Wednesday, December 27, 2023

Wednesday, December 27, 2023

 

  I was wide awake at 1:30. When I woke, I was fully refreshed and convinced it must be close to five am. The clock dissuaded me from that notion. The experts say if you can't sleep, get up and do something else. I did. I got on Charity Navigator and made all my yearly donations. It took me several hours and was off my mind. Ah!

  I went back to bed shortly before four am, thinking I could get an hour's sleep. I was freezing. My hands and feet were like ice. Yes, it gets cold in Hawaii. I had been sitting on my screened-in lanai for three hours in 65-degree temperature. I hadn't felt cold the whole time I worked on making those contributions, but three blankets weren't enough to combat the cold when I got back in bed. I could have gotten up and closed the sliding doors to my bedroom. Body heat and breath are surprisingly reliable sources of heat. Elsa and I can do a bang-up job warming up a space, rapidly taking the sting out of the cold.

 Driveway yoga was on the schedule this morning. I moved my car out to the street to leave at 7:45 for the kupuna mahjong get-together at church. It was drizzling when I got to the driveway at seven. I figured I'd be uncomfortably wet if I stayed. I went inside, leaving Yvette and Carolyn in the driveway to complete the asanas. I did the gentle seated yoga I do every other morning.

  No one was in the parish center when I arrived at the church. I saw T.J., who is the organizing backbone of the church. She didn't know what was going on any more than I did. I called Paulette, who attended last week when I didn't. She said, "I thought I told you we wouldn't meet again after the holidays." I said, "You didn't expect me to remember?"

  I went to Long's to pick up some dental supplies. Before moving on, I sat in the parking lot and called Kraftsman Autobody to ask if I could come by for a rough estimate. I explained I had found a dent in the loaner Kia had provided. While there was no way it could have happened on my shift, I couldn't prove otherwise. I can imagine that no one noticed the dent. I hadn't carefully looked for dents before I took the car. It's been a while since I rented a car, and I remembered to do that examination. I wanted to know what a body shop would say it would cost to repair it so I wasn't blindsided by some outrageous bill. While estimates were usually given by appointment, they had someone immediately available. I drove over there. Jamie came out after ten minutes, apologized for making me wait, and checked out the door. Estimate $5,000 to $6,000. Holy cow! I stayed calm throughout. I kept repeating Mike's mantra, "It's just a problem to be solved." I keep my eye on doing my best to solve a problem. What a gift he gave me.

 Next, I headed to the vacuum repair shop. I have been besieged by breakdowns. Yesterday, my precious Rainbow vacuum cleaner just stopped working. I need it to do deep cleanings of the carpet when Elsa decides my lanai carpet is the best spot to do her business despite having easy access to the outside.

   While the sign on the shop said 'open a nine,' there was no one there. There was a number to call. It was answered immediately. The woman who received the vacuums was on a delivery and would be there in a while. I went to Island Naturals to see if they had some in-house tuna salad available. They did. It is so good. Then, I returned to the vacuum store. The woman arrived within ten minutes.

  She looked at my machine and asked, "How long have you had it?" The machine must be at least 15 years old. She said, "I hope it's not the motor. It costs $300 and will take several months to get one."  It's Hawaii. The motor would have to come by boat, a six-week trip.

 It was an Ulu Wini day. I worked with four kids today. I got tired quickly. I worked with a sixth-grade girl. She asked for help in math with fractions. I asked her which fraction was the largest, ½ or 1/8. She didn't have a clue. From there, we proceed to the addition of fractions. It's hard for kids to understand why you can only add numbers with the same denominator and why you can't add those numbers together. I explain it by showing how you can only add like objects together. You can't count the apples if you only figure out how many oranges you have. She didn't even get that concept. She seemed to understand everything I taught. Is that because I went back to the basics and explained them in a way she could understand, or would she lose everything I taught as she had with the tutor the school provided? I looked forward to seeing her the next day to find out.

 I'm reading a book on math. It describes what I experience with these kids. They do not see the concrete represented in the abstract. Math is something floating in space that has no relationship to the physical world. On the other hand, I read something I had never thought of before, although I had known it. 1+ 1  can sometimes equal one. Of course, it does. It's evident once someone shows you how that is possible. If two clouds merge, you have one cloud. Ergo 1-1 = 1. I felt wonderfully energized after teaching math. It is so much fun figuring out how to make the math real for kids.

  I left when I felt tired. I got home and did a  session with adolescent D. We started each class with a cross-body blending exercise. I say, "Give me a word, any word." So far, he has only been giving me one-syllable words. It reflects his poor skills and appropriate insecurity. He really can't remember anything from one minute to the next.