Monday, April 12, 2021

Monday, April 12, 2021

 

 I slept well, needed fewer naps, and had more energy since I started rubbing the Magnesium oil on my legs at night. Coincidence or cause and effect? I didn't know if it had affected the spasming in my leg muscles. Sometimes, I think it made it worse. It may be that the muscles are starting to relax, and that's why that's happening.

            On my walk this morning, I noticed some dark objects in Darby's driveway. Yep, it was poop, huge chunks. That must have been one hell of a dog! Darby came out as I was bending down to pick it up. She had noticed it but thought they were leaves. She knew which animal had dumped it there when she saw it- a pig. She said their poop looks barrel-shaped. That's what it was.

            Darby told me she heard about romance scammers being put on trial for their behavior and their victims speaking up in their defense. They claimed it was a fair exchange. I understood. There was an intimacy in the exchange, an intimacy I had lost when Mike died. How does one describe that intimacy: someone wants something from you that's personal, that belongs to you without being actually abusive, or at least not verbally or physically? I knew something was wrong when the scammers worked me, but it also felt good. A recent widow, what could be better?

            I got a call from my financial advisor this morning at Raymond James. He has become concerned about how I spend money.   I have recently made some large payments, and now I have decided to distribute money to my inheritors. I'm not giving them $15,000 a year allowed per person. That would be too much for me. I'm doing $5,000 per person. I also have a substantial loan planned. Understandably he was concerned because I was almost sucked into a scam to the tune of $6,000. I went over my reasoning for the large expenses I have made over the last three years: I paid off the mortgage, so we're not vulnerable to the bank, bought a new car, and installed a solar system. These are all expenses that were either necessary or money savers. My monthly expenses run somewhere in the neighborhood of three thousand. The gardeners are my single regular house-related expense.  

            I have been feeling pretty good despite problems with three family members. They are not comfortable with some prominent characteristics of my personality. I have to be the one who always wants to work things out. I have changed my tune. I want to set limits. I know, I know. Most people would subtly do this; I have to declare it. I don't do much subtly. I like things out in the open. Well, this is the last time they'll have to deal with that discomfort.   Or- it may be that this stand will radically improve things between me and those genuinely interested in improved relations. There are those I am entirely too much for, and it's not worth any effort. They may wish otherwise because I am one of their few close relatives, but it isn't going to work. Oh, well.

            I thought I would be distressed today, having isolated myself from three people, but no—quite the opposite. I felt calmer than I had felt in a long time. Very interesting. I ate less chocolate. I now think much of my agitation is from forcing myself to deal with difficult situations. That was how I grew up coping with difficult situations, trying to resolve them, so I got along with everyone. It took great effort on my part. I had to think a great deal about how to approach those people. I'm not giving them much thought right now. Wow! I have some faith that if this is best for me, it will be best for everyone. 

            On one of my walks, it occurred to me that reconciliation can only happen when everyone is ready. In the meantime, a separate peace may be all that is possible. That means I live with a semi-permeable boundary, finding what I can share with people and ignoring the rest. It's the AA prayer: change what I can, accept what I can't, and have the wisdom to know the difference. As with all other things, timing is everything. 

            In the meantime, I spent about an hour practicing and reworking the video presentation for the Phonics Discovery System for YouTube posting. I think it will have to be a two-part video, or more like two videos, each 45 minutes apiece. The process is simple, but the concept is unfamiliar.

            I had three students today: J., my Step-Up student. I wanted to do 10 minutes of phonemic breakdown. I set the timer. In the middle, I got a text asking if I could meet with my 4pm student fifteen minutes earlier. J switched to some work he was having problems with. He did well on an article he had to read. Then we watched a video on volcanoes. We = yes, we- missed 3 out of 10 questions. One I got right, but since I wasn't absolutely sure of my answer, he gave a different answer. One was wrong. It claimed that the volcanos in Hawaii weren't hot spot volcanoes. No. They are. They had the answer wrong. I had to cut it short with J because of my next student. I can be flexible with him. We can do forty-five minutes here, an hour there, and then half an hour some other time. We're both flexible. 

            I had my adolescent D.  He said yes; he could read the words in his video game a little better. He also said he didn't see any improvement. I do. I'm wondering if his criterion for progress is having attained his goal of reading on grade level. I'm going to give him a SUDS, where he has to evaluate his rate of improvement on a number line. This should be interesting. He does say he can use his auditory center more. This should make an enormous difference. I had to keep pushing him to use cross-body blending. When he did, he was successful. I also had to repeatedly remind him not to start decoding a word with the initial letters unless he had determined the vowel's sound with the consonants that followed. When students don't follow procedures, I want to bang my head against the wall. 

            I had I at 4:00. We continued working on the Barnell Loft materials on Drawing Conclusions. She's in third-grade material, which is on a fourth-grade level; well, at least it was considered fourth grade when I was a kid. (One of the guys who put this series together was my sister-in-law's fifth-grade teacher.) She read sounds smooth now; her decoding skills were good. There were only a few spots where she needed some assistance. She also catches errors on her own. Her reading comprehension is pretty good. She missed some words. I would challenge her; she would reread it and get it. I had to reread the passage on one item myself. 

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Musings:

            I watch a TED talk on communication and the brain. When a particular scene came on, I realized that I had seen this before, but I had a completely different reaction this time. 

            I have thought for years that our brain patterns develop because we make a Xerox copy of the brains of others, particularly our parents. This talk was on brain entrainment, which is how two brains manifest the same brain activity. I use the word manifest because the patterns show up as the same on brain scans.  

            Our brains at rest show a scattered, irregular pattern like a Jackson Pollack painting. Our minds are all over the place, jumping from one thought to another. When we are all listening to the same story, our brains fall in sync. We crave synchronicity with others. It's a basic human need. If our parents have not developed brains that focus, we wind up with brains that cannot focus.  

            A focused brain is desirable, particularly in school environments; however, it has its downsides too. The brain that can connect random bits of information is the creative brain. If we have parents whose brains are too focused, we lose that aspect of ourselves as we entrain with their pattern. 

            There are always those offspring who do not follow the family pattern. Things happen. Each person has their own experiences. Something may have occurred that set that child on another path. I'm working with two children who had bad ear infections as children. There is a significant correlation between ear infections and dyslexia. Shit happens. But we can assume that most people develop following the pattern of one of their parents.

            We need all kinds of brains in society. One person may be more one way than the other. We are a diverse society; we need diverse brains.     

            For better or worse, we are a society that demands competence in dealing with abstract symbols, letters and numbers, and abstract thought. This stimulus is not as compelling as hands-on work that provides more sensory stimulation. Some adaptations can be made to accommodate these limitations. I want to propose a different approach to help those with ADD focus on the abstract. I feel somewhat sad thinking that these folks may find themselves squeezed into a small space after living in such a large unfocused one. But it's survival. 

            People with ADD find difficulty focusing on subtle stimulation. They can't control what they focus on. Their brain has to be hijacked by strong stimulation for them to be able to focus. We can help them be more engaged with subtle, abstract stimulation by training them to be aware of the sensory details of that stimulation.

            We already know that phonetics training changes the brain. Neuroscientists have seen the brain images of those who have difficulty reading versus those who don't. Different parts of the brain are engaged. With phonetics training, parts of the less active brain become more so. Phonetics is definitely a way to go. 

            Focusing on phonemic awareness helps develop underdeveloped parts of the brain. The simple solution is to make every speech sound in every word in a text, not just the phonetically regular ones, and name every letter in continuous text. 

            If there is a pattern of learning difficulties in families, the parents should do the work along with the child. Oh, I can see a problem here. If a parent is highly competent and the child is struggling, there will be weak entrainment. That weak entrainment will negatively impact the child and create an aversion to the activity. Don't have an immediate solution. 

