Thursday, June 11, 2020

   I called Shivani. She had heard my message about my dream about Sidney. I dreamt that I was taking care of him and was doing a lousy job.  He had to ask me to feed him and change his diaper. He remained calm and accepting despite my lousy job.  Shivani laughed and said he was really like that. As we talked, he pulled the covers off her and told her he needed his diaper changed. He is an unusually lovely, easy child.  Shivani is an unusually lovely, relaxed parent.  She told me that she had received the scrapbook which her mother put together for Mike many years ago.  It had family pictures from previous generations and immigrant documents, marriage certificates, and birth certificates.  It is incredible. 

    There was a light sprinkle the whole time I walked this morning. Driveway yoga was going to be out. I called Yvette and proposed doing the driveway yoga in my house. We could move some of the furniture and fit in eight mats and provide a safe space.  When Elsa and I got home, Yvette and Scott were coming up the driveway to set up in my house. They quickly turned around and walked out again. Izzy, one of her three dogs, set up a howl because she could hear Yvette’s voice. She can cry nonstop. She sounds like a baby. One day I heard her crying and was sure it was a baby. Amazing. In response to her crying, Yvette realized using my house was undoable. So, she set up downstairs in her house. We got six people in. 

    I did some work on the article. At 10:30, I had a session with D.  He remembered the multiplication facts we had been working on.  He was able to repeat them quickly. I added a new one. However, when I asked him to remember that one, he couldn’t. This fellow also has a devil of a time remembering procedures—every time, I have to remind him of the steps he has to go through. 

    I told him to recall my voice, saying the multiplication fact. Then, press the save button, his nose, and send the information down to long-term memory.  He didn’t remember to press the save button, but he did remember which way to move his finger on the side of his head; he moved it in a clockwise direction. When he followed the procedure I taught him, he was able to recall the fact. 

    When we worked on the sequencing activity, he did reasonably well but not perfectly. His speed was delayed.   I’m going to wait until that response is up to speed before I layer on the next activity.

    We worked on reading for the rest of the session. D. had trouble discerning the difference between cars and carts again. Problems with word recognition show up when he’s tired. He was yawning a lot.  He said he went to bed and asleep at 9 pm and got up around 7.  I have no idea was he was so tired. We were only able to cover one paragraph. Again, there were errors in word recognition and comprehension. 

    When I asked him to visualize a word for the purpose of recognition, he couldn’t do it. He said he could see it in his mind, but he couldn’t recall the word. When I wrote the word and showed it to him, he was able to recognize it immediately. So why is that? There has to be a difference in how we perceive what we see with our eyes, what we recall, and what we imagine. If not, there would be no way to tell the difference between the three. There would be no way for us to know if we are actually seeing something, remembering it, or just imagining it. That would be crazy-making. I assume that what we perceive with our senses is the strongest impression. We have to learn to recognize the rest.

    When I finished my tutoring session, I worked on the article today. I was running it through Grammarly when I became so tired that I needed to sleep. I went down for my midday nap.  I don’t know how I’m ever going to be able to go back to tutoring at school. By 11 or 12, I need to go down for a two-hour nap.  

    Dorothy called as I was beginning to surface, but I was still too tired to answer. I got up to go to the bathroom and lay back down, intending to sleep longer. I was wide awake a short time later and got up to call Dorothy. We talked a little about her ex-husband, who is having a tough time. She also complained about being bored by her confinement due to the Covid virus. Dorothy has always been good at entertaining herself. I’m the one who had problems with it. However, this confinement has pushed her to the end of her tolerance for it.  I am lucky. I have face-to-face contact with people here. I see Yvette, Josh, and their friends fairly regularly, even if it’s just to say hello in the driveway. I participate in Yvette’s driveway yoga class with several other people.  Also, my house is open to nature.  I’m not confined to my house. 

    When I got up, I finished editing my article and sent it out to Dorothy and Shivani. Scott texted me while I was on the phone with Judy saying there was a response to Craig’s List posting of my Prius. Amazing. Scott also volunteered to post the ad for the car and for a stationary bike that Mike had.  I am very grateful for his help.  This relieves me of a stressful situation. The guy wanted to come over today to see the car. Scott had plans of meeting with him a block away from my house to be on the safe side. I would never have thought of that.  He told me to get all my stuff out of the car and locate the title.   Those two chores were easy. I thought I might do some cleaning of the inside of the car too.

    Yvette and Josh had their 15th wedding anniversary party tonight. It was a small group of ten people; I wasn’t going to have to travel far.  

    I spent the afternoon attending to the car. First, I took out the plastic floor mats. They hadn’t been cleaned in years. It was no big deal. Once I had them out, I ran the garden hose on the jet-setting over them. Perfect! Then I went to do some vacuuming. First, I had to have Yvette move her car to get the Prius closer to the house.  I had never used the attachments on the Shark, which Yvette bought for us before we moved here permanently and brought our Rainbow with us. I always used my Rainbow. The suction on that one is fantastic- it was fantastic.  I only realized after I struggled with the attachment for the Shark for a while that I hadn’t understood how the machine worked to have use of a longer hose. Also, I couldn’t get one of the attachments off the machine. Scott came up to run something under a hose, and he got it off. There was no special release button. It just required brute force, something I’m a little short of these days. 

    I went into the house to shower to get ready for the party. Yvette’s friend Elise, who trained in a French cooking school to become a professional chief, prepared heavy pupus. The food was delicious, and the company was great. This was the best group ever. We all fit around a large round table out in front of the house. Then it started to rain, and we moved inside. We all fit easily into Yvette and Josh’s house. We had gathered there because Izzy made it clear that doing it upstairs in my house would be impossible.

    We played a social game called Two Truths and a Lie. I went first. I had prepared a list. My lie was easy to find. Then Steve went. He told three long, long stories. Others followed his example.  The stories were great, and we were all listening to the same person. I guess I’ve never been to a party with people I don’t know well where a game is used to connect people.

    After the game came the dancing.  Not everyone danced.  I managed to get up and do some. I think some of the people were amazed that I could still do as much as I did.  

    I had had a little beer with the pupus.  A little means one-third of a juice class. Does anyone remember juice glasses?  They are the size of two shots glasses. Small.  I got a buzz off that.  I like the taste of beer, but I get hit fast and hard by liquor.  If I have too much, like a full juice glass, I wind up with a mild hangover the next day.

    When I was ready to go back upstairs to my quarters, B. walked me up to make sure I arrived safely. Besides my having a buzz, it gets very, very dark at night here.  When I got home, I watched a little bit of Bosch before I went to bed.

  

Wednesday, June 10, 2020

 Boy, did I have a bad night!  I felt that I made the wrong decision about the car. I was motivated by a false sense of desperation. I believe the dealer took advantage of me too.  It wouldn’t be so bad if I hadn’t gone to the Ford dealership and seen a functional ohana. That GM valued his employee and his customers. The poor guy I dealt with is desperate to get for himself.  Too bad for him. Not a great way to live. I feel like I’ve committed to a bad marriage.

    I am more upset by this than Mike’s death.  In the case of Mike’s death, I was always true to myself and him.  Had I let the nurse at the dialysis center bully me into not taking him to the emergency room, then I would have been in an entirely different situation.  While I have some questions if I did the best by him, it’s not to the point where I am drowning in regret as I am now.  I did this to myself. I had options and couldn’t see them.  Josh and I could have shared the car for six months until the Ford Fusion 2021 came in. This is the cause of my pain.  I did not listen to myself.  I had thought the car was a 2020. Who has a 2019 still on their lot?  I could have stopped the process the moment I heard it was 2019 as I was signing the paperwork. I could have brought the whole process to a halt then and there.  It is that I regret; it is that betrayal of my better instincts that I grieve. 

