October 11, 2024

October 11, 2024 

 

     When I called Jean, my Hanai sister who lives in a retirement community in New Jersey, her husband answered the phone.  It's easier to talk to him than her.  She is not doing well physically. She is in constant pain, and her pain is her favorite topic of conversation, understandably.  John, sadly, suffers from dementia.  He is a brilliant man who can still easily discuss chemical engineering but can't remember what happened three minutes ago.  He is aware of his condition and seems to be doing okay with it. He is a happy, senile old man.  He seems to enjoy my miscellaneous conversation. I usually talk about nonpersonal topics. Today, in my despair, I talk about how poorly I was doing.  John was a good listener. I also felt good that       I wasn't burdening him with my travails.  He wouldn't remember a thing I said. 

        I was considering making some changes to my will.  I had to find it first.  I had looked in several places with no success. I found it today on the coffee table on the lanai, where I had stacked other written material and projects when I cleared the dining room table.

 When I worked with the Twins this morning, I did the visual recall drill with both of them.  they both seem to enjoy the exercise.  If I could get them to do this exercise with each other as a form of play, that would be fantastic. I'm astounded that I never thought of this before.

This visual embedding work I started doing was partially inspired by Dahaene's lectures. He emphasizes the problems with the visual aspect of the reading process versus the aural. Twin E is making more of a conscious effort with the embedding than A. Twin A read wearer as water today. There is a lack of conscious oversight. They only do what their unconscious mind directs them to do.  They are never at the helm of their own behavior. They can only do what they've been trained to do.  This 'thoughtlessness' makes them look stupid.  How do I teach that type of oversight? Do I want to teach them this? If they have enough to make it through life, would they really be better evaluating their every move?

 Imprint in clay  E ran a head A  wearer as water.  lack of conscious oversight is what makes them look stupid. They only do what comes naturally. There is no oversight thought.  Do I want to teach them this?

      It was Hula Friday.  Lord, the teaching is lousy.  Last Friday, she got up on the stage to model the dance. We all loved that. I asked her if she planned to do that. She said no; she would start on the floor.  None of us have a good view of her that way except for the people right in front of her.  Her mic system is poor.  We can't hear her clearly and don't know the vocabulary.  Also, she only models the moves repetitively. She doesn't say things like it's two of these, then one of that, then two of the first move again. It's all bottom-up. She makes no effort to help.

 I finished listening to Why Fish Don't Exist by Lulu Miller on Audible. I loved it. It's brilliantly written, and her language is wonderful and endlessly engaging. Sadly, it's only four hours long. I could listen to this woman forever. What a wonderful writer. I chose a biography of Robin Williams next. Wow! What a comparison. It's repetitious without direction, and the language is uninteresting. It's as bad as Why Fish Don't Exist is good.

      After Hula, I went to the bank to cash two checks. I deposited one and cashed the other. When I arrived, there were two tellers and three people before me. Then, one of those tellers closed up, and seven people came.  It was a ridiculous situation.  I was going to stop at Costco on the way home but didn't have time if I wanted to go to Ulu Wini after their lunch. 

 I had a quick lunch and went off. There were only a few kids at the table. Most of the ones who were still in the program were playing in the playground set, which is a centerpiece of the community.

      The commercial playground set was installed during my first year volunteering there in 2015.  Children of all ages gather around the set. The older children sit on it or play with the younger children. The younger children clamber over it, using all the climbing and sliding options.  The age range of the children moving around the structure is from three years old to middle school children.  It's a pleasure to sit there and watch the show. 

      Only one student wanted to work with me, second-grade SL. I had only worked with her once before since school started this year. My notes said she had problems with memory.  She told me the letters moved about, spinning from the top of her head on the left side and the forehead in a counterclockwise manner. Today, we established that spin slowed down when confronted with letters.  I had her do the appropriate spin release.  If the spin is inclined to speed up under stress, allow it to speed up until it stops.  If it's inclined to slow down under stress, allow it to slow down until it stops.  ST did the latter.  I asked her if it was peaceful.  She nodded yes.   And the letters were stable.  