Sunday, April 11, 2021

 Sunday, April 11, 2021

             I had a tough night. I am in an unresolved conflict with several people. The conflict arises from such different lifestyles; there is no way to reconcile them, despite efforts. So sad. I have to settle without being able to. This is somewhat new for me. I have cut people off when they're too much for me, but this is setting boundaries instead of absolute ones. Mike and   I set boundaries with each other. We told each other when we had violated each other. In fact, that was one of the premises of our relationship.

            Mike made up his mind that he wanted to marry me before our first date. I was it. How lucky was I?!! We often think women pursue men and trap them into marriage. I know several cases where the man who knows  'this is it' before the woman. 

            At the start of my relationship with Mike, I brought up the issue of boundary protection. Both of us were raised by mothers who had no boundaries. They believed they were allowed to do whatever they wanted without regard for our feelings. I had recently read a book on the subject; I remember the title being Hitting Below the Belt. (The only book of that title I can find now is a love story. The book I was thinking of is a self-help book. I must have the wrong title.) It was instructions on how to deal with conflict. The important point was to stop before harm was done. I showed Mike something I learned from life-savings instruction, the life-savings tap. 

            In life-saving instruction classes, you work with a partner; one of you is the drowning person, and the other is the life-saver. You have to struggle with each other underwater. One of the participants may be in trouble and need air. If they struggle, are they acting their part, or are they really in trouble? To resolve that confusion, the person in trouble taps twice on the other guy's body. The exercise comes to an immediate stop. With Mike and me, the deal was if one of us tapped, we immediately stopped whatever was going on. We could always revisit it. It worked beautifully for us. It took me many years to think of how someone could abuse this trick. Anything can be abused if the goal is superiority or power. We eventually dropped the tapping. I don't know how many years it was before we did. We still violated each other's boundaries and expressed objections, but we could do it without that aid.

            I like negotiation. Many others don't. It's not that I always do it right. I don't. But I'd rather try it than not. I can see where those who don't like to negotiate would be very uncomfortable with me. Of course, I'm very uncomfortable with them. Is there a right or wrong? Is there a way of resolving those differences?  

            I faced something in myself today. I want people to see my point of view. I can do it with others. I can see where they're coming from. However, I'm not good about saying I'm sorry when I feel unheard myself. I'm in a situation where I can acknowledge to my friends that someone I'm in conflict with was hurt. They have told me so. Their behavior has also hurt me. I have no evidence they even see that I have reason to be hurt. Saying I'm sorry feels like admitting I'm in the wrong, exclusively. Whatever the problem is, it is all my fault. The other person walks away with no interest in seeing my point of view. Is there anyone good in this situation? One of the people I'm in conflict with actually told me that she finds my inclination to always see the other person's point of view annoying; she thinks I'm other-directed. What the hell am I going to do in that situation?  

            The model for the apologizing behavior I have in mind is the behavior of customer service providers. Have you ever noticed? You damage something, and they say, "I'm sorry to hear you're having trouble." Have you ever noticed how your frayed nerves lay back down upon hearing this? Those very words can make things worse depending upon the tone of voice used. My favorite, "I'm sorry you feel that way, but I'm not responsible for your feelings?" Really??? I have never agreed with that bullshit. 

            I had a therapist trying to convince me that I had no responsibility for my mother's discomfort with me. That didn't make sense. I may have been the child and she the adult, but that didn't mean that she wasn't hurt by what I did. She was hurt because I disagreed with her about the beauty of a model on the TV is irrelevant. Her internal system undoubtedly caused her pain, but it was also triggered by me. It wouldn't have been triggered if I hadn't shared my opinion on that model's appearance. The therapist argued that my mother was damaged goods. True. My counterargument was, what if she was a burn victim? Could you argue that I was not the cause of her pain when I bumped into her because I didn't cause the burns? I needed, still need, some way to thread my way through this narrow path. Okay. Next therapy session. 

Saturday, April 10, 2021

 Saturday, April 10, 2021 

              Yoga this morning as usual. The sun is coming up sooner. That means non-biting houseflies are dancing on us before the class is over. 

            After the class, I talked to Yvette and Scott about the window again. We’re still in a place where the window will remain on my guest room floor. Sadly, communication between Yvette and me is complicated. God, we are different people. We’re both good people who are happy for each other’s life successes and wish each other well. But we do not have a smooth relationship. There are some actual disagreements; moreover, there is no overlap of similarities that carry us through. Sad for both of us.

            I did some housekeeping and gardening and had a session with A at 11:30. When I went to pull up the work I had been doing with him, I saw I didn’t have enough for the session. To have a text we both can see, I type exercises from books I have. When we started with these exercises, he did one or two at a time. Now he does 5 to 7. He did seven today. At the beginning of the session, I heard a significant improvement in his reading- remarkable, really. His reading was faster and smoother. He just sailed through the three to four sentences per exercise with ease. Then he hit a wall. At the start of our session, he had no problem keeping b and d straight. All of a sudden, he was confused. Then he reversed sounds; for example, when blending a and m, he put the m sound before the a. I asked him if he was aware that he was reversing sounds. He said yes. I’m not convinced that’s true, but it would be great if it were. I asked him, “What have I told you to do when you reverse sounds?”  He didn’t know. Oh, boy. I had to lead him through cross-body blending again.  

Friday, April 9, 2021

 Friday, April 9, 2021

Last night was my third time using magnesium oil on my legs before going to bed. No, I did not sleep through to 3:30 am. I was up and peeing regularly by 12:30. 

I thought my session with Shelly was at 8 am. I had Judy scheduled for 9:45. She wants to go over the video presentation for the Phonics Discovery System. She said she had several hours of questions. When I discovered that the appointment was actually for 9, I called her. She wanted to put it off. I said forty minutes was better than nothing, and I was dying to hear her questions. I told her I would be finished at 10. She should come over a few minutes early to pick up some items for a charity donation. I set them in the driveway for easy access. 

After Judy loaded her car, she moved to come into the house. I asked her to wait a few minutes until I finished my session. While there was nothing I was discussing with Shelly that I wouldn't have mentioned with Judy, it feels very different if I have a deep conversation with one person versus another. 

In my session with Shelly, I talked about the latest debacle in relationships, how I resolved to limit or eliminate my relationships with people who don't enjoy me, no less are downright uncomfortable with aspects of my personality. I'm always the one who wants to work things out. I believe things are always resolvable. I give up. I'm not angry with these people, just disappointed and sad. 

When dealing with these people, I tend to get somewhat hysterical. I experience them like blocks of wood; they're immovable. They usually maintain their composure while my volume goes up, and I get sarcastic. My words may not be brutal, but my tone is. I lose it. It doesn't serve me in any way. It's humiliating that I don't have the self-control I need, and it certainly doesn't promote reconciliation with others.

Shelly asked me if I did that with Mike. The answer was no. I trusted him to be interested in my point of view. I don't get that way when I think someone really wants to hear what I have to say and how I feel. Some people I have trouble with really have no interest in my point of view. Others really can't abandon theirs; it's too uncomfortable- for whatever reason. Sad, but I have no solution. I have to work on my own failings. 

I have some strange idea these people will be more interested in me when I reject them. That's not going to work. I would try to find some common ground where we can mutually enjoy each other. If we couldn't find that, I would bow out.  

I spent about an hour revising the parts of the PowerPoint that Judy and I went over this morning. I wrote some notes, but I knew I would forget the meat of her observations if I waited too long. Sometimes Judy apologizes for her criticisms, but I am doing very well. I have no idea where this maturity and sanity are coming from, but I welcome her insights. I'm downright excited by her observations and insights. Thank you, God.

I was supposed to have an appointment with my fourth grade D.  I sent the Zoom link. When I didn't get a response by three minutes into the meeting, I called his mom. "Oh, I thought I told you, he's back in school. He can't meet with you anymore on Fridays." I went through my texts and emails, nope. There I go again; was I wrong? 

