Category Archives: R

Seattle

12 Saturday Aug 2017

Posted by in Food, R, Serenity

≈ 6 Comments

If I was going to post a picture of the past several days (which I am not), it would be of the little park on the corner of the street. Preferably with a lot of dogs in it. Over the past few days, I’ve spent enough time there that I’m starting to actually get to know some of the neighborhood dogs. Not quite by name yet, but maybe soon.

I’m also developing familiarity with the neighborhood Pokemon players. There’s a yellow team that I’m starting to feel a deep envy for — at least four players, who play together. Every morning or so, I take over the park’s gym, turning it blue, and before too long — sometimes within the hour — they’ve taken it back. It’s fun, but Team Blue could use a little more support. Also there are a ton of Pokemon raids available in Seattle and I’m not good enough, as a solo player, to win any except the easiest. But a team of four probably wins them all. I wish my brother and nephew were here or some of my friends from Florida — we’d be collecting legendary Pokemon right and left. But I don’t think I’m going to manage to convince my friend P or any of her housemates to start playing anytime soon. Maybe I should start working on the teenage boy who lives in the front apartment.

So, yeah, I’ve been parked in my friend P’s driveway for the past several days. They have been lovely days. R and I squeezed in a trip to Value Village, our favorite Seattle thrift shop, and a showing of Spiderman on his last day in the city, before I dropped him off at the train station and waved goodbye. I’m always sad to say good-bye to him. I love how independent and mature he is — it’s fantastic to have an almost entirely self-sufficient 21-year-old — but I do miss him. And saying good-bye with no idea of when I’ll see him again is always hard.

But I got over the pain pretty quick. The next day I did useful stuff, lots of it. Email and writing and laundry and cleaning and working on plans for a new screen door. Zelda walked through the old one, breaking the strings that created the tension that kept it up. I miss it already and I’m pretty sure that no substitute I come up with is going to work nearly as well, but it was pretty fragile for life with two dogs. B used to walk right under it. I’m not surprised that it broke, really, just hoping that I can create something that will let me get airflow through that door without being too inconvenient to live with.

Anyway, after my useful stuff, I went kayaking on Lake Washington with P and J. We saw a beaver! It was much smaller than I would have expected it to be, but the tail was unmistakeable. If my phone hadn’t been buried in a dry bag, I would have tried to take a picture, but we didn’t get close enough that it would have been more than a brown and black blur in the water on a phone photo, anyway. It was sort of thrilling, though, to see an animal that I’d never seen before in the midst of such an urban setting.

That evening, there were five of us for dinner. I’ve been cooking a fair amount, but nothing too exciting. We had summer quinoa bowls one night (greens, quinoa, corn, avocado, salmon, cilantro, with a dressing of sour cream, lime, and garlic) and autumn quinoa bowls another (greens, quinoa, roasted broccoli, baked sweet potato chunks with cinnamon and ginger, spicy roasted chick peas, chicken, with a dressing of thinned hummus with extra garlic). That night, though, we had tacos: I made spicy shredded chicken in the instant pot, which basically involved dumping a couple tablespoons of chili garlic sauce and some water on top of two chicken breasts, and pressure-cooking for 15 minutes on high. Yum. On my first couple bites, I thought it was too spicy, but it was great with avocado and mango salsa, and made for excellent leftovers. If there was any left, I’d be putting it in an omelette this morning.

My big accomplishment yesterday was putting curtains up in Serenity to separate the cab from the rest of the van. I’ve been thinking about doing it for months and my one regret — as it always seems to be with things like this! — is that I didn’t do it eons ago. I bought a Maytex Smart Curtains Ultimate Light Blocker Sheridan Window Panelin white at Fred Meyer and hung it sideways, so the 50″ side goes top to bottom. That way the dogs can still easily go under it to get to the seats and their bed under the seats. Also, I can push it to the front of the seats, so my back-of-the-seat storage doesn’t get impeded by the curtain when it’s closed. But wow, sleeping last night was so cozy. I’d sort of been vaguely aware of how much light coming in through the spaces around the front window covering kept me restless, but last night I slept like a rock. I think it’s going to be helpful with the heat, too, but the weather has changed today and it’s currently gray and chilly outside, so I’ll have to wait and see on that aspect of it.