    When I got up at 6, I was dizzy. I headed back to bed. When I got up at 8, I was in better shape. I still didn’t plan on doing one of my longer walks. Instead, I was going to head to the end of the block and come right back. However, I felt fine when I got to that point and decided to go up the hill.  My legs did just fine.  I went up to the first fire hydrant so I could see how the new house was progressing. I passed another property that has had a lot of work done on it. 

    A rock wall had been put up at the base of the property. I always associated rock walls with New England. Because of the melting glaciers flowed over that land, the land up there is very rocky. Farmers pile up rocks to mark the borders of their property.  New English rock walls look very different from Hawaiian rock walls. The New England ones are just a pile of rocks. The ones in Hawaii have a flat side. The new England rocks were tumbled and don’t have a flat side. The Hawaiian rocks were laid down by lava flow and were smoothed by the lava flowing over them. I would imagine the Hawaiian rock walls are more difficult to build, requiring more skill. The land surrounding the new house had been sculpted, and the house had sides and a roof on it. The workmen were doing work inside the house.

    When I got home,  I set up Elsa’s food to absorb the hot water before I served it to create a gravy. I decided to check out the remaining hibiscus with blister mites.  I pulled off any leaves that were infected.  I remember the guy at Farm and Garden telling me I could pick off the leaves. I’m not sure if picking off the leaves a substitute for cutting the shrub back and treating the plant with some toxic chemicals.  I will have to check with Margo.

    When I came back in, I realized that poor Elsa had been waiting for her food to be served for quite some while.  Once I fed her, I sat down to work on the computer. Elsa sat at my feet and scratched.  Dr. Marty claims that his food will relieve skin problems, but this is not my experience. Since I have taken her off the half and half mix of Science Diet and Dr. Marty’s and put her on all Dr. Marty’s, her skin has gotten worse. She is licking herself raw.  I am still giving her the medication or giving it to her again.  I’ll wait a little bit longer before I start with Science Diet again. The ingredients do look terrible. The first ingredient is cornstarch, the second hydrolyzed chicken, and from there on, it is al

 

Tuesday, June 9, 2020

I got up shortly after 5:30.  I wanted to complete my walk and be home in time for Yvette's driveway yoga. At the end of class, the students broke out in hugs. When a student offered Yvette one, she bowed out gracefully.

When I went to the kitchen, the roach I had stomped on, and left was gone. Wow! I was impressed.  Those ants did a job on it. 

When I swept the kitchen floor, I found the roach corpse at the edge of the refrigerator. Okay, the ants may not have eaten the whole thing, but how did they move it six inches? The ants weren't interested in what was left of the roach. The corpse was all mine. 

     I called Dorothy and asked if I could complain.  She listens to a lot of complaints from her ex-husband. I figured she would be an expert on listening. I complained about my car purchase. She assured me that everyone walks away from that situation, feeling they could have done better. I've heard people say they need several showers to wash the experience off. 

      I was exhausted. I feel bad about the car deal. I was really shocked when I realized I was buying a 2019. Has that car been sitting idly in the lot for all this time? That wears down the batteries, all three of them. 

    When I woke up from a long nap, I called Progressive to check on the car insurance. I've been meaning to do this for a while and have been putting it off. The last time I called them, they told me that my rates would drop in November when my probation time expired after many accidents.  It would up that the monthly charge on the ten-year-old Ford is higher than on my brand new Kia. That doesn't make a lick of sense. The customer service agent kept saying they just put in the VIN number, and it comes up automatically. They have no way of explaining the difference.  I kept saying that there has to be some way of explaining the charge. They know nothing. It reminds me of what Adam went through with the insurance company. 

    Right before Adam went on my insurance so he could use Mike's car to Uber, he had a car accident.  With the car turned off, he was parked when someone backed into his at 40 miles an hour, totaling his brand-new car.  When Progressive put in the VIN number, it was reported that Adam was responsible for the accident. The police report, the other driver, and her insurance company all understood that t was 100%  her problem.  Progressive was a rock wall. Sorry, that's what the computer reported when they put in the VIN number. Adam beat his head against the wall.  He finally got satisfaction when he told them his father was a personal injury lawyer.  Given the information I got today, I wonder. It may be time to change insurance companies.  There are a lot of changes that have to happen.

    After that, I called Kea. Kingston was asleep.  I told her I was on the lookout for people to work with. She told me her sister had a five-year-old, and she was concerned she wasn't reading yet. OMG! Concerned that her five-year-old wasn't reading yet. I'm with Waldorf: don't teach word recognition until seven, work on language skills in the meantime. My nephew, David, went to Waldorf.  I observed a pre-school class. It was a treat. David would come home and retell the stories he heard in his pre-school class  His retelling wasn't as well organized as the original story. It was a kick listening to his version, but he went on for a good five minutes. Most kids don't have well-developed language skills. If parents want their children to progress, that's what they should work on.  

    I finally realized that I could have waited six months for the Ford Fusion to come in.  Josh has been driving my car.  We could have worked something out.  He could have driven it to work, and someone could have driven me down later in the day to pick it up. Then someone could have picked Josh up from work at the end of the day.  Realizing how most of this was my fault because I didn't take care of myself has made me feel somewhat better. 

    I'm as sure as I can be that I didn't get a good deal. I spent full price for a 2019. Possibly the same price I would have paid for a 2021 Ford in six months. I'm actually thinking I might trade this car in and buy the Fusion in six months. I may at least find out how I might do.  The loss will probably be somewhat more than I would have paid for a car rental. A hell of a lot more if I had just used Mike's Ford and worked out a deal with Josh. Oh, well. 

    What makes me unhappy about the deal is the folks at Kia. There's a soullessness about the place. That wouldn't be so bad if I didn't meet the folks at Orchid Ford. There is love there, love of their work because they see it as a service as well as a business and love of their fellow employees.  

    Yvette was having a fifteenth wedding anniversary party for her and Josh. She was going to have the party in the yard in front of her house. She was going to get a tent if it rained.  She had only invited ten people. Ridiculous, I thought; just have it in my house.  There have been no cases of Covid on this island in several days. I hugged people today.   We can move furniture around and have everyone sitting in the front living room, no problem. It's a wide-open space with hallway space on either side. We can have plenty of room between people.  We can open every window and put on every fan. That should reduce the viral load, assuming there is any chance that someone is a secret carrier. We can also use the driveway for a dance area, assuming it isn't raining.  

    While I hadn't heard from Yvette yet,  I did hear from B. He called today from Costco to ask me if I needed anything. In the meantime, he told me he had heard of the change of plans for the party and was planning to put up the colored lights among the trees in the front of my house. This will be a perfect setting. When Yvette got home, she stopped by when she got home to check if I was really okay with having guests in the house. Wasn't I concerned about contamination? First off, I have stopped being overly concerned, whether I should be or not. Second, I think we can create enough space and moving air in the house to make it safe even if it isn't.

    The 3rd-grade teacher I'm working with called to tell me that the mother of the boy I'm working with told her she doesn't have to work with her son anymore; she thinks I'm doing a fantastic job. 

    I'm suffering from too little to do.  I want to do more tutoring. I'm starting to tell everyone I know that I'm looking for work.  I was inspired to be more out there for myself from Judy's son Matt's example.  He enters his work in competitions and sells himself. I'm willing to work for nothing or  $1. But if someone asks my fee, it's $60 an hour.  The idea that Yvette gets $70 an hour for massage and teachers get $25 drives me nuts. Yvette is a fantastic massage therapist; she deserves every cent she gets. But this is a standard fee for all massage therapists, whether they're good or not. 