I had an appointment with I. at 4 pm. I switched to using the Barnell Loft Drawing Conclusions D with her. I now have three students in this material with three different sets of objectives. The exercise involves reading a six to seven-sentence paragraph about some nonfiction issue with expository writing. The exercise requires the student to make an inference. The answer has been obliquely referred to; the student has to infer the answer. They have to select their answer and support their choice by finding the words in the paragraph that support their answer. Interesting! I. was answering the questions based on what she thought would be right instead of what the author said. I gave her my comprehension exercise. I say, "I am a 12- year-old boy with bright red hair," and then I ask, "What did I say?" While it is undoubtedly important to evaluate the validity of what an author has to say, it is equally important to recognize what they said in the first place before they can evaluate it. That's the basis for all conversations, reconciliations, and peaceful solutions between people. It is a vital skill.  

Thursday, April 8, 2021

 Thursday, April 8, 2021

             After yoga, Scott came in and did a few chores for me. He changed a light bulb in my hallway ceiling. I had tried it on my own. I had pulled the casing down. I was familiar with high hats, where you can pull the casing right out to access the bulb. That didn't work; I was concerned about pulling too hard and breaking something. I figured Scott would know what it was about. He had the same problem. He managed to fit his fingers up within the casing and unscrew the bulb. I had a new one of a similar size, but it is about six times brighter than the one I had before. 

            Scott also finished up a small job he hadn't gotten to when he installed my toilet. He had to file down or clip the screws that held the toilet to the floor so those decorative caps could fix over them. Everything's in order now.

            After watching that video presentation from the curriculum team for LAUSD on Phonics, I was upset. I called Judy to tell her what I had seen. I had hoped that I wasn't still so far out from the mainstream. I love my work and the results I get. I don't like feeling that far out from the mainstream. Judy recognizes the value of what I do and takes it in stride. She neither puts me down nor exaggerates the benefits of what I do. It just is, and I just am. Ah!

            My computer was sluggish this morning, slow to save a file. I thought to call Brian H. and ask him if it was a problem to be concerned about. On my way to Kaiser for my surgical appointment to have my hernia checked, I got a phone call from an unidentified number. I sometimes answer them just for my amusement. However, this was a call from an old contact. The online Microsoft computer company that ran the scam on me.

            I hadn't recognized the number. I was surprised to hear it was from them. I said, "You have your nerve calling me after your company tried to run a scam on me!" He started telling me no, it wasn't them. It must have been some company that hacked them. Please, speak to his supervisor, Alex. It was Alex who passed me on to the scammers. There may be a small group within the company that does the scamming. Alex picks out people he thinks would be good targets. Let me see, old, recently widowed; she sounds like a likely easy prey. Kevin, the tech, told me that I didn't have a new operating system downloaded, preventing updates.  

            Since the scam, I started working with in-person computer support. Fortunately, my Apple computer was in the shop at the time of the original scam. I can't remember why- some hardware problem. Oh, yes. In fact, it was either Alex or Kevin who recommended that I take it to a local shop. If he did it, he would have to do something to my files that would be risky. They could do it without that risk. The local shop cleaned up my computer. 

  Recently, I had another problem with the computer. I called Apple support. They told me I needed a new battery. I called the local shop I had dealt with before. They wanted to do a full diagnostic for a mere $100 in addition to the new battery and the installation. I didn't see why this was necessary; Apple had already run the diagnostic. All I wanted was a new battery.   My friend Adam had a tenant who actually worked for the shop. I called and quit because he figured he could deliver better service for less. I called him. He took care of the battery, ordering it online and coming over to my house to install it for much less than it would have cost me at the local shop. That's who I called this morning when I got that call from the online Microsoft support people who tried to scam me. He assured me they couldn't crash my computer or do much damage. He could come over. I was on my way to Kaiser; I would call him when I was on my way home.  

     I had a surgical appointment at Kaiser about my hernia. As I expected, the doctor said it was trivial; she wouldn't recommend surgery at this time, but I could get it if I wanted. No. What I did want was advice about what to look for. I was told it could stay the way it was until I died, or it could become seriously worse suddenly. If it got worse, a piece of my digestive tract would be pushed through an opening in my abdominal wall. I would feel nausea and not have to go to the bathroom. Sounds fantastic! She said when that happens to get myself to a doctor immediately. I got the picture.

            I stopped at Ace hardware before heading home. I was looking for a non-slip rug pad. They didn't have quite what I needed. They had something closer to shelf lining. When I bought it, I realized why what I had been using hadn't worked. I have been trying to get a plastic-covered floor pad to not slide on carpeting. Well, the plastic is slick. Everything slides off that. 

            Shortly after I got home, Brian arrived. He ran programs to check my computer. He assured me the scammers weren't into it. When I asked him about the new program, he said he hadn't downloaded it because it would change the computer format. Why do they do that? Then you have to learn a whole different system for working your computer. If I have one that works, why can't I keep that one?

            I had my second session with K.  I wanted to work on his constant need to fidget and his inability to concentrate. When I asked him where the discomfort was, he squirmed and said in his head. That was a surprise. I expected it to be in his body, muscles spasming. I checked out the movement in his head. He couldn't give me much information; other than he couldn't control his thoughts. Moving seemed to help. I tried the slow-moving line exercise. He could focus and sit still but said he didn't like it. No, he was not more comfortable afterward. As far as I can make out, K has the self-awareness of an appliance lightbulb. After the slow line exercise, he said he felt uncomfortable – get this- in his nose. It felt weird. I asked him if he thought what we were doing was dangerous. He said no. I explained weird means something new is happening in your body/nervous system. It feels weird because it's new. You have to know the difference between safe weird and dangerous weird. I had his forebrain tell his back brain that this activity was safe. He experienced some relaxation. 

            When I asked K if he felt differently, he said no. He always felt this way. He had no trouble concentrating and sitting still in school. His mother told me the exact opposite.

            Then I did some of the Using Context Clues exercise with two-sentence setups with a blank, which had to be filled in from the choices below. Today, I started with the book on a second-grade level. In our last session, I used one from the first-grade level. 

I started reading the words very slowly. K said he wanted to take over. He moved through 5 of these exercises quickly. I asked if it felt better than when he usually did schoolwork. He said no. It came out he didn't consider these exercises schoolwork. Okay. If he's comfortable, it's not schoolwork; if he's not comfortable, it is. He said something about having trouble counting in math. I asked his mom. She said she knew nothing about it. His teachers never said anything about him having problems in math.

            At 2 pm, I tried to link with J on Zoom. He didn't respond. I called, no answer. Then he texted me; he was eating. When he got on, I asked him if he saw a difference due to the phonemic work we did yesterday when I broke the words down into their basic sound units very slowly. He said yes. He did better on his homework. He asked if he could put his earphones on and continue eating while I did the work. Yep. I did it for 10 minutes. He will hopefully start listening to the audio files and let me off the hook once he is sufficiently comfortable with me doing it in person.

            I had a session with E at 2:30. I called a few minutes before; he didn't answer. He called back a few minutes later. He was still in class when I called. 

            I asked E. what the most annoying thing was. He said it had nothing to do with him. Two of his friends were fighting. He was trying to smooth things over, but nothing was working. His friend Elijah had talked to his friend Mike's girlfriend. Oh, boy. It had everything to do with him. His social group was being torn apart by a fight over a girl. I had E. see himself standing alone, looking around for a place where he could go if his social group did fall apart. He found something. Neither one of us had any idea what he was thinking other than there were more social contacts out there than in his current group.

            I saw that Mike was upset because he depended on his girlfriend's attention to feel like a worthwhile person. He saw Elijah as threatening that relationship, as bird-dogging his girlfriend. On the other hand, Elijah saw that he was being accused of being a bad person, frightening him. Maybe his conversation with Mike's girlfriend was totally innocent. Perhaps it was an expression of Mike wanting the relationship Mike had for himself without even being aware of it. 

