Wednesday, January 17, 2024

 Wednesday, January 17, 2024  

 

    I slept in today, getting up at six rather than five. I headed out for my morning walk. It was shorter than usual because I wanted to be home in time for driveway yoga with Yvette. When Elsa and I got home, the gate was closed. Josh was approaching his car to leave for the day. I still had to get my car out of the driveway and onto the street. I asked Josh to open it and close it when he left. Before he could close it, he got a message from Yvette that yoga was canceled. Yvette was feeling ‘rough’ and needed more sleep. I did the Gentle Seated yoga on YouTube.

   I did my morning chores, Wordle, New York Times Mini, and Connections. I use hints when needed, particularly for Connections.

   I left at 8:30  for my 9 am appointment with the occupational therapist. When I arrived, they told me I had an 8:15 am appointment. I missed it. Damn. I was going to have to pay a penalty fee. But no, I wouldn’t. That rule doesn’t apply to long-term patients who make one mistake. That gave me plenty of time to do other chores in town. I considered going to Kia and dealing with the dented door. Now that  JJ, the service manager, and Alex, the booking agent, were gone, I had no one who had even seen the car before I took it.

   I decided not to make a big deal of it. I will hand in the loaner car when I pick up my car. I went about other chores. I had my friend’s cement angel (17 lbs.) in the car. It had been her daughter’s. She wanted it shipped to her house in Arizona. I stopped at UPS and then at USPS  to learn about shipping possibilities. UPS’s shipping fee would be $186 to ship for 40 lbs. Packing would be just as expensive: $116. On the other hand,  USPS would charge $50 for 16. 7 lbs.

   I went home, worked, and napped briefly before going to Ulu Wini. I spoke to one of the mothers. Her son insisted on answering reading comprehension questions with the answers he thought would be correct, not what the author had to say. For him, it’s a fierce battle to maintain his integrity.  

   Adults often use the tag expression, “ Do you understand?” Children don’t always understand what the expression means. When used by adults as above, it means, “Do you understand there will be consequences if you don’t do as I say?”  But the child can understand it to mean, “Do you understand (and agree) your room is a mess that needs to be cleaned?” if the kid cleans it, what is he agreeing with? 

   Josephine, the social services administrator at Ulu Wini, asked me to tell her what I was doing with the children. I thought she wanted to know what I did with each child. No, she wanted to know what methods I used to help them so she and the other workers could use them when working with the children.

  I asked Josephine about the Marshallese culture. Most of the children I work with come from those islands, as does the gardener I just fired. Do the people from the Marshall Islands neglect to think through the consequences of their actions. Yes.

   The Marshall Islands consist of 29 atolls and 5 islands with a population of 72,000. A small population in confined spaces. By the time someone is 6, they know everything there is to know. They don’t have to think about it. They can rely on tradition.

    It makes me so sad to think of their loss. Between 1946 and 1958, the United States government detonated 67 nuclear bombs in and around the Marshall Islands, vaporizing whole islands. They moved here to escape the deadly effects of the bombings. The USA contaminated their water, land, and air. So sad.

    I had a session with Adolescent D when I got home. He read the sight words through the 300-350 list. This is a vast improvement. But let’s remember Twin A in fourth grade is doing the same work. She is practicing it and may well do better than D shortly. D does nothing independently. He drives me nuts. However, he is applying the decoding strategies I taught him.