Monday, June 8, 2020

    I ignored the alarm at 5:30 and got up at 6. Elsa showed reluctance to go out at this time too. If she is really uncomfortable with a two-mile walk or walking altogether, I don't want to force her. I got the harness on her and went out. First, I tried to call my friend Jean in Arizona. This is the second day I haven't gotten an answer. I asked her to text me to tell me what was going on. She said she was tired from the chemo and not up to a telephone conversation. Then I called my hanai sister, Jean, in Princeton. She said I always call her in the middle of her workday. She feels she has to keep going and get everything done before she's too pooped.   

    At home, I fed Elsa and mediated after I called Ford Motors and left a message for them to call me back; I wanted some information on what cars they have for sale. I just wanted to check it out. Besides the price, yikes! I don't like the color of the car at Kia. I see it as black, but the dealer assures me it is a dark, dark, dark blue, called Gravity Blue. It occurred to me that if I wind up being very unhappy with the color, I can have the car repainted. One of my concerns about color is, does it trap heat? Cars get hot enough here with the sun beating down on them.

    I still have to check what the features are on the cheaper car versus the more expensive one. If the safety features are only on the more expensive one, that's the one I want, particularly as I get older and more dimwitted.

    I went out to pull the blister mite-infected leaves off the hibiscus. I had B. pull out the nearby shrub, which was badly infected, by attaching one end of a rope to it and the other end to his truck. The gardeners will take the uprooted plant to green waste. Yesterday, I cut the infected leaves off this plant. I don't want those going into the green waste because I'm afraid they will infect other plants. I put them in a garbage bag and will have them go out with the trash on Wednesday. 

    When I got inside, I found Elsa had pooped on the wee-wee pad I had laid down in the shower the other. Fantastic! The pad had been sitting on my shower floor for a week. The first day I put it down, I followed her out the shower door into the yard and caught her pee on the pad. She's been walking over it to get out the back door since then, ignoring it. Apparently, she knew what it was for.

    I had a Zoom tutoring session at 10:30. I made several phone calls. I called the vet to schedule an appointment for Elsa's dental treatment. It will be sometime in August. They are only doing that service on Thursdays for the time being unless it's an emergency. Next, I called Sears. Yes, my maintenance check-up was due, had been in April. I got appointments in July. I called the dentist to make an appointment. They've been up and running for a while but didn't let me know. I had a cleaning appointment just after the shutdown starter, which was canceled. 

    D., my tutoring student, did well remembering his multiplication facts and the before and after exercise. If he does as well on Thursday, I will start making modifications. I will add one or two multiplication facts and change the before/after exercise with the alphabet. He will still see them written out; he won't have to recall the letters from memory.

    His reading comprehension continues to be excellent, but his word recognition was not as good as it was last week. He read cars as carts, etc. I attribute it to his being tired. I have been told that his mother allows him to play Fortnite forever and ever. That would make me brain dead. 

    He encountered a problem with the word hard. Once he had identified the vowel, I put consonants before it—bar, car. I asked him to picture the c-a-r word in his head, just picturing the letters. He said he could see the word, but not he didn't recognize it. Then I wrote the word on a piece of paper and held it up to the camera. No problem. Why was he able to recognize it when he saw it on paper and not when he saw it in his mind? Another problem to be solved.

    After I was finished there, I headed out to the Ford Dealership to see what they had to offer me. The salesman was a complete joy to work with. I got more information from him than I had been getting from the other dealers. He didn't have a car for me. There were no plug-ins/hybrids on the island, and the Oahu dealership would not ship one. They checked. I think I would have gotten a better deal with Ford than I did with Kia. From what I could tell, the 2020 Fusion features are the same as the 2019 Kia Niro, and it was cheaper, but it wouldn't be available for six months. The Fusion was rated 8 out of 10, the Niro a 7-8 out of 10.

    Not only was the Ford salesman a delight to work with, but it was also clear that the relationship between the general manager and his salesmen was good too. I turned around as I walked out to tell the salesman that I wanted to praise him to his boss. He said his boss had heard every word I said. The boss called from his office, confirming it. He appreciated his salesman's good work. He supported his interest in being a caring person, interested in helping people instead of just getting the best deal for the company. 

    There was a funny, awkward moment at Ford. I asked him how many Kilowatt-hours the Niro battery needed to fully charge the battery. He told me it took 24 kwh. I calculated 24 X .40=$9.60. Since the electric battery delivers 26 miles. That would have meant that every trip to town would have cost me $9.60. Wow! Then he realized he was giving me the kwh for charging the Niro EV, which is an all-electric and runs 250 miles on one charge. That's quite a difference.

    After I left Ford, I drove right down to the Kia dealership to do the deed. I bought the car. I didn't feel great about it, but the deed was done. I thought I didn't have a choice. I needed a car, and it was the only plug-in hybrid on the island. I drove my Prius home while the salespeople from Kia drove the new car to my house. The Prius drove well until that last stretch on the Queen K. Going up Kaiminani, I had to drive on the shoulder and let cars pass me; I was doing 9 mph. Whatever, I made it. 

    Sometimes during the evening, I stomped on a good-sized roach in the kitchen. I figured I'd sweep in out in the morning. When I came back later, it was surrounded by ants. I love watching these babies do a cleanup job. I discovered where their nest was by watching them run back and forth. It's under my frig. I have a tiled floor. These ants went back and forth on the grout, not the tile. There were two columns. One set of ants went across a tile on the diagonal to get to their section of the grout. Amazing.   

Sunday, June 7, 2020

    I woke up around 5 but stayed in bed for another 45 minutes. Elsa and I were out of the house by six. I tried calling my friend Jean in Arizona.  No answer. This wouldn't be a chemo day, but she may be knocked out. Then I called Dorothy. 

    On our last call, she told me that Shivani had complained that she couldn't find a mask that fit her comfortably. Dorothy has been hand-making masks and thought she would offer to make Shivani one that would fit her. Dorothy said she was planning to take all sorts of measurements of Shivani's face or have Shivani take them.  She would be able to create a pattern using the measures.

    Dorothy told me that David, her son, and his girlfriend planned on stopping by today. She was concerned that she had no food in the house other than peanut butter and jelly.  I asked her if she had waffles. She did and thought of all the other things she had that would go with those waffles.  The plan was for them to sit on Dorothy's patio at a safe distance while they ate with their masks off. Although, as Dorothy pointed out, the two kids never go anyplace either. David only goes out to do the food shopping. His girlfriend is a graduate student at Princeton University in Neuroscience and works from home. The likelihood of them carrying the virus is slim at this point.

    I got a message from my friend Carol in Ohio this morning. She wanted to know the type of dialysis Mike was planning to get when it became clear that a transplant wasn't in his immediate future.  When I did call, she told me she found the name on the Internet.  She suspects kidney problems because her lower limbs are swollen.  I remember Mike had to get shoes two sizes larger at the end. 

    I hope I was enough support for Mike during his time in the hospital.  I didn't get overly worked up because I assumed all this was a temporary glitch, and he would be all right with the transplant. 

    Besides talking about ailments, I told Carol that I was feeling somewhat depressed. I assumed it was because of my procrastination on the article and lack of involvement with students, but I think it may be something else.  I now believe that we are coming out of the shutdown; I am feeling more anxious. Carol told me she is hearing this from a lot of people.

    Many years ago, a friend told me a story of a man she met in France.  He had been a French national of European heritage who lived and worked in Algeria during its struggle to be independent of France. There was a lot of hostility between French nationals and Algerians, as you can imagine.  This man rode a bus every morning to work that took him through an all-Algerian neighborhood.  One day he missed the bus and had to walk to work. He was putting his life at risk. He knew if he ran into someone who wanted to kill him, he would be a dead man. No one would help him.  He made it through to the other side that day without consequence. Even though he did run into people, no one bothered him. The interesting twist to this story is that it was only once he returned to France that his nightmares started. He hadn't had them while he was in Algeria. Interesting. Post-traumatic shock is really that. It only occurs after the stressful situation is over, even if that situation lasts years. 