            I told Elijah that things like this would be happening among his friends. This is what adolescence was about. He wanted to know why it had to be that way. My explanation was based on theories of evolutionary psychology, as usual. Our brains were formed at a time when this behavior was still suitable. We were working with an old operating system and trying to download Zoom. There is a way it can be done with our brains, even if that doesn't work with computers. Our brains are more flexible than any computer program. 

            I had A immediately after E. He was reading more rapidly but making more errors. I think he was using his automatic processing more. Now we have to polish his perceptual system. I will give him the exercise of naming letters and underlying vowels. That seems to do the trick.

            I went for a short walk and talked to Jean, my hanai sister, checking up on how I was doing. So sweet. She had difficulty hearing me. The wind was blowing, disrupting the sounds.

            When I came back in the house, I had an appointment with adolescent D.  He said he didn't see a difference after our session yesterday when I got him to stop using his visual working memory to process speech sounds and use his auditory processing working memory. Sounds didn't feel like they were louder or clearer. Okay. Too bad, very sad, but it wasn't successful. I continued with him struggling to decode words, identifying the phonemes, and blending them back together. While he still did some reversals. Reading fi in a word as if, he identified those moments and was able to correct them. He had more trouble hearing and fixing problems with intruded or deleted sounds.  

            Because he sounded frustrated and angry, I offered to do the work. I did the same exercise I had done with J; I read the text's transcribed version, making every sound. I could feel his anger and contempt. I asked, "Are you thinking, "Of course, I can do this because you're doing the reading?" Yep. I had to explain why I was doing it. I asked him to focus on the spot, identify the auditory working memory and feel the sound in that spot. He actually relaxed and listened. Wow! What an improvement in his openness to sound. Very exciting.

            I called Judy, returning her call from earlier in the afternoon while I was working. Her computer had stopped working. She has a book she's written on that hard drive. Yikes! Brian, who helped me this morning, is also her go-to guy. He will be over tomorrow at 4. She is booked every moment. 

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Musings:

            OMG! I watched a video presentation on teaching Phonics following the model put out by the University of Florida, the leading researcher on the learning and teaching of reading. OMG! I am so different from them. It's scary. I prefer to think I'm way ahead of them.

            They now acknowledge that phonemic awareness is different from Phonics. According to them, you're teaching phonemic awareness if you don't correlate the sounds with the written form. Phonemes are just sounds and don't have anything to do with the written form. Does that mean that once a linguist transcribes a spoken language, they are no longer dealing with the language's phonemic structure?

            They spoke about the 'sight words' or 'high-frequency words that have to be learned by visual memory without any references to the phonemes or the phonemes' relationship to the letters representing them. The implication is there are no phonemes in the 'sight words,' and the letters do not represent the sounds.

            Let's look at the word said. Now here's a word with a phonetic twist. The ai does not represent the short e as a rule. (It probably does in some unstressed syllable somewhere.)  For starters, the s and the d are phonetically regular. Then it is the ai that represents the sound of the short e. The alternative would be spelling said and sd as is done in Hebrew. Therefore, the ai does represent a phoneme. 

            The Phonics being taught is the same rigid brand that only includes those patterns which are rigidly regular. No irregularities allowed! 

            Then the presenters talked about blending. They spoke about blending as having something to do with speed. It has zero to do with speed. It has to do with transitioning from one sound to the next, so there is a continuous sound flow. It can be done slowly or quickly.

            They did acknowledge that the field of reading has to recognize the insights from psychology, linguistics, and neuroscience. However, they don't use the insights from these fields. That would require they actually studied phonemes under the guidance of a linguist, and cognition under the supervision of someone who had some expertise in the field.   Okay, neuroscience sounds like it is just accessible to those in the medical profession. I've been doing BrainManagementSkills for close to 50 years now.  

            No, I am not thrilled that I am so far ahead of mainstream research. It makes me out of my time. No fun. Scary.  

Wednesday, April 7, 2021

Wednesday, April 7, 2021

 

It was lights out by10, and I slept straight through till 3:30. Unheard of. I usually had to get up and pee at least two to three times a night. Of course, I didn't sleep well the night before. I had an exceptionally bad night's sleep- some glitch in interpersonal relationships. Was this due to the magnesium oil that arrived yesterday?

My acupuncturist recommended the spray for spasming muscles. The directions say it's good for sleep. I sprayed it on my lower legs, as much of them as I could reach. I was also able to get some under my right foot. I slide into bed. Hate to think about what that oil did to my sheets. 

As I read my update entries from a year ago as I entered them into the blog, I see I was working on the same physical challenge then as I am now. Objectives cycle through. Currently, I'm working on the position of my right foot while thrusting my left hip. I have to trust it as compensation for the right hip thrust. Walking that way creates stress in the left calf muscles- It feels like some nerve pinching. I find it curious that the problems in my hip show up in the outer thigh.

I'm dealing with major shifts in my relationships with others. Several people in my family are uncomfortable with me and don't enjoy me. Worse yet, they think rather poorly of me. I've decided to give up on working out these relationships. I am going to set my boundaries. My guess is one, and all will be relieved.

Shortly before I met Mike, I made a similar shift in setting boundaries. I figured I was never going to find a life partner. I decided I would see someone I was dating only once a month and only allow one phone call a week. When I was on a date, I would do exactly what I wanted to do. On one dinner date in a Chinese restaurant, I read a book. Rude, yes. He didn't call again. But I had to figure out how to make myself comfortable. When learning a new skill, mistakes are inevitable. I never had more dates, and Mike was one of them. He loved that I was prepared to take care of myself. He continued to love that in me. He said he didn't have to guess what I was thinking or feeling. 

Some love that trait in me, and some hate it. Some love my 'out there being myself' trait, and some hate it. Some love the way my mind works, and some hate it. Mike had mixed feelings about the last two. He liked my upfront-out-there behavior in relation to himself, but he was embarrassed when I was that way with others. I wasn't thrilled with some of his social behavior either, but there were no deal-breakers. The good so outweighed the bad. 

I have always been someone who struggles to make relationships work. So, I'm hanging in there when they would just as soon leave. Being with these people makes me feel lousy. Do I need this crap? This is a problem since the people I am referring to are all parts of my family. I was talking to Judy about it. With one of the people, I think we can set up mutually comfortable circumstances for us. We can play a board game, take a course, or something of that order. Casual conversation is out. That's not comfortable for either one of us. For her, I always pose the threat of bringing up a topic that will make her uncomfortable. It is her unwillingness to intrude to such an extent that she has never said, 'How are you?" She sees questions as a form of invasiveness, not an expressed interest. We are polar opposites in how we relate to others. As a result, her children are very uncomfortable with me because of how they were raised and explicit instructions to avoid a relationship with me, as I was considered 'dangerous.' 

    The people involved have no reason to modify their behavior. They all have functional lives; their coping skills work for them. I like my coping skills; they have served me well in many ways. Have they served me perfectly? No. I can't imagine anyone has a 'perfect' set for themselves, no less others. With one person, I think we can deliberately create circumstances we can be mutually functional in. With the other two, I don't see it. The extent of their discomfort with me is just too great. I know our mutual discomfort is great for one of them – very disappointing. We're just going to have to forgive ourselves and each other and start from there. 

I got another notification from my Visa credit card company that I owed money. OMG! I usually pay the moment the bill comes in the door. In the bad ole days, I sat down immediately, wrote a check, put a stamp on the envelope, and put it in the mail. Now that I switched to online payment, a bill slipped under my radar. I owed over $4,000 on a card that I usually keep under $500. The first step was figuring out why the bill was so high. Ah, it was the last payment for the additional solar panels. The payment was due on February 2, and now it's April 7. However, I can't find the bill for March. I always pay on time, and the one time I don't, I have an enormous bill. The penalty will be interesting. Next time, that credit card bill will be on the end table until it is paid. My short-term memory is gone.