      I started with the word THE.  I had her press the letters into her Working Visual Memory at the forehead.  Then she had to wait until her 'mind gave her the word."  the instructions are to sit and wait as if waiting for someone else to say the word.  THE came up for her.  Next, we worked on OF.  This word didn't come up for her.  I told her the sound represented by each letter, and she blended the sounds.  I then reviewed THE and OF, having her imprint the letters in her VWM and wait till the word came up.  When she remembered OF, she looked surprised.  Then she looked away where. Before, she had given me rapt attention.  I asked if she was done.  Yes.  I sent her packing.  If a student has been paying attention, looks away, or becomes distracted, I take that as a cue that they had it for the day.  This is their brain saying they need time to process what's happened.  I considered a break like that part of the learning process.

      Since no one else wanted to work with me, I headed off to Costco. I only had a few items to pick up. I had to park at the far end of the parking lot; I anticipated spending half an hour in line. I chose the self-checkout. The bank of checkout stations at the far end was free. There was no one using them or in line.  

      As I walked out of the store, I checked each checkout line to see if Adolescent D was working on one of them. This would be his last day before school starts again on Monday. He wasn't on any of the manned ones, and he wouldn't have recognized me anyway since I was masked. 

        I removed my mask as I exited the store. As I crossed the street, D came toward me, pushing carts he picked up from the drop-off areas in the parking lot to return them to the front of the store.  I only recognized him because of his haircut, chin length, light brown, and wavy.  He had on a baseball cap and sunglasses. I didn't even see his face.  I was bareheaded and unmasked, but I had sunglasses on.  He didn't give me a second look.  I am not inclined to approach him and tell him who I am.  Given he only let me see his face on the Zoom screen twice in the three years I worked with him, I figured such an encounter would be traumatic.

         I came home planning to do a lot of writing on the updates and my Teaching document. I did neither. I played endless games of Free Cell and listened to NPR.   On one of the shows, they talked about the interstitial tissues. My question was: how do these tissues differ from fascia.  Coincidently, Mellissa called. She's a doctor. I asked her the question. They're completely different. Fascia is the saran wrap for every organ and every part of every organ. The interstitial tissue is between every cell. It sounds a little like bubble wrap.  These are two organs in the body that have been discovered in my lifetime.

      The doctors knew about fascia.  During autopsies, they would scoop it up and throw it away so they could get to the real organs.   The interstitium was undetected. It can only be seen under magnification.  In preparing the slides for magnificent the interstitium is destroyed. They were discovered by accident. Amazing.

     When I saw Dr. Reed the other day, concerned about my mental state, I reminded her I had requested an EKG.  She had ordered it earlier, but Kaiser never called me to make an appointment. She had a nurse come in and administer there and then. She called me the next day, saying she saw something on the EKG that concerned her. She wanted to do follow-up testing for a stress test and an echocardiogram.

      I got an appointment for November 14 at 9:30 for an echocardiogram and stress test. I will spend the day in Honolulu getting the tests.  I called to make travel arrangements. They will contact me two weeks before by appointment. I will go to our local clinic to pick up the travel documents for the flight and the taxi to and from the hospital.  The stress test alone will take four hours. I better have plenty of books on-tape lined up. 

     After I finished the session, I left for a beach date with Jean.  We met at Pine Trees. It's a lovely beach but not suitable for swimming.  Few beaches in Hawaii are good for swimming. All the ones I've been to have dangerous rock formations surrounding them, and most have boulders in the middle of the water you can bump into as you swim.  There is one beach that is relatively free of boulders.  The water never gets higher than your waist. You can swim in it, but it's not an ocean experience. The other problem with Hawaiian beaches is that sudden drops often make the water dangerous.  These beaches are gorgeous and fabulous for surfing but not the best for swimming.  Kua Bay is the best of the lot. They have lifeguards there now. The last time I was there, I asked the lifeguard about any incidents. Sure enough. He had just pulled someone out with a broken back.  He had been surfacing, and a wave caught him wrong and dashed him on the rocks. 

    Jean and I had no plans to swim. We didn't even put on bathing suits.  We sat on the beach, walked a bit, and enjoyed the view and each other's company. 

 I don't say much about people other than my students in these updates. Since the first readers are friends and family, I must honor everyone's privacy. 

 Jean had to be home by 11 because her son-in-law had an appointment.  The kids were home from school. She would watch them while he was out.  She wanted to stop off at Target before she went home.  I went with her because she wanted to meet Judy. The hope was she would be working at that time.  Judy was there checking people out. Her line was busy. I stood behind her, smiling. The woman who was checking out pointed to me. Judy ignored the signal.  She did it again, and Judy finally turned around. I gave her a quick hug and went on my way. While there, I  checked if the Haagen Das ice cream was still on sale.  It was.  