    Now we are coming out of the shutdown, the most substantial part of the stress is over. We can start going to stores again, church again, yoga again. I can even get a haircut soon. (A note here: My haircut still looks fantastic. This is due to Randee Jennings of Salon Muse in Kailua Kona, Hi. She gave me such a good haircut; it continues to look good after three months. Amazing!)  The crisis is over; time to have a post-traumatic shock.  But besides, this situation is still ambiguous. Is there any continuing danger?  Do we have to continue being so careful? We may never know. 

    I do know that many people believed that the precautions taken weren't good.  Basically, let the elderly and the sick die; save the economy for the living. They saw it as a choice between saving lives and the economy.  If that was a clear-cut choice, I would agree, and I'm one of the elderly. However, there is a third option: had we not taken precautions, it might have meant a significant loss of life, which would have affected the economy negatively.  In other words, it would have been bad on both counts. We will never know for sure.  It seems now that the strains of the virus are weakening. It might be because we starved them or because they are outliving their life span. We will never know that either. I come back to this: I thank God that I wasn't in a position to decide how to respond to this situation. 

    When I got home from my walk, I fed Elsa and mediated for thirty minutes. I wish I had the discipline to do that more regularly instead of turning to FreeCell, ruining my hands and wrists, or napping.  

    Then the next thing I did was get on my vibrating platform.  I bought it while living in Ohio shortly before my left inner thigh muscles were damaged by Mike. I didn't dare use the machine. That muscle hurt while driving on a major highway. I felt every bump in the road.  I got on today partially because it's supposed to be good for my body and partly because I thought it might help my mental state.

    Heather, one of the Bikram yoga teachers, had heard that in one of the war-torn countries, they were putting people on vibrating machines to help them overcome their stress.  They had noticed that children and animals shook after life-threatening incidents, but adults didn't.  They thought it might be possible that the shaking was literally a way of 'shaking it off.'  

    I set my vibrating platform on high and went for it.  My inner thigh muscle doesn't complain nowadays.  I worked on straightening my right leg completely to bring my left hip forward.  When I did that successfully, I felt the vibration as a consistent frequency through my whole body. I thought, "Wow!" My best guess is that I will feel the vibration the same throughout my body when my spine is straight.  I felt fine when I got off after a few minutes. I'm not sure if my state of mind is improved.

    Then I washed Elsa. Boy, she hates this. I'm inclined to avoid it because of her reaction. I know her skin feels better when I do it regularly. It should be done at least every two weeks. The breeder told me she washed her dogs once a week. 

    I got ready to go to church.  I planned to take the Prius rather than the Ford. I discovered that while the hybrid battery doesn't hold a charge, it does take one. I had enough to make it up the hill at the end of the street to the intersection. From there was downhill.  I kept tapping the brakes to charge the battery.  I made it most of the way down Queen K at a reasonable speed.  As I approached Makala, I could feel the car start to slow down and pull back.  I tapped the brakes as I approached the intersection and regained power. I made it safely to church without a hitch. 

    Again, I arrived a bit late. Masks and hand cleansing were required before we entered the church. The original thought on their part was that we would have to use a hand sanitizer.  A genius member of the church set up two utility sinks with garden hoses so we could use old-fashioned soap and water.  

    The church was fuller today than it was last week. Next week, they will have to start using the chairs set up on the outdoor lanais.  I couldn't find Judy or Paulette. They usually come to this mass. I wondered if they were home taking care of Leon and Luke while Jazzy delivered the baby.  Her due date is between June 6h and the 10th.  Any moment now.

    The lady who had forgotten to put on her mask while serving as a eucharist minister last week was there again. This week she had her mask on but moved so slowly that she was shuffling along long after the other sections had finished being served.  We were all standing there waiting for her to finish when Fr. Lio said," Everyone, sit down." She still had five more people to serve. It was funny. The poor woman! I suspect that her senses are dulled by medications. She's doing the best she can.

    I called Judy as I left the church. No answer. I called Paulette next. She told me they were going to the 1pm mass because Fr. Lio asked her to cantor the mass. Judy was still in bed. 

    I made it home without a hitch. This is kind of fun.  I make sure I have reading material with me if the car does die, and I need to wait for a tow. 

    Judy called while I was washing Elsa.  No, I did not answer the phone.  Judy called again when I was through.  We spoke at length about this and that.  I told her I had heard something on NPR on my way home that surprised me. It was about the sacking of Rome. I had always thought these tribes came from the north to attack Rome and brought it to its knees.  It winds up that there was also a substantial population of Goths living in Rome, but they were considered subhuman and treated like dirt. If a Goth was successful in Rome culture, it was considered a fluke.  Eventually, this population rose up against Rome and attacked from the inside. There was one man in particular who became a leader of this uprising. 

    Judy had a lot of information on the topic. She told me that the Roman army became manned by the Goths. The Romans considered themselves too good for that type of labor and risk. You can only treat people you're dependent on badly for so long when they will turn around and bite you. Surprise! 

    I just finished a book about the theories of Karl Marx. He argues that the underclass, in the instance of his writing, the working class, which creates the material goods which finance the wealthy, will eventually rebel and overthrow the wealthy.  Peter Singer, who wrote the Very Short Introduction to Marx, claimed that Marx's theory that this would happen in the wealthy developed countries rather than the poor underdeveloped countries wound up being wrong. But wasn't Rome a wealthy, developed city-state?  I think we are living in interesting times. Poor us! 

    Judy spoke at great length about Roman history. She said there were twenty emperors in twenty years. Things were falling apart at the top as well as the bottom.  She told me that Mike knew a great deal about Roman history. I knew he was a history buff, but he didn't share a lot of his information with me. I'm not sure why. No, I didn't like him lecturing me; but I would have enjoyed it when he shared something that he found exciting. Quite different. Unfortunately, he was more comfortable with the teacher mode. It felt controlling. I wasn't comfortable with that. On the other hand, I had absolutely no compunction about babbling on about something I found interesting or exciting. 

I must say, my generation has had the easiest time ever known to man. Most people I knew had roofs over their heads and food to eat. My family was middle class- not rich but satisfactory. Also, right after the war, the middle class flourished. It wasn't just a few lucky people. It was most of the middle class. Besides financial opportunities, we had education and medicine.  

         Penicillin was released for public use in the summer of 1945. How do I know this? My sister, born on June 13, 1945, developed blood poisoning due to an ear infection. Her life was saved by penicillin, which wouldn't have been available a month sooner. Where was all the penicillin? On the battlefronts. It was there for the military, not for civilians. 

    Besides the material stability in my lifetime, my generation also had the benefits of cohesive communities. My generation started the rebellion against conformity.  We had some struggles against social rigidity, but it was loosening in my lifetime. My family lived in one of the original housing projects in the Bronx in NYC. We knew most of the people in our building, or at least many. I once snuck across a major intersection that had no light against my mother's specific instructions. One of our neighbors happened to be looking out her window and saw me.  She ratted me out. I doubt that would happen today.  Of course, I am white.  I don't think that all citizens of the USA were as blessed as I was.

    I took a nap after I got home. Escape from reality or tiredness because of a somewhat busy morning?  When I got up, I dealt with the hibiscus B. uprooted by tying a rope around the plant, which was then attached to the towing hook on his truck. The plant was suffering badly from blister mites.  I had cut it back once before and treated it as well as the neighboring hibiscus. I took a picture of the plant's trunk and showed it to Margo, our resident plant expert. She told me then to pull it out. I didn't, and it came back beautifully, but the mites came back better than ever. It was time for this poor plant to go.