I had three sessions planned for today. Fourth grade D., J, and adolescent D. Fourth grade D's mom was on the phone and couldn't get off. She wasn't free until an hour later. I had the time, and so did it then. D's reading accuracy is much better. However, he still doesn't follow the recommended procedure if he has trouble with a word. It drives me nuts. There is a good possibility he doesn't remember the procedure. He did a good job on the comprehension activity, only making a mistake if there was a not in the sentence. I asked him if he knew the ten commandments. He said yes. They go, Thou shalt not steal. If the 'nots' were left out, it would read, Thou Shalt Steal. Some difference, eh?

I sent a link to J at 2:30, but there was no response. I didn't hear from him until after 5. He said he was with his mom. He is usually a good kid. We have an easy back-and-forth relationship. I want him to listen to the audio file with the words phonemically broken down to see if this will help his verbal fluency. The problem isn't with English; it is with all languages. Last time, I did the exercise using a philosophy text, saying each sound very slowly. He found that relaxing. He fell asleep—all good. I want to do 10 minutes a day with him to see what happens with his verbal fluency.

I had an appointment with adolescent D at 4. I sent the link. There was no response by 4:05. I called his mom. They had just walked in the door, and D signed on immediately. He continued to have problems with the word average. He could decode and say the first two syllables; the third undid him. He got a vowel sound that would work. That /j/ represented by ge foiled him. He would distort the /j/ sound, adding a vowel sound. He would reverse the /a/ and the /j/ sound.  

Again, I asked him if the letters moved. He said no. I wondered if the sounds swirled around in his head. He asked, what does that mean? I described it as a feeling of confusion where things are moving around in your head instead of holding still. Yes. Where was he feeling that swirling? In the front of his head. Wow! This is the first bit of helpful feedback I've gotten from him. He is using his visual working memory to process sound. It will work in a pinch, but it is not designed for that purpose. 

I showed him where the working auditory processing center was; if you drive a pencil through the head just to the left of the soft spot and through the side at the temple, where the two pencils meet is the auditory working memory. He was able to visualize the site and focus there. I spoke some German to him and asked him to feel the vibrations in that area. He didn't feel any. I asked, "What can I do to help D?" always a good question. 

I got the image of a spot right behind and slightly above his left ear. I asked him to focus on that spot. Picture a color there. Blue. A pretty or ugly blue. A pretty blue. What's its texture, soft or hard? Soft like ice cream. How big? Medium-sized. I told him to allow it to drain. I saw it flowing down behind the ear. As it did, I saw another color being exposed. He said it was pink. A pretty or ugly pink? Ugly. I told him to instruct his brain to release anything negative about that spot to keep anything positive or anything he still needed. I told him that his unconscious mind would work that out; he didn't have to do anything. As that pink spot dissipated, I asked him if he felt a little weird. A little. Good, that means something new is happening. As it continued, I could feel increased relaxation. He concurred. In the end, we went back to the spot where the auditory working memory resides. This time I did some phonemic sounding. He could feel it. We may have solved his problem. We'll see.

______ -______-______

Musings:

I've just started working with a 7-year-old boy at the end of second grade. His ostensible problem is his reading. I had one session with him; his mother was at his side the whole time. I was surprised at how poor his word recognition skills were. His mother made it clear that that was not the problem. He refused to pay attention. He fidgeted. He played with the chair he was sitting in and the desk drawer. He could not sit still. He had a bouncy ball in school, but he didn't have that here. She said he didn't want to do the session; he just wanted to play video games. She said if he didn't do as well as she knew he could, he wouldn't get to play video games.; he would have to sit with her and read. Boy, his reading improved immediately.

His hyperactivity has to be dealt with first, but not with drugs. My body hurt when I had to sit still, as I remember it. It can be agony. It's like little taser shocks were running through my body. Sitting still was torture, physical torture. 

The question is, why is he just fine when he is playing video games? Good question. Is it that he is distracted from the pain, or does it go away? Is there something in the nervous system that makes those little shocks stop? Is it possible that concentration reorganizes the nervous system?

I can't, won't, see this child in person until he has been vaccinated. That's going to be a while. I am planning to have the mom be my hands. I can see places in his body where there are energy leaks. Also, it looks like he is ungrounded. The energy stops just under his knees. It doesn't go down to the bottom of his feet and into the ground.

I have a few successful exercises. A strategy I could use is drawing a meandering line v-e-r-y slowly and having the student watch it. That action produced remarkable results with one child. Weird! Another is having him place his hand and arm on his mother's while resting it on a tabletop and moving it very slowly. Doing very slowly undercuts the monosynaptic reflex response.

       What is the monosynaptic stretch reflex? It is the most primitive neurological pathway. It's the one used to keep us standing without thinking about it. It runs from the spine directly to the muscles. It never connects to the brain. Suppose something has to connect to the brain. In that case, it requires something like 200 synaptic connections versus the one of the monosynaptic stretch reflex. It is set to automatic, as it should be. But what if it fires inappropriately? How to alter it? If we move so slowly that the nervous system doesn't detect it. Then we can change that neurological response.  

Tuesday, April 6, 2021

 Tuesday, April 6, 2021

            

            When I posted the update to the blog, I found I was working on the same variation of my walk now as I had a year ago: I was pushing out my left hip. I remembered a massage therapist telling me that the way to solve a physical problem was to do the exact opposite of what I used to do. The acupuncturist thinks it has to do with my hip. Indeed, it’s the placement of my hips; the question is, how much does it have to do with my lost cartilage in my one hip?

            I’m in a bad state. I have to deal with several people in my family who don’t really like me. They don’t enjoy me. Then don’t look at me and smile, glad that I’m around. I hear/feel them groan. I can’t afford these folks anymore. When I dealt with them in the past, I could come home to Mike and have my core value as a decent human reaffirmed. He would smile at me in delight. He would hug and kiss me. Being around people that hang on by a thread only because they are family is unbearable. I have to cut off from them for the time being. I feel lonely in their company. Sad, but I have to find my own. 

            I worked on the blog and updates. I had a new student today, K. He is completing second grade now. His mom sent me his report grade. He gets good marks for his word recognition skills but not his comprehension. I started with first-grade material, Using Context Clues. I was disappointed to hear how he read. His mom was sitting by his side. She said he fidgets the whole time. They have a bouncy ball for him at school, but she doesn’t one that at home. His mom said his reading was much better than what he was doing for me. He didn’t want to focus; he just wanted to get back to his video games. Mom said if he didn’t focus, he wouldn’t be going back even after the session. An immediate improvement! Okay. I usually ask parents not to interfere. In this case, I’m going to need the mom. His comprehension was pretty good. It seems his biggest problem is his attention. That’s what we’re going to have to work on that– with some reading practice thrown in. Mom said he does poorly on his work because he doesn’t bother reading the material to start. He just wants to get it over.

            I had an appointment with J. Today he worked on reading comprehension on a drama assignment. He read several plays and answered comprehension questions. I asked J if he was in a program that promoted him as he improved or if the teacher assigned the piece. He said the teacher assigned it. He didn’t know if the whole class got the same assignment. I didn’t see any numbers or letters on the text. I still don’t know his reading level. He’s doing well with the work he does. He said he is getting most answers correct when I’m not there. 

            I asked J again if he had listened to the audio file. He said no. I believe it will help him. Well, at least it won’t do him harm. I asked him to determine how much he liked the audio file on a scale from 1 to 10. The ten was his mom’s tamales. He said a four. Instead of playing the audio file, I dictated the transcription from the text of a book I was reading. I slowed it down; he said that was better. Ah! A clear sign of an auditory problem. First, I wrote the letters as well. I discovered he was falling asleep. I told him that was fine. I read like that for a good fifteen minutes. I have to do this more often with him.