     I was Judy's last customer before her break when I went to check out. Jean never got to meet Judy.

     While I indulge in the Haagen Das ice cream, I am very disappointed in the taste. I don't know how much of this is due to the change in my taste buds with age and the change in the recipe from the last time I had ice cream before Mike died over five years ago.

 I stopped at Farm & Garden on the way home. Bill at F & G hadn't recognized the shrub I showed him that was in trouble.  I texted a picture of it to Margo.  It was a plumeria shrub, and it was suffering from scale. She told me to cut off the infected branches and treat the plant with Bayer's All in One.  When I told the clerk at F & G what I wanted, she got me Bioadvanced  Tree and Shrub Protect and Feed.  They said it was the same. It was no longer called Bayer's because it was associated with Monsanto. I hope so. They usually give top-grade service. They are a trusted company in a heavily agricultural area.

      I went home for a small lunch before heading to Ulu Wini. I only had sixth-grade ML today. We continued working on comprehension. After working with her, I stayed at the community center. I pulled out my computer, checked emails, and worked on updates. I love the atmosphere there.  

     Ulu Wini is a local income housing project that is a true community.  Someone donated a park playground set that is a central focus for all the kids.  I watch children of all ages play there and interact. They have no idea of how lucky they are to have that. 

     Of course, no one can call the Marshallese children lucky. They were forced to leave their island homes, which provided an even stronger sense of community.  I had the last remnant of that sense of community when I was a child. I lived in one of the first projects in NYC.  All the kids hung out in front of the building and on the street.  My sister had it even better. When we moved to the Long Island community of Great Neck,  she played in an undeveloped field that provided drainage for the area. There were several children her age in the immediate vicinity. While there were at least three other children my age, we were all freshmen in high school. Running around the neighborhood playing tag was out. 

     I had an appointment at 3:30 with Dr. Reed.  She used to be my primary physician. She switched to same-day care after she gave birth to spend more time with her baby.  Since she is the nicest lady in the world and the best physician by far, I see her rather than the other doctors.  Reed avoids extreme treatments when possible. She searches for more straightforward answers.  I came to her because I was concerned about my mental state, that internal shaking, and my fear of an impending breakdown.  

      I had spoken to Dr. Reed about my mental state before this.  She had said it didn't sound like depression; I took pleasure in things and felt better after contact with others. The problem was grief and loneliness.   An antidepressant didn't seem appropriate.  She recommended an over-the-counter pill, 5-HTP, which provides serotonin rather than just preventing its uptake.  She asked me how many I took. Two a day. That was too much. Too much serotonin was just as bad as too little.  I had to cut back to one a day.  The L-Theanine she recommended is good for anxiety; I could take up to 8 pills a day, two pills four times a day, but I should start with one at a time. 

      Dr. Reed also checked my breathing with her stethoscope. She could feel my intercostal muscles shaking. She recommended abdominal breathing. That made an immediate difference. 

 I had been an abdominal breather all my life.  Whenever someone observed me breathing, they commented on my deep breathing. That is with the exception of therapists, who watched the movement in the chest instead of the abdomen.  Then, a year ago, I signed up for individual lessons in the Gokhale approach to posture. I spent a lot of money on an incompetent teacher.  There was nothing individualized about her program.  She read from a script and could make no adjustments. She gave me a reason to believe she hadn't even read my intake form, which stated I had a spinal curvature. She never commented or acknowledged that problem. The day she worked on my feet, she was surprised I had arches when most of the people she worked with didn't. She then showed me a picture of a baby's foot to show me the correct shape of the human foot instead of exploring how I could improve my feet. That was the last straw.  

      When Doreen taught the lesson on the rib anchor, I complained I couldn't hold the anchor and do abdominal breathing.  Since I believed then, as I do a year later, that the idea of the rib anchor is correct, I made an effort to change my breathing to chest breathing as she directed.  Doing so undermined my well-being.  Her directions should have been to find a way to do abdominal breathing while holding the rib answer.  The same holds true for the shoulder position. You have to work to keep the rib anchor while rolling your shoulders back.  Too many of us have collapsed our shoulders and chests.  Our ribs stick out, and along with it, our bellies and our shoulders roll in and down.   The ribs should be down, and the shoulders and neck should be back. 

    I asked Dr. Reed to recheck me with her stethoscope after I did the abdominal breathing. She said she no longer felt the shaking. I felt light-years better.