       The uprooted plant was lying in the driveway. The gardener was coming on the 10th. He could haul away whatever is left, but I don't want the infected leaves to go into the green waste. I'm concerned that they will infect some other plants. I cut off the infected branches, put them in a garbage bag, and put them in the trash rather than the green waste. It wasn't as big a deal as I thought it would be. It is the outer leaves that are most infected.  I just had to cut them off. I hope my reading of the situation is correct.

    While I was working, it was threatening rain again.  The was a light drizzle, but it never turned into a total downpour. But when I looked outside later, I saw the promised rain had arrived.  The ground was wet. 

    I sat and played FreeCell and listened to classical music on NPR.  I finally worked on the article. I actually got a fair amount done. I was quite pleased with myself.  I think it was Jean Mabry who said, "Just say what you want to say." Great idea, but it had resulted in an unreadable book with too many technical details to hold the attention of the uninitiated, and even then, it was too dense.

    I went to do the before-dinner walk with Elsa. She developed a new trick. When I call her to come to the door to put her harness on, she doesn't come. She sits down in the hallway in the kitchen, looking at me.  I call her. Good luck! I have been walking out the door, shutting it, and saying, "Goodbye, Elsa." Then she comes running; I was able to get the harness on her. Tonight, when  I made my fake departure, she came running to the door. When I opened the door, she ran back to the kitchen. I did my 1,000 step walk without her, holding her harness and leash in my hand. I was expecting to run into someone who would ask me where she was, but no.  I don't think she's too smart for her own good, but she may be too smart for mine.

    When I got back from my walk, I expected to have to walk through the house looking for her evening business. She came to the door. I put her harness on, and we walked out to the driveway. She made a huge pee then.  I felt confident that she hadn't done anything in the house. We went back inside, and I fed her. She's right that I should leave a little earlier for our walk.  I go whenever I want instead of holding to a strict schedule. 

    As I sat down for dinner, B. called.  He said his brother in California had a heart attack. At first, I didn't understand what he was saying. His father is in the hospital with a stroke. I thought it might be like him, but it didn't sound like he said, "Dad." B. got a call from his father telling him about his brother's condition.  His brother is the head of his local fire department.  His co-workers were on him like white on rice. He was rushed to the hospital.  He got the best possible care someone could get. Why was B.'s dad, who was in the hospital, the one contacted when he was in the hospital recovering from a stroke? 

    B.'s dad is listed as the first emergency contact for all his kids.  He was contacted in the hospital, I assume, on his cell phone. Then it was up to him to contact his wife and his other kids to let them know about his son. Paul, B.'s dad, is not allowed any visitors because of the virus shut down. It's a nightmare. I can't imagine what Paul's wife, Jo, must be going through. I know that she has spent time just sleeping in her car in the hospital parking lot. It would have been hell on me to not have been able to be by Mike's side during my waking hours.  It breaks my heart. All I have to offer is prayers.

Saturday, June 6, 2020

    I was up by 5:45 without an alarm.  Since I wanted to participate in Yvette's driveway-yoga class at 7. I walked quickly, so I was home in time. I fed Elsa, washed the dishes, and set up my yoga mat, chair, walker, and strap on the driveway.  I told Yvette to call me when she was ready to start.

    There were five students today besides me. Again, I learned something new. Yvette did some of the poses I remember the Iyengar yoga teacher doing in Columbus, Ohio. My God, she is so much better than that woman was. First off, she gives more specific information, which helps me make better use of the poses. Second, she encourages, welcomes my adaptations. Sometimes she makes suggestions.

    I called Kea to work with Kingston. I told him he could just read two pages.  He didn't hear me or didn't understand what I said because he sailed through three and a half pages. He had to stop because nature called.  Teachers should tell parents that if they just have their kids read the same material over and over again for ten minutes a day, that will satisfy the homework requirements for reading for poor readers.

    As I was getting off the phone with Kingston, Dorothy called. The Zoom feature I use enlarged the book's print on the text on my phone went wild. It became so large I couldn't delete it.  I tried to shut the phone down, but the size of the zoom screen made that impossible.  I couldn't receive calls or write any texts.  This was scary.  

    I called Damon on the house phone frantically. His is the only telephone number I know by heart. I got his voice mail. I told him about my problem and told him to call me on the house phone. The phone rang while I was in the shower.  I raced to get it and nearly slipped on the wet floor. I would have been lying there with a cracked skull.  That would have improved the day.

    I called Damon's number back immediately.  No answer again. I decided to call T-Mobile to see if I could get help. I was on the phone waiting for a while. Finally, I decided to hang up and call Damon again. Voice mail again.  

    I switched tactics.  There must be some way to force my iPhone to shut down. I looked it up on the Internet. The suggestions they made didn't work on the version of the phone I have.  Finally, 'Damon' called me back, at least I thought it was. It was August. Yay!  That kid saved my a-- --. He is amazing.  Not only is he there for me, but he knows so much. He is helping me with other things, particularly with downloading my phonemic awareness audio files on YouTube. 

    I spoke to Damon afterward to talk about car options. He told me to look into other cars, not just to make sure I'm getting the best deal. I'm not sure the guy is giving me the best deal. He is too anxious to get the car off his lot. My guess the impact of the virus shutdown has left him feeling rather anxious, as it has left everyone else.

    I was told if I leased it for two years, I would get $3,000 back. I wanted to put down the maximum amount allowed. My monthly payments would have been $85 a month. A quick calculation showed me that meant that I would save $1000 on the deal.  For anyone putting down less money, that deal would still be a moneymaker for the car company.  

    I think I'm going to go with the Kia if, for no other reason, this outfit got 4.5 stars out of 5 while other car dealerships didn't do as well. 

    I finished A Very Short Introduction on Marx tonight and started one on Hobbes. I had assumed that Peter Singer must be an expert on Marx. I couldn't imagine Oxford University Press commissioning someone who was not an expert on his subject to write about it.  Peter singer is a Utilitarian who teaches at Princeton University. He is a philosopher. His ethics are based on statistical odds rather than ethical leanings.  I think his concern is for the survival of the greatest number. He is definitely a moral man, invested in being his brother's keeper. He and his wife donate a large percentage of their income to Oxfam and perhaps other organizations of that ilk. He is, after all, an ethicist.  

    I love these little A Very Short Introduction books. I ordered several more Mike didn't have in his collection or had already given away, one on Hegel, Kant, Heidegger, Kierkegaard, Schopenhauer,  and Wittgenstein. I have thought that Mike would be thrilled with my interest in these philosophers. However, if we started discussing them, it would have been a serious threat to our marriage. Our approach to ideas was completely different. Many years ago, Mike said if he had been my boss, he would have fired me. This was because of my unconventional ways of doing things. I invent my own methods. I was never particularly upset about it. Lord knows why. I had some essential faith in his respect for me and for my life commitments. Shortly before he died, I reminded him of what he said. He said he was just afraid of chaos.  I represented an uncontrollable force. As I've mentioned before, he found the unexpected twists and turns in my thinking fun in the end.  He said I was endless entertaining. That's how I experience my mind as an endless source of entertainment and fulfillment. I find my mind my favorite toy. 

    It has been raining a lot of late, every day, several times a day.  It was pouring as Elsa and I headed out for a before-bed walk.  I just let her out the back door.  I had done 6,000 steps and yoga today. Good enough.  

 

Friday, June 5, 2020

    I had taken so many naps yesterday that sleeping for 8 hours was a challenge.  I woke up at 4 am and meditated. For better or for worse, I fell asleep.  I got up at 5:45. My toe felt much better. I put on my Crocs and headed out for one of my longer walks.  As we set out, there was a light rain, not even a drizzle, but as we continued, the rain came down harder.  I took a shortcut home before the cloud opened and let me know who was boss.

    I meditated when I got home. I must, must do this more regularly. Yes, I meditate as I lie in bed, but it’s not the same.  Sitting and meditating has a different effect. 