            I had A immediately after J. I asked him how he was doing with automatic processing. He said fine, but then he decoded every word. I don’t think he had a clue. However, he’s moving through the comprehension exercises rather nicely.       At the end of the session, he read the Carpenter story A #7 for the first time. He hit some glitches, but he did rather well. 

            I finished Made you Look and started another video that Damon recommended, The Creative Brain. Very interesting. They emphasize how the creative mind is good at combining disparate things. Chabon talked about not trying to write an original novel but one using the past. He said what I believe; you can’t help but write an original. You will put your imprint on something no matter how close you try to copy. Individuality is inevitable; skill at your craft is not.

Monday, April 5, 2021

 Monday, April 5, 2021

             I spent the morning ordering copies of Mike's doctoral thesis from the dissertation publishing house. Ready for this title? "The Unity of Spiritual and Political Exercises in Simone Weil's Call for a New Saintliness: Being, Thinking and Doing in the Quest for the Good," I remember Mike speaking about it simply as Weil's Quest for the good. I ordered one digital copy and two hard copies, one for Jean and one for Damon. No, I hadn't read it yet. Reading it will probably make me feel lonely. Reading his journals is disappointing. They're all abstract and deal with functional issues. I suppose someone reading my journals, the ones I wrote from 18 to 32, would feel the same about them. However, I remember pouring out my heart and guts as I wrote them. Some people think abstract thought has no connection to feelings; geez, are they ever wrong. 

            I finally got vacuuming done in the living quarters over Yvette and Josh's. Josh had been home for four days straight with a bad back. I don't vacuum when he's in the house.

            I was supposed to have an appointment with H today. An hour before the session, I got a text from mom saying he was back in school and would no longer be working with me. The mom isn't downright arrogant, just not very thoughtful.

            I had three appointments today. First, with J.  We worked on math. A graph was provided with 100 squares. The questions ran if x is 30% of a total number, what is the total number? Or, 30% of some x is how many. The instructions were to use the graph to solve the problem. I had no idea how to do that. Finding 30% of x was easy. Finding the 100% from x is 30%, not so much. I figured out I could use ratios and get the answer. If there's another way, I don't know. I asked J," What percent is all?" He had no idea. Oh, dear. I had to say," 100%."

     J still struggled with speech. He often had problems with word recall. He'd say, 'you know' or '"What's the word?' This was not just an English language problem. He told me that he had trouble in Spanish too. Today I asked if his Spanish had improved. Yes, I asked about his English. Yes.   We still have to do more work.

            Scott and Yvette came up carrying the unwanted window. They laid it down in the guest room. I was in no hurry to do something about it. However, I was greatly relieved that Yvette didn't just make do with it since she thought it wouldn't meet her needs. There was no question that I would be able to sell it whenever ready to do so.was

            I had an appointment with my adolescent D. His mom wasn't with us today. He works hard. He reverses letters/ sounds. I asked him if the letters moved on around. He said no. That means his problem is with his audio processing. The work went slow but steady. He had trouble reading today. He asked what sound they made. Here the ey makes the long a, but the same letters make the long e sound in money. He apologized at the end for reversing the sounds. I assured him he didn't owe me an apology for that. I listed the things he could apologize for; being rude dismissive was one of them. 

            Afterward, I had an appointment with I. Her mom was supposed to get hold of me and tell me something about her teacher, but still no word. I.'s reading fluency is still halting. Also, I've been concerned about her comprehension. I started using the Drawing Conclusions D, 4th-grade level. She was in 3rd grade. She selected an answer that was never mentioned or suggested in the text. Hmm!

            I watched the end of one video Damon recommended and the beginning of another. Made You Look was the first one. It was the true story of fraud in the art world. This amazing Chinese artist was able to copy famous abstract artists, de Kooning, Motherwell, Rothko, and Pollack. People spent millions, like $30 million, on single paintings. I thought the paintings were great, but they weren't the works of famous artists. I thought the fake Rothko was better than anyone painted by the actual artist. I loved the magenta peeking from behind and through the large dark rectangle. I'd happily live with any one of those paintings. Of course, I wouldn't spend $30 million on it. I would never spend several hundred thousand, no less several million. I don't have that kind of money for art. What money I do have, I spend on solar panels.          

Sunday, April 4, 2021

Sunday, April 4, 2021

 

            After posting last year's update on the blog, I checked the stats, as I always do. What do you know? A zero for yesterday-the first in a long time. I have been running ones through threes, fours, and even sevens. Wow! Where are the advertisers?

            I wrote a story based on words with -am, like ham, Sam, Tammy, slam, etc., for the woman who contacted me for help with the student she's tutoring in LA.  

            I had a shock today. I saw a video of one of my nieces. When she's around me, her face and body are in motion in ways that look like discomfort to me. When she walks, she flounces. Today, I saw her as if I had never seen her. Her face and body were composed. Seeing her this way made me think she only moved that way when I was around; it said she was very uncomfortable with me. She had given me other indications of this in her behavior. Boy, that blew me out of the water. I knew I wasn't one of her favorite people, -but this degree of discomfort was unexpected. It triggered loneliness in me. I could always come home to Mike, and he would hug me and assure me that he was comfortable with me. 

            I was on the verge of calling Jean, Mike's ex, who has become one of my best friends, really a sister. She has a knack for comforting me. I have several people close to me who are uncomfortable with me. Of course, I'm uncomfortable with them too. However, I tend to find everyone interesting and seek a way to relate. According to them, the fault for our relationship's failure falls on me. "You're weird. I don't know anyone else like you." It's sort of funny when I look at the family members they find acceptable. Weird? OMG! I'm only weird because I think abstractly, philosophically, ask for what I want and approach people with an openness that closed people find disconcerting. Well, those are the only items I know of.

            Now, in all fairness, I am a bold presence. Some people think that makes me the best thing since sliced bread. Even Mike, who was more compressed than me, said that he loved my openness because he didn't have to guess what I was thinking. But there is the other end of the spectrum. However, after many years, he finally spoke up about how I approached employees in stores when I needed help. He said I had to say excuse me first. I told him not when I had already made eye contact; that was unnecessary. Oh?

            Just as I was thinking of calling Jean for comfort, Damon called. I wept on the call with him. While he advised me on fixing it, mostly accepting the reality and avoiding the people who upset me, he was also a comfort. Cylin, his wife, chimed in. She recognized the depth of my loss. Having someone who knows you well, has lived with you for 45 years, and still finds you wonderful cannot be replaced by a whole herd of friendly people with who you have light contact.

            At 1 pm, I had The Awareness Keys to Excellent Living zoom presentation. Last week's key was clarity. During the week, I couldn't remember what it was and had to ask Yvette to remind me. Nonetheless, I had been working on precisely that issue. I clarified several issues. So far, every key the presenter has mentioned, Gratefulness, Humility, Clarity, and now Language, are issues that are always on my mind. No, it doesn't mean that I'm way ahead of others. I still struggle, particularly with Language. I think my words are pretty good when I argue. Also, I have gotten much, much better about timing. I don't put down the other person; however, my tone is off. When I get scared, I get louder, more dramatic, more sarcastic, more in general. I can't imagine it is pleasant to deal with. I have been working for years to get control of this trait- with only moderate improvement. 

      I do think focusing on a single aspect at a time is helpful. The clarity key impacted me even though I wasn't consciously aware of it. Having achieved clarity, I said what I had to say. I didn't say anything accusatory. However, I didn't say it gently either. The other person tried to lay it all on me, saying she knew no one else like me. (That wasn't a compliment.) I interpreted that to mean that something was wrong with me. Afterward, I thought, "Of course, you know no one else like me." When you have contact with such a person, you hightail it out of there lickety-split."  I don't run quite as fast from people that are like her. I stick around like some masochist in hopes of resolving differences and finding an area of commonality. Sometimes, you have to give up. I have been known to give up, but it's usually on moral issues, not stylistic differences.

