told him to watch the changes in his body, forearm, upper arm, back, etc. I needed to see where the fear started in me. If I could catch it in its early stage, I could avert having it gaining control over me.  

   The other day, I did a SUDS with D on his fear. If I started at a ten, where was it now. He said a four. I told him that was about as low as it would go. You can't, don't really want to, get rid of fear. You don't want it to be in control of you. I asked D where that fear started with him. He said his stomach. I suspected it wasn't there but knew I could be wrong. We went back to observing the sensations around his stomach. Then, it moved up to his jaw. I saw anger.

  D is a profoundly moral person. He would never project his anger on another person. He turns it on himself. He switched his attention to the right side of his lower abdomen. As that resolved, he felt greater relaxation- the criterion for positive change.

   Every session of late, D has been asking why he is the way he is. I gave him several possible answers. It may be psychological; it is also possible that it is neurological. Today, I asked if his question was not so much "Why did this happen?" as "Why did it happen to me?" He agreed. I said, "Why not you? Why not me? There's nothing personal about it. It is just the luck of the draw." He said that made him feel better. Okay.

   Fr Lio responded to my request for help unloading the wedges from my car into the cemetery. He could do it at noon on Tuesday. I called Adam to ask if he could help load the 200 lb cement wedges into my car. He didn't answer as usual. I called Jazzy. I walked to the screened-in lanai area while talking to her. Scott came running out of his room with an intense look. He told me to be quiet; the vet was now putting Liner down. I moved immediately and thanked Scott for letting me know. I was preoccupied with my own concerns. Dealing with this is difficult for me. But I feel terrible that I intruded on that precious moment. I later found a text from Josh asking me to be quiet. I could hear Yvette sobbing. The thought of losing Elsa tears my heart out.

    I packed, showered, and got everything set to leave for the airport to catch my flight at 6:05. I had tried to sign in on the app. It kept telling me I couldn't do it sooner than 24 hours before flight time, referring to my return flight from Honolulu. I checked in at the service desk instead of the kiosk. The lady told me that my flight had been for 6:05 am. Oh, boy. That dits of a lady had booked me for the wrong flight. She didn't get anything right. She had my previous flight information before. She told me the later flight was booked and she could get me on the earlier one. Then she booked me on an am flight instead of a pm. Fortunately, there was plenty of room on the 6:05 pm flight. As it turned out, it was half empty.

   When I got to Honolulu, I grabbed a cab instead of calling an Uber. Oh boy. The cabby looked like he had entered the street name into his GPS. Then he pulled off the highway and into a gas station. "Give me the address again." I gave it to him three times, and his GPS didn't work. Oh, boy. Here I am with another incompetent person. I was furious. The fare was already over $65, and we had further to go. Did he take me out of the way to increase his fare? 

   I pulled out my phone and typed in the address, and it came up. I told the cab driver where to go. We were close to the destination. Then we couldn't find the house. "Let me out here. I'll find it." He told me I didn't have to pay him. He did get me to my destination. I gave him $40. No more because I suspected he had taken me for a longer ride than necessary.  

   The poor man was uncomfortable leaving me in the street with my suitcase. He walked up and down the street, trying to find the house. A woman came out of her house, and I asked her if she knew where the house would be. She didn't know the address and didn't know which way the numbers ran.  

  Darcy, the woman, stuck with me. She even ran after the cab when I cried out that I thought I had left something in the cab. I hadn't. I found my wallet in a different compartment in my purse. I finally called Lauren. She came out of her house and called my name. Darcy saw her first and stuck with me until she saw I was in safe hands.

    Lauren introduced me to her mother-in-law, Ali. The children were still up two and year-old Koa and four-month-old Rio. Koa was taken with me and allowed me to read him a book. It was lovely to see a positive response. I never had that from the other kids in my family.