    I called Kea and then Elijah and Sariah. None of them answered their phones. Kea called me back within a few minutes.  Kingston was rocking this morning. We are rereading the same pages every day.  He did three and half of the five pages I have on my phone that Sariah sent me.  His word accuracy is good. Given that he is reading above grade level,  he should be fine next year. I could really stop working with him, but I think he should be reading Harry Potter by the end of the summer, even though he will be entering second grade. I can handle it if he doesn’t, but it seems a reasonable goal with this child.  Also, I have nothing else to do.  I  asked both of my 3rd-grade teachers if there are other children I can work with. No response. 

    I had D. at 10:30 am.  There was a minor glitch in the Zoom connection, but we dealt with it.  Today, he remembered one of the three multiplication facts I have been using as vehicles to get that memory brain up and functioning.  When I gave him 3x3, he said 3+6=9.  Close but no cigar.  But I consider 3 +6=9 good.  He remembered the 9 and the 3, and he did an automatic recall of an addition fact, which he wasn’t able to do before.  I’m looking for improvement in the process.

    We also worked on the before and after concept, which he needs.  I had the numbers 1 through 4 written and held them up for him to see on the Zoom screen.  What is the number before 2? What is the number after 2?  He did somewhat better with this today.  I started by having him lift his left arm and say, “before,” and then the right arm, and say, “after.”  He was able to use this strategy to help him remember which is before and which is after. Once he is secure with the numbers, I will change the image to the letters in alphabetic order and then finally to letters in a word.

    We then worked on reading Socks, and he knocked my socks off. His comprehension is dramatically improved. There were only a few words he read wrong and didn’t correct, or I had to ask if what he was saying made sense. This is a much, much harder book than the one we were reading together before.

    After we were finished, I drove down to Aloha Kia to look at what Sandor’s cousin had to offer.  The car looks great, but it’s in a very dark blue.  It’s the only color he has. I will have to make a choice by tomorrow if I want to hold on to the car.  He was telling me I could save money by leasing for two years and then paying it off. As I calculated the monthly leasing fee, it came to $1000 less.  If I pay it off, I will have peace of mind. Who knows if I will have money in two years to pay it off?  We’re in for a ride. 

    I finally realized that my Prius died because I hadn’t driven it enough for three months. That’s why both of the batteries in the car died at once. Of course, the car is also 13 years old, with 135,000 miles on it.  I have been thinking it was time to get a new car for a while. The Kia is a higher-end than I need, but I feel more secure buying it from someone who knew Mike. Mike did the eulogy at Allan’s grandmother’s funeral.  I loved Mike. I assume everyone else did too because he was loveable, besides admirable. God, I loved that man!

    I came home to nap.  The washing machine was running when I came in. The load that was going was Yvette’s. I had done a load this morning, washing my bed linens.  I had put them on the line before I left. By the time I got home, they were soaked by the rain.  I don’t think I will be using those sheets tonight.   

When Yvette came up to pick up her laundry, we talked about what’s going on in the world.    We talked about what we were comfortable doing or even somewhat uncomfortable doing to support the cause against police violence. Racial prejudice is clearly an issue, but so is unnecessary police violence.  Racial discrimination is a huge issue, which is difficult to overcome. However, we can change police department policies. Specific violent actions should be outlawed, making it clear to all police that there are limits to what they can do and expect to be exonerated. 

    A friend told me that when Dylan Roof was arrested, the police took him out to a Burger King because he was hungry. As lopsided as the police are in their behavior with black versus white perpetrators, I thought that was a little extreme. I checked it on Snopes. It said that a policeman went out to a burger King to buy him a hamburger.  Because of the nature of his crime, he couldn’t eat with the other prisoners. However, I do believe if it had been a young black man shooting up a white group, he wouldn’t have been in any shape to eat because of what the police would have done to him. 

    I have noticed that the Prius Battery holds a charge well enough for short trips.  I took it out and drove it up and down the street, pressing the brake regularly to help recharge the hybrid battery. I will drive it to town tomorrow.  I need to buy a gallon of gas anyway.  

    On the way home, I heard an African American US Senator say that he is often stopped while driving. He was once stopped because he put his indicator on late while changing lanes. When he spoke to his friends in the police department, he said this is a rouse used to allow the police to check the inside of the car and sniff around for drugs.  Driving while black.

Thursday, June 4, 2020

    Boy, did I not want to get out of bed this morning.  I could have stayed in bed all day and slept. But I got up around 6 to walk Elsa and get ready for Tuesday's driveway yoga with Yvette. When I went out to walk Elsa, the driveway was wet from recent rainfall, but it looked like it would be dry in time for class. However, Yvette never came to set up for class. I didn't know what was going on until a little later. There had just been a little break in the weather for my walk with Elsa. Driveway yoga was not going to work today.

    Elsa has started a new behavior. She doesn't come to me to have her leash put on when I call.  My response: I walk out the door and say, "Goodbye, Elsa." That brings her running, so she's in reach for me to put on the harness and leash. What is this about?

    Since Yvette's class on Saturday, I have been completely straightening my right leg as I walk without hurting the knee. It did complain a bit yesterday, briefly, but it's good to go now.  As I suspected, my body's right side is as much of a problem as the left. When I straightened that right leg thoroughly, the right side at my waist responded. It's not bad now. I wouldn't even notice it if it hadn't been those exact muscles that had me flat on my back for a while. Of course, as I straighten my right leg, my left leg behaves differently. This is good. Let's see where this goes.    

    After talking with Sandor and then Damon, I am excited about the possibility of a new car. I intend to get a plug-in/hybrid combo.  I don't need an electric car with a 400-mile range. It's something like 15 miles into town.  Rarely do I travel much beyond that. This means I will be able to run mostly on the electric motor.  I can charge it when I'm home during the day, which means drawing from my solar panels instead of the electric company. 

    I worked with K this morning. It was like pulling nails.  His mom said that he had been misbehaving over the last couple of days and wouldn't cooperate with her at all. He's perfecting passive-aggressive behavior to get his way.  Let me tell you, I was ready to throw in the towel this morning. He was getting on my last nerve. He spent more time delaying reading than he spent reading.

    I was feeling down this morning like I had nothing to do with my life.  Writing about my reading method is proving very hard. I feel suspended.  It would be an excellent time to meditate regularly. I did some of that yesterday. I just sat with the terrible feeling instead of running away from it.  That always helps. This morning, I used my Bissell floor washing vacuum cleaner to wash my kitchen floor. That made me feel better.  I need some interaction with the world outside of my mind. 

    At two pm promptly, Judy showed up in my driveway to take me to Toyota to pick up my sad car. She had said that she would contact me if she would be late. I ran to the bathroom, grabbed my purse and a mask, and headed out. I detailed my latest sagas: car, article writing. Judy had some great news. Her son Matthew, a composer, wrote a song with a lyricist from England that won some contest. There was other good news about Netflix considering one of his songs for one of their productions and some well-known producer interested in working with him. Matthew is incredible. 

    I had Judy drop me off at Island Naturals. I noticed I was out of apples. Toyota was only a block away. I stopped off at the showroom before I picked up my car. I've been there several times for car repair.  I have waited in the waiting room. Nonetheless, I was surprised when I entered the 'showroom' to find no cars. It was only the waiting room. Here in Hawaii, where the weather is always good, there is no need for an indoor showroom.

    I inquired about their electric cars. This fellow sat down with me and answered my questions. I had no need to see the car; I know what they look like. The base price for the plug/ hybrid is $28,000.  I didn't get information on the warranty.  I did ask about the possible trade-in value of my car. A 2007 is worth $3,000.  Since the car has over 130,000, that amount is cut in half. From that, the expense of repairing the car is taken off. Let's see $4,500 for the hybrid battery. Who knows how much for the air conditioner, replacing the latch on the trunk, and fixing the frontend bumper. I wound up owing them money.  I won't get much under any circumstances.