            I liked the point on Language. Three gates of speech: 1) Is what I have to say necessary for my well-being, 2) Can I express it kindly or clearly. 3) Right timing. I'm good at all three professionally, not that I don't make mistakes. On a personal level, I have had my moments. However, if I'm scared, #2 is my Achilles heel. I don't put people down or tell them something is all their fault. But boy, do I get loud, and I sound aggressive. My mouth says one thing; my body says something entirely different. I understand it's fear, but it's hard for people to see fear. My defense is to fight- to the death if necessary. It's hard to see me as vulnerable. 

            I must say the presenter contradicted herself. She said we should never say should and then gave a list of words we "shouldn't" use. I think she means never to say should in an argument with another person.

            I needed to withdraw into a fiction book. I checked my Kindle, but my Kindle was bare. I called Amazon. Yes, they had cut off my account. It probably happened when they shut down my Amazon account due to an unpaid bill. I straightened that out, but it didn't automatically affect my Kindle. 

       As I got ready for bed last night, I heard a coqui in my yard. Coquis are these quarter-sized frogs that came to Hawaii via Puerto Rico in plants. The Puerto Ricans love them. There these frogs have natural enemies that keep their numbers in check. Here there are no natural enemies, and their population is overwhelming. In Puerto Rico, they provide a comforting background noise. Here their numbers are so high, that it is impossible to hear the TV or a sermon in a church at night. Not only that, but they're mutating. They are growing larger and becoming active during the day as well as at night. It's a nightmare. 

     In response to hearing this coqui, I got out of bed and headed out to the front yard in my underpants with a bag of baking soda in hand. Baking soda kills them. As I approached the spot where I heard the sound, the croaking stopped. I stood still. If I moved, it stopped. I stood still. I only could do so much. I thought it was coming from a particular shrub. I poured baking soda over the area. The creature croaked as I walked back to the house. Did I get the bugger? I don't know. 

Saturday, April 3, 2021

 Saturday, April 3, 2021

             I got up at my usual time, anticipating the 7 am yoga class. At 7 am, I was still on the phone with Dorothy, wondering what was happening. I texted Yvette, "Yoga?" but didn't hear back. I was a little worried. Josh had been home for several days because he wasn't feeling well. I wasn't too concerned because no one else showed up. She must have thought to tell everyone else. I went to check my texts. Sometimes I get one, and the device doesn't beep or vibrate to tell me. I saw a text from Yvette.   I had read part of it but missed the whole central section. That's weird. In that section, Yvette explained she would be out dancing till late on Friday night and had canceled yoga for Saturday morning. 

            I had a session with A a little later in the morning. I started with the comprehension exercise. I always have him read the passage first. He had trouble with today's passage. I was particularly struck by his conscious decoding of every word, even the high-frequency ones. I instructed him on how to use automatic processing to recall words. His mom came through the room while we were working. She saw him with his eyes closed and told him to sit up and pay attention. First off, I had instructed him to close his eyes to visualize the word in his mind. He was able to follow my instructions. When I asked him if he was doing something different from what he usually does, he said yes.

            At the end of the session, I asked to speak to his mom. I told her what we had worked on and how she could implement it when she worked with him. I told her to instruct him to decode a word if it didn't come up automatically.

            I also asked her if he fell asleep easily. She said yes when he naps but not when he goes to bed at night. He did fall asleep a few times while we were working. I told her not to worry, I just yelled his name, and he woke up again. I would deal with it. However, I also told her he should be sitting in a dining room chair, not an Executive chair. A can't sit up straight in that chair. He slides back into the embracing 'arms' of the chair. 

            After I was finished with A, I headed into town. I thought I had a 1 pm appointment with the acupuncturist. As I headed down the hill to the main highway into town, I remembered that the appointment was at 1:30. Good. I could run down to Safeway first to pick up some more sauerkraut. I get cravings. Given my cravings run to sauerkraut and Hersey Milk Chocolate Kisses with almonds, could I be pregnant?                         

            The acupuncturist had me on my stomach for this session. She worked on my back and the back of my legs, hamstrings, and Achilles. I am looking forward to seeing how this plays out. 

            I got a chocolate delivery from Amazon. My order was for four packages of Hersey's Milk Chocolate Kisses with almonds. The bags looked different. I opened one immediately. Yes, these are knock-offs. They don't quite taste the same. Maybe this will wean me off my craving for them. I'll be in forced withdrawal.

            Tommy, my techie, stopped by. He needed me to do something with the slide show for the audio file. I had questions. I was supposed to provide a link through Facebook to the written transcription. I told Tommy that since I had no idea how to do it, I couldn't write instructions on how to do it. It took some time to pull the information out of him. He said something about the information being 'pinned' and all they had to do was go to a 'pinned post." What the hell did that mean? Once he left, I completed the instruction slides and emailed the file to him.

            I continued watching Bloodlands on Amazon. I want a sensible mystery show, nothing edgy. Do they make that anymore? Damn! There was some twist to this thing that is making me uncomfortable. I fast-forwarded to the end of episode three only to discover that they hadn't posted the last episode in the mini-series yet, with its conclusion. I switched to watching "A Month in the Country." It stars Colin Firth, Kenneth Branagh, and Natasha Richardson, all in their twenties. Firth was almost unrecognizable. It's not quite as pleasant as I would like. There is meanness in it. I want nice. I want a stress-free experience. Oh, well. The views of the English countryside were lovely.

Friday, April 2, 2021

 Friday, April 2, 2021

 

       I slept well until 3:30. Then I was awake and wrestling with annoying thoughts: trying to get people to see something my way. It was becoming clearer; what I missed most about Mike was how he looked at me with delight. I meditated to ease my distress. It occurred to me to recall anyone who looked at me with delight. My paternal grandfather came to mind. He sat in my mother's house every day as a tolerated guest. I treated him terribly. I didn't see him as a relevant source of love and comfort. I knew he created a space for me to be myself, to release the stress I lived under. He loved to watch me dance, and I loved to dance. It had occurred to me that space was created because when I was dancing and he was watching, my mother had everything under control. She knew where both of us were and what we were doing. I don't think my mother would have tolerated my daily dancing if he hadn't been there. Free self-expression wasn't something I remember her being uncomfortable with. It occurred to me a 4:00 am was that my grandfather, Opi, made an active contribution to my life. He took delight. I remember my dad looking at me that way too. I remember my mom looking at me, beaming. I wouldn't describe that as a look of delight. It was too intense- maybe joy and pride. But if I 'caught' her looking at me that way, she would quickly turn away. My mother believed that positive feedback was bad for children- for people in general. Some of her beliefs were culturally rooted, but she added her own twist.

           Feeling the lack of that delight in my life feels like losing a most basic need. I know others have respect or admiration for me, but delight is what I need. It's what I got and gave in my relationship with Mike. People say that a truly loving relationship isn't where you keep account of what you give and get. Bull shit! It's just that what's being accounted for is different. It's not how much money he spent on me or how many times he did something my way, although those factors can enter in. Being looked at with delight was the bottom line. It was worth, let's say, 1,000 points.

            Then there was laughter, affection, and another thousand there for each. Then Mike was a person I could take delight in, someone who allowed me to express that feeling freely without feeling demeaned. Demeaned, you ask? Isn't the delight I'm describing what we express to young children? They are delightful; they delight us, and we feel free to express that delight. Mike and I were two grown people who didn't object to being looked at with delight, and didn't feel demeaned or diminished by having someone enjoy us as they would a child. However, we never viewed each other as children. We didn't rob each other of authority or autonomy. How did I ever get so lucky to meet this man?

        Well, I’ve counted up the positive points, delight 1,000, playfulness 1,000, affection 1,000.  The negatives were trivial against that accumulation of points—five hundred off for his lousy conversational skills. But 750 added on, maybe even another 1,000 for his ability and willingness to not only negotiate with me but cocreate solutions to our life challenges.

