Tuesday, June 18, 2024

 Tuesday, June 18, 2024

   I was exhausted last night. I had been exhausted most of the day, exhausted to the point of dysfunction.  I finally reinstated the rules of place value in my mind sometime during the night.  Having lost a firm grip on those principles was scary. I don't know the significance. I don't think about place value daily, but I have thought of it and how to teach it repeatedly for years.  It's something that should have security embedded in my mind. Why did it get so mixed up? 

   I woke up around 3:30 and went back to sleep till 4. I finally got up around 4:30.  Grief and loneliness weighed hard on my heart. After Mike died,  my niece called to say she was concerned I wasn't dealing appropriately with his death. I told her it wasn't an issue now; I would deal with it when it became one.  Boy, it has hit hard, and it becomes harder.  I don't like loneliness. 

   I walked with Dean and Nina this morning. I saw them at quite a distance, but I wasn't sure if it was them or just white lines on the road.  Those 'white lines' were changing their position in relation to the fences and houses.  Then, I had to determine if they were moving toward or away from me.  When I saw the 'white lines' at the bottom of one of the walker's legs, I knew it was Dean.  He's the only one wearing white socks.

  I mowed the streetside strip this morning. Peter's father weed-whacked the front strip we share. I mow it as a courtesy to my neighbor across the street, whose mailbox sits on that land. If it isn't cut back, she has to wade through knee-high grass to get to her mailbox.

  Peter's dad's action was perfectly timed.  I wouldn't have to mow their section, too. Patrick and I see mowing as a form of therapy.  

   I spent the day writing and pouring boiling water on weeds.  Weeding with boiling water serves multiple purposes. It gets me up and moving on regularly. The water takes about five minutes to boil in the electric tea kettle. I sit and write for those five minutes. Then, take the carafe to the yard and pour the water directly on the weeds. It kills the weeds while doing minimal damage to the soil. Yvette expressed concern the boiling water killed the microbes. I checked with the state agriculture extension office. An expert said boiling water does not cause permanent soil damage. The microbe population is reinstated within two days. 

    I worked with Adolescent D. I find my work with him exhausting. It is just grueling. I'm sure he feels that way too. I opened up the possibility there were psychological factors. There often is a problem with students who fall behind in school. I asked him if he still believed he had to be perfect. He gave an emphatic No!. This was the strongest statement I had ever heard him make.  He used to think perfection was the goal. I convinced him that pursuing perfection only guaranteed failure. Since perfection is impossible, failure is a certainty. If the goal is to be good enough, you have a chance of having some success. Some degree of failure is always accompanies learning something new or overcoming a difficulty. Still, success is possible with a good enough standard.