    Despite the problems with the battery, the drive home was trouble-free – until I got to just before the turn-off into my street.  I think it was at that point that the battery lost its charge. That was okay. The rest of the way was downhill to my driveway. I made a point of riding the brake, so the battery got recharged for my next excursion.

    Sandor got back to me about Mealiinani's cousin from the Kia Dealership.  There had been something wrong with the guy's phone.  Apparently, Mike gave the eulogy at his grandmother's funeral. I'm telling you Mike is still taking care of me and doing a great job of it.  Sandor assured me that his cousin would advise me where I could go if I didn't like the Kia. He also told me that I shouldn't buy the car immediately but lease it for a few months. For some reason I can't fathom, this would save me $12,000. I could pay it off without penalty. Wow!  Thank you for sharing. 

    I looked at the article on the reading method a little and took a nap. My words aren't even making any sense to me anymore. How can I expect them to make sense to someone else?  Both Dorothy and Judy have said I need to make a video to demonstrate the process.  To me, it seems so simple and obvious. Of course, I've been using it for 25 years.    

    My before-dinner walk was short. It wasn't actually raining. It was as if water was dripping off the trees after a rain, but we weren't under a tree. It was the open sky above us. 

 

Wednesday, June 3, 2020

    I'm stuck doing short walks because of my sore toe.  Soaking it last night in Epson Salts, white vinegar, and hot water did some good, but it still wasn't 100%.  

    I had to get my car down to Toyota to get it checked out. I had no trouble driving it there. It was a smooth ride all the way.  When I got there, I called Yvette to come to pick me up.  My guess was they would conclude the problem was with the hybrid battery. It would cost me $160 to get that information, but I would rather know for sure than just assume. 

    Yvette picked me up with all her windows wide open.  She is a very thoughtful person. As we drove home, I reminded her that this car situation had implications for Josh. Josh drives Mike's old car to work every morning. If I need the car, he will have to find some other form of transportation. She said they realized that immediately, and he started checking out cars for sale. However, I don't think I want to take over Mike's car. It is only a year younger than mine. While it has less mileage on it than mine does, it doesn't have a lot of life left either. I want a car that will take me through to the end of my life. I don't want to have to worry about finding another set of wheels in a few years. 

    Toyota called mid-afternoon to tell me the hybrid battery was indeed dead.  I called Damon immediately. He drives an electric car now. That's what I'm planning to buy. I looked up electric car sales in Kona. I called one company. They sold Subaru. He told me that he had an electric with a hybrid backup for $33,000. That's with $4,000 off for the end year sale. And then there is the rebate. All told, this car will cost me less than the Prius did thirteen years ago. This is particularly amazing since this is in Hawaii. Everything costs more here than on the mainland because it has to be shipped here. 

    Yvette came up and told me that the boyfriend of a friend of hers works at Toyota.  Also, one of the yoga students works for all the car sales companies in town. Then I called Sandor. He said his wife has a cousin who is the GM at the Kia sales department. I should have figured. His wife, Meaali'inani, is from an old Hawaiian family.  Cousins run in the hundreds. Later in the evening, Damon finally called back.  He looked up cars for me.  I don't need top of the line. I need one that will drive the 8 miles into town and back twice a day, once for Bikram and one for school when I finally go back to going places again.  As it winds up, it looks like the Kia Niro is my best bet. 

    The other day I bought some wee pads from Petco. A friend encouraged me to try them with Elsa.  She was almost three when I got her, and she was pad trained. The moment she came to my house, she promptly ignored them as an option.  I had pads around the house. Oh, how much better the outdoors was and, in a pinch, my carpets.  I understood my friend to say that the pads he was recommending were scented to attract dogs to do their business. When I check the specs on the bag, that wasn't the case at all. They were scented not to offend my nose. They offer a pack of 50 pads for a mere $45.  I don't think so.  I don't want her to use the pad so much as I want her to use the shower floor.  Since the pads he recommended weren't designed to attract her to do her business there, I looked for something cheaper.  There was a biodegradable package of 10 for $12.  Since the larger package would sit around until it disintegrated, there was no point in getting the cheaper option

    The idea was that I would put the pad in the shower, place her there, and encourage her to use it.  I put the pad down. She went to the shower door leading to the outside. She ran out the moment I opened the door and started peeing. I grabbed the pad and stuck it under here, soiling it.  I left that pad on the shower floor, hoping she would get the message.

    I did quite a bit of work on the article and thought, "There's no one who's ever going to get this from this article." I called Dorothy in despair.  I asked outright if she got what I was talking about. She didn't really, as far as I could make out.  This threw me deeper into despair.  If she, with her incredible knowledge of languages, she speaks something like six, and her interest in education, doesn't get what I'm saying, how can I expect anyone else to?  The feeling is no one is interested in the work.  I feel I have something of value here, and no one seems interested despite the success I have with it. It is hard on my nerves. Some of it is an ego problem, I'm not seen or valued, and some of it is a Cassandra problem. I know something that will help people, and no one will listen to me. 

    I called Judy. She said I have to remember that I have helped many, many people. I can assume that the work I am doing now will be commonplace at some point. The methods I use are just too obvious. Someone else will develop them in time. In the meantime, there's only the work I do with individual students to satisfy me.  That is going to have to be enough. 

    I must have taken three one-hour naps today. It was avoidance.

    I watched the conclusion of Five Days: the Train. While the beginning of the show was very satisfying, the end was not. At first, I didn't like it because I thought it was too complicated, but I decided it was because most of the characters wind up worse off, for one reason or another, at the end of the show than at the beginning—a downer. Now, I know why it only got three stars. 

Tuesday, June 2, 2020

    My right big toe was bothering me. It felt like it was uncomfortably rubbing against the inside edge of my right Croc.  I finally looked at it.  It was inflamed. I treated it with Tea Tree oil and soaked it in hot water with Epson Salts and vinegar.  I also resolved not to walk a lot until the inflammation was gone and stop wearing my Crocs, so the toe didn't continue to be abraded.  I put on a pair of Oofos slippers. Slippers is the word for flip-flops in Hawaii. 

    My morning walk was brief, just up and down my block. Besides the problem with my toe, the Oofos engaged a whole different set of muscles than my Crocs do. 

    I was home as Yvette was setting up her Tuesday driveway yoga class. She was expecting eight students; only five of those showed up, and I joined that group.  I was a few minutes late.  I had to feed Elsa. I left her inside the house to eat as I set up my mat and my chair, but I also left the door open.

    Yvette's three dogs are part of her yoga class. Yoga with dogs instead of goats.  The gate to the street is closed, which makes it safe for them. When Elsa was finished with breakfast, she joined us. She promptly visited each student to be petted. They all did so as they did their poses.  I must take pictures of her doing this. 

    My body responded both joyfully and stressfully to the stretches.  My core muscles loved it; my inner thigh and hip muscles felt the strain. However, I could see that I could do things I couldn't do before.  I have been straightening out my back, which has changed how my body works.  

    I did some work on the blog when I came inside.  The teacher I am working with called. After I shared a problem I am having with a student's mother, she told me she had issues with her too. She came to class during open school night and said to her," I have to get my son out of your class." The teacher said, "Why?" The mother said, "Have you looked at the color of your skin?" The teacher is white; this woman and her family are black. She assumed the teacher would not give her child the best she had because he was black. The teacher told her to speak to the principal. No changes were made. Besides the outrageousness of that request, there were no black teachers in that grade level.  While Hawaii is very multicolored, there are very few African Americans anywhere. Our diversity is from the Asian and Polynesian communities.  Whites, known as haoles here, are mostly from the mainland or from older families from England and Portugal. They were the first settlers on the island after the Polynesians found this little spot of land in the middle of the Pacific.