         I realized this morning why Jesus is such a big deal. He is described as a source of unconditional love. I think this means he can delight in us. While I think Mike was able to become a fully believing Christian, it's harder for me. The reasoning behind the belief system seems shaky to me at best. But I am capable of allowing, giving permission to, my right brain to believe in the love and healing presence of Jesus. The process is captured in the phrase, "Do not let your left hand know what your right hand is doing." There is a truth behind that. 

        The left hand connects to the right hemisphere, the right hand to the left. The left is more logical, structured, downright controlling, and associated with ego. The right hemisphere is more childlike. I can separate the two. I have a bright left brain. It knows it's good for me to accept that love of Jesus. People who do not keep these two aspects of the brain separate, allowing each to do what it does best and complement each other, run into trouble. 

        When walking, I am trying to focus more on pulling up my thigh muscles, which triggers my abdomen's uplift. It's hard work.

        Because I wrote a note to myself, I remembered to call the Easter Seals service in Honolulu to ask if they provided services for a high-functioning girl that is poor at picking up on non-verbal cues. Another option is for them to advise me on what I could do to address this problem. They had no one in the office- Covid. They will get back to me sometime next week.

      I had two sessions today; actually, three, no, four if you count my session l had with Shelly. I felt very stressed by unsatisfying interactions with some people and hearing about unsatisfying interactions between other people. Sitting with sadness and grief is a bitch. 

        In my last session with Shelly, I sat with the pain my mother caused me that I still carried. That was unpleasant. It was made worse by her insistence that she did nothing to hurt me; I was only claiming to be that to hurt her. When the old pain waved over me, a hug from Mike would comfort me. Now, I don't have that. I am dependent on people who are either not as comforting or not as available as Mike was.

        I went back to that sensation, sitting at the bottom of my abdomen. An image of a trout-sized fish flopping about in a small puddle of water at the bottom of a well came to mind. At first, I saw that as an image of myself in pain. But this fish looked at me with a cunning eye. Weird.

            I knew I had to go down to the bottom of the well to be near the fish. My image was of a stone-lined well with a metal rung ladder. I started climbing down. A chill penetrated my body that was deeper than the wet chill of the well. Shelly felt it too. 

        When I got to the bottom, I sat on one of the bottom rungs and just watched. My four-year-old self entered the scene. She crouched by the fish, tempted to touch it. She reached out and pulled her hand back repeatedly. I thought the fish was a part of me that I had to absorb back into myself – but that odd look? That's where the session ended. I mediated, continuing on my own. I concluded the fish represented a will to power, much praised by Nietzsche and the Nazis, but one my conscious mind always feared. I'm sure a four-year-old child has to deal with this question. An infant has no doubt about who should be in power. Some people choose that path and work to achieve power and control in their lives. I always thought it was so lonely at the 'top.' Not interested, thank you. I wanted to say firmly rooted in the ordinary. I concluded that the image I saw was my four-year-old self wrestling with that question. So far, the fish has been left there flopping. Maybe all I have to absorb s the four-year-old who wants power. I didn't know what to do with the fish. Further meditation will reveal that. 

        I had a session with 4th grade D. He told me he didn't have school today. I was confused; was it a holiday? He had reminded me it was Good Friday. I knew that but forgot. My tutoring session with him was more of the same. I have to remind him to use the procedures I have taught him: when confused: start with the vowel; if you have trouble blending, use cross body blending. He had a problem with one of the comprehension exercises. It had a 'not' statement in it. He overlooked that. 

       I had a zoom meeting with one of the Step-Up Tutors working with a first-grade girl. The tutor has no experience teaching. Julia referred her to me. This little girl reads they and them as the—some combination of poor visual perception, poor memory, and no phonics. I don't know which one is the worst. I showed the tutor how to use the Phonics Discovery system with the sight word list. There may be other factors involved.

      In the late afternoon, I had an appointment with my adolescent D. He did the work but was hostile to any intrusion into his personal thought process. I asked him how he felt about the work, hoping his response would be better. I wanted it to be fun, as in a video game. I also asked where in his brain he sensed activity. He was unresponsive. I started wondering if I would be able to help him. If he, and his mom, thought this wouldn't help him, I just had to let it go.

       I sat down to meditate on my adolescent D.  I concluded that I had to stop asking him questions about his perceptions of himself. He was very private; he wouldn't even let me see his face on the screen. His dad walked through the room while we were working and said, "Wouldn't it be better if you could see him?" in an annoyed voice. I said, "Your son is very private. If he's uncomfortable and feels he has to defend himself, that will be more counterproductive than whatever problems are caused by not being able to see him." Now, I realized that I could not use my BrainManagementSkills with this boy. I told him that I would not ask any more questions and just focus on the procedure. I had a plan for our next lesson. 

      There was also another problem. When adolescent D decoded a paragraph on a fourth-grade level, he read the long words he had to use a labor-intensive strategy to decode. Still, he missed two sight words, they being one of them. Huh? He passed the sight word list. His visual memory tested as good. I'll have to think about this.

Thursday, April 1, 2021

 Thursday, April 1, 2021

      Elsa has been barking and running toward cars for quite a while. Now she has started doing this with pedestrians. I’m wondering if something is wrong with her, like a brain tumor. Her behavior is getting weird. It is also getting weird in good ways, from my point of view. She started cuddling with me. It’s taken her two years to fully accept me as a Mike replacement. Boy, she missed him.

        It’s interesting. Just as Elsa recovers, I go into the worst phase of my grief. The second anniversary of his death was on March 3. I heard a theory that the third year is the worst. It’s like a slow detox – only of something good, love, and security.  

         Mike always greeted me joyfully. I don’t think he ever looked at me and had that “Oh, it’s her again” look. He was always delighted. There are a few people who greet me that way now. I am so grateful for them. They aren’t in touch with me every day, but I can hold the delight I think I hear in their voices. Then some people make me feel tolerated when they look at me. And then some look at me and communicate, “Oh, shit. Here she comes.”  I thank God daily for those in my life who show enthusiasm for my existence. 

        Yvette canceled yoga for today, anticipating a 3 o’clock appointment with the vet for Liner, who threw up some pretty yucky-looking stuff yesterday.

         I upload a blog entry a year behind the current date. I always check the stats when I do. The average number is slowly rising—no more zeroes, some ones, but more threes and fours and fives and sixes. Sometimes there’s a surprisingly large number, like 150. I have no idea how that happens. It’s fun to watch the numbers increase.

           I usually have a small bowl of pretzels for breakfast with two cups of water before I have my miso soup with tofu. This morning, I finished off a large container of pretzels. I practice replacing items I regularly use when I start using the last one. I have been completely reliable. I went to get a new jar. There wasn’t one. This was the second time I found myself completely out of something, having forgotten to order it when I opened that last. My short-term memory is slipping. I thought of how to compensate for this lack. I will set the empty container near my computer and not throw it out until I have placed the next order.

        At 10 am, Judy arrived, as we had arranged. She watched the recording of my Zoom presentation to the Step-Up group. Judy said I didn’t look like a daft, hyper lady, just animated. She had questions about the process. Her questions made it clear that I hadn’t explained a step clearly enough. I have to do more demonstrating before I can expect someone to do it on their own. To experiment with Phase I, she wrote Hail, Guardian. She asked how the student would know to keep ai together to represent the long a.  If I’m working with a student who doesn’t know, I will tell them. More likely, I’m writing the transcription while I pull the sounds out of them, so they will see it modeled and not have to ‘know’ it.  

         E, the adolescent, canceled again for today. I finally asked him if he would like to stop our sessions. He canceled three weeks in a row. What’s going on? He finally said that he wanted to continue the sessions, but Thursdays have been busy. Later in the day, I also got a cancelation for A. His older brother broke his arm, and his mom had to take him to the doctor.