Thursday, July 21, 2022

 Thursday, July 21, 2022

I had an early appointment with the M & W sisters at 8:30. I did the Gating Game with both. It was the first time in a while for going-into-second-grade M. I thought she was avoiding it because it was hard. Still, she went along with my proposal without resistance.   She needed help considering the meaning of the text and the letters in words. The problem persisted today.

   With going-into-sixth-grade W, we spent a lot of time on background knowledge, defining words, and locating Europe and Polynesia on a world map. Where was Europe, and what countries were in it? She didn’t have a clue. She would be studying the world in sixth grade. I, too, learned something about the countries in Europe. I still have Yugoslavia in mind. I looked it up. It started to break up in 1991, and the last county to declare independence was in 2008. I also learned or relearned that Turkey is half in Europe and half in Asia, as is Russia.   I needed a nap after the sessions.

   I had an appointment with Shelly, my therapist/life coach. I worked on my relationship with my father. He died sixty-six years ago when I was fifteen and my sister was ten. I barely remember him. He was a good, attentive family man who loved having daughters. As with all relationships, there was a downside. Whatever my relationship with him was, it got frozen when I was still a child. I never had the opportunity to free myself from his parental grasp as I did with my mother. He had been my lifeline when I was a child, but that’s not an appropriate relationship for an adult woman to have with her father. I hadn’t paid much attention to my relationship with him in therapy. My relationship with my mother drew all the attention because of the constant state of combat. 

   I had Adolescent D at 2 pm. I spent some time lecturing him. He was still conceptually locked into behaviors that were counterproductive when it came to learning, particularly if he was going to learn to read.   When I told him he would never learn to read if he didn’t make an effort, he promptly said, “I can read.” I asked him if he read as well as he wanted to. Did he read as well as his parents? His parents are both college educated. No. How well did he want to read? Well enough to read texts? Is that all he wants to be able to read? He thought about it and admitted no. Does this boy say anything that comes to mind to protect himself from facing his sense of failure, or does he not understand how poorly he reads compared to his peers? Self-defense was apparent in his response today, but I’d seen other moments when I wasn’t so sure. It was almost as if his perspective had changed from minute to minute. It was good enough if he looked at his reading from one perspective. From another, not.

  My air cooler arrived. I ordered it thinking it might be a suitable replacement for some of the air conditioners on the property. While I have two air conditioners, one in the library and one in the guest room for Sir Damon to use when he visits, I never use them. I don’t even turn on the fans. I often wear a sweatshirt all day, even in July. I was wearing one as I wrote this. Josh and B used them.   They were old systems and pulled a lot of electricity. The one I purchased was smaller than a toaster. However, I don’t know why I was surprised. It only costs $39. The directions were incomplete and hard to read. I needed a magnifying glass to see the small print. The company posted its support site on the box. I Googled it. Surprise! It didn’t exist. I would have to see what I got stuck with.