    Judy came over for a massage from Yvette. She came out looking like melted butter. She asked Yvette what method she used. She said she was trained in Hawaiian massage, but her work is eclectic.  I said it was "Yvette massage." She works by instinct, and those instincts are very, very good.

    I had spent part of the morning getting packages ready for mailing. An old necklace from my mother and a birthday present for Sam went to Karin; a picture of Mike and me went to Carol and John in Maryland. I sent off two packages to Shivani, one with the remaining wooden flowers from the craft kit and the scrapbook her mother had made for Mike many years ago.  It should be kept in the family.  There are old pictures and original documents from Shivani's grandparents and great-grandparents.

    The postal clerk complimented me on my improvised packaging.  Because two of the packages were under thirteen ounces, they went first class and were inexpensive.  The scrapbook is huge and cost quite a bit more.  I will be relieved to hear that it has arrived safely.

    I headed over to the old industrial area to go to Petco to pick up some items.  I decided to Stop by at JAWS and just have Tasha, Edwin's receptionist, reset my car monitor. She had just left, but Edwin did it for me.  He told me that his analysis showed there is something wrong with my hybrid battery. If this is the case, this car will have to be retired. Oh, boy.

    I drove over to Toyota immediately, right next door, to see if they could take a look. Their technology is more sophisticated. They didn't have a technician available. I had to make an appointment for 9 am tomorrow.  I texted Yvette to tell her about my situation and ask her if she could pick me up from Toyota and drive me home. 

    As I drove home, my car showed serious signs of failure.  I had heard some suspicious noises before, but this was a whole different order of seriousness.  I couldn't get my car to accelerate. After I stopped at a light, the car would slowly accelerate to thirteen miles an hour. After a little bit of time, it would get up to forty-five miles an hour. If I traveled long enough, it could get up to fifty miles an hour. It didn't look good.

    I thought of how much stress I'm under—the virus, the police violence, and resulting racial unrest, and now my car. Compared to the other two, my car is a trivial problem. The first two are life-changing for all of us. One has to wonder how this will all resolve.  I wished Mike were here to give me a comforting hug.  I got that he is upset that I have to face all this alone.  For a few minutes, I felt that way too. However, the Mike I am missing is the one before he got sick.  If he had survived pancreatitis, he would have been another burden, miserably unhappy with his limited life, and another stressor on me. He wouldn't have had much to offer me, and the situation would have only made him feel even worse. He would have been helpless, totally dependent on me. 

    When he was in the hospital, I considered a long recovery time. I was optimistic as long as he didn't sink into despair and anger either with himself or his situation. But I realized in retrospect that his chance of full recovery was close to zero. My poor baby.  He went through so much. He was so brave facing this terrible situation. 

    I stopped at Costco on my way home to pick up the collagen product Yvette recommended, which says is helping Josh with his knee and has improved her skin. I also picked up baguettes for her, blueberries, onions, Clorox 2, and another case of almond milk for me. I bought the chopped onion in the spice aisle because there's no point for me to buy a fresh onion. I don't use it enough.  As I walked to my car, I was wondering if I would make it out of the parking lot.  The car strains more on hills than on the flat ground, and I had a three-mile hill to climb to get home. Fortunately, I had a straight run at the exit on the hill out of the parking lot. Then it was downhill to Queen K, the major highway running parallel to the ocean and, therefore, flat roadway. I made the right turn onto Kaminani to make that three-mile climb.  I never got the speedometer above thirteen miles an hour. I signaled other cars to pass me.  But I made it home.

    When I got home, I listened to an NPR interview with Christian Cooper. What an amazing man. He is the one who confronted a woman in Central Park asking her to put her dog on a leash while videotaping her. She didn't want to be videotaped and threatened to tell the police that an African American man was threatening her.  I had assumed that she said this in a moment of panic and confusion. Yes, fed by bias but not a deliberate manipulation to get him to do something her way. I heard the video. Wow! Really. This is a clear threat on her part.  Since all he was doing was videotaping her while he was backing off from her advances, there is no question that she didn't feel in danger. She was just outraged that he would ask her to obey the law. How dare he! Really?  This is stunning. This woman's life is in ruin. Does she deserve this much punishment for literally threatening an African American man by threatening to call the police and telling them that she was being threatened? Holy cow!

         Like Christian Cooper, I agree that while she deserves punishment, she doesn't deserve what is currently happening to her, the loss of her job, and the death threats.  This is way beyond what she deserves.  I know a way out of her situation. She either has to move into a white supremacist group or reform and get on the speaking circuit explaining who she was and how this experience has transformed her. She can become a champion for human rights for African Americans. Does she have the brains and self-awareness to do this? We'll see, won't we? Either way, she does not deserve the worst of what may come her way any more than Christian deserved her treatment of him, or George Floyd deserved what he got. 

    Trump! However, frightening I have found him in the past, he is outdoing himself now. It's like he's taken lessons from Dylan Roof. He committed his deed, hoping to ignite a race war. Had he waited a few years, he wouldn't have had to sacrifice his own life to achieve his desired end; Trump would already have been in power. This is all very painful for me. 

    Yvette came up to get the baguettes I bought for her from Costco. I talked about my concerns about police violence, racial tension, and Trump's response to the situation.  I don't know which of the many emotions I am feeling dominate, fear, sadness, or anger?  I am grateful that I live in Hawaii; it's pretty peaceful here. People are demonstrating.  I am terrified of group activities and am thinking of joining in on the demonstrations against police violence.

    Here is a simple solution that would reduce the number of violent police acts: fire any police officer with more than, let's say, three convictions for inappropriate use of violence. This behavior costs the police forces across the nation a ton of money.  I believe these bad cops don't get fire because of the unions.  I propose that we start suiting the unions as well.  

    I am a strong advocate of unions.  I have a good understanding of what life was like for workers before the unions.  No, I don't want to go back to that. But that does not mean that I think everything unions do is right. Absolutely not. There is a large room in NYC filled with teachers who could not be allowed in the classrooms and can't be fired. They have to show up to this room every day and sit there for the hours that school is in session- and receive their full pay. What a waste! The unions also make it impossible to fire police officers that are not suited for the job and give everyone else in the profession a bad name. There has to be some reasonable criterion for getting these folks off the payroll and, in the case of the police officers, off the streets. 

    I vented to Yvette. We are on the same page, which is nice.  We both are the beneficiaries of white privilege. Yvette finds her position confusing because she is mixed race.  Her father's family is from the Dominican Republic.  Their skin is darker than a white person's because of their mixed racial heritage. Yvette's mother was white. 

    I have experienced something similar.  I come from a mixed marriage: my father came from an upper class German Jewish family and my mother from a German lower-middle-class Lutheran one. I was born right before the US entered WWII. These distinctions were important in those days.  I had encounters with Jewish people who were prejudice against Christians and Germans.  In that case, I made it plain that I was Christian and German.  Then there were Christians who were prejudiced against Jews. In that case, I identified with the Jews. People usually backed off when I confronted them, but in each case, it was because "I was different." No, not really. Prejudice like that doesn't make exceptions.  All I managed to do was get them to back off. 

    Talking to Yvette did help relieve some of my stress.  As a result, I was able to do quite a bit of work on my article on my reading method. After the Zoom meeting to discuss the article with Dorothy and Shivani, I was frozen for two days. I'm not quite sure why.  I got a little bit of work done in the intervening period, but not a lot.  Today, I actually enjoyed working on the project. 

    I continued watching "Five Days- The Train" after dinner. I love this show. It shares a structure to the movie "Crash.".  A single incident brings all these different lives together. It is also a murder mystery. I find it very engaging. I recognize many of the actors from other videos.  It is a very good crew.  It got only three stars. Not in my book.