Hmm, I think I meant to write about something else, too, but I am being summoned for breakfast, so maybe next time for whatever that was. May all your Saturdays be pleasing!

Mother’s Day Weekend

17 Wednesday May 2017

Posted by in Personal, R

≈ 2 Comments

One last Cedar Key sunrise

One last Cedar Key sunrise

I broke my walking streak this weekend. For 158 days in a row, I reached my daily step goal, ranging from the 3000 I started with, up to the 7000 that I’ve been doing since March. But on Friday, I spent several hours driving down to Sarasota and it was oppressively hot. I needed to go grocery shopping so I figured I’d do some walking in a nice air-conditioned store, but I couldn’t find the store and so ran out of time. In the evening, I went out to dinner with R and his friend A to a cool Peruvian restaurant and by the time I got back to the campground, it was full dark. And I still had over 2,000 steps to go. I looked at my step-counter and just said, nope, done. The end of my streak!

But yesterday R came to pick me up at the campground and he didn’t want to pay the parking fee, so asked me to meet him out at the front. I grumbled a little inwardly — I’d walked all the way out to the front when I was here in the fall and I remembered it as a really long walk. Six months later, not so much. It was satisfyingly easy, even in the heat. I will definitely be starting a new walking streak, and maybe even raising my goal, but maybe not until I get out of Florida. Only two weeks left here, I hope!

R took me out to the movies — Guardians of the Galaxy II. I don’t know how many years now we’ve been going to superhero movies for Mother’s Day, but it’s a very satisfying tradition. The movie was a little darker than I expected it to be, though, and some of the jokes were surprisingly… mature. In an entertaining twist of roles, R — who works in a preschool and babysits in his spare time — said afterwards that he couldn’t help thinking about the uncomfortable conversations some of the parents of the small children in the audience were likely to be having. It’s rated PG-13, so I’m thinking those parents should have been a little warier.

In other news, I’m feeling dramatically stressed about this upcoming week, for no real good reason. It just feels like I have a lot to do…

(So much to do, in fact, that I forget to finish and post this blog post on Monday. But I’m posting it now and following it with another!)

Random things

05 Friday May 2017

Posted by in Food, Personal, R, Randomness

≈ 8 Comments

On one of my first days here, a bird flew overhead carrying a fish at least half its size. It was a raptor, and the first name that popped into my head was “osprey.” I didn’t even try to catch a picture–I just watched in awe and wonder as it glided past me.

Then I looked it up. The app I’ve been using to identify birds is seriously stupid. This bird was obviously, unquestionably, without a doubt, a raptor. I knew it was some sort of hawk. But the method of narrowing down the options is by location, size, and color, so my first list of birds included ducks and geese and other totally inappropriate choices. My second list was just as bad. In the end, the app’s only close-to-reasonable choices were peregrine falcon or red-tailed hawk. I was grumpy about both of them. It didn’t look like a red-tailed hawk to me and it seemed too big to be a peregrine falcon. Today I remembered to look it up when I was on my computer. It was totally an osprey. I’m both pleased with my own bird identifying abilities (score!) and ready to look for a new app, one that lets you choose “type”. Maybe even food supply.

pelican

No app required to identify this bird.

The wind yesterday was strong enough to shake the van. This morning it was strong enough to blow Zelda sideways when we were walking and to turn her fur all sleek and spiky. There’s something exciting about wind. It feels rejuvenating. I’m not going to be trying to sit outside and write in it, though, because the gritty sand is getting everywhere.

But that’s okay, because with the wind came a twenty-degree temperature drop. It’s glorious. The first thing I did when Z and I got back from our walk was open all the shades and take down the window covers. I’ve been trying to keep it cooler inside by keeping it dark, but wow, the light really makes me happy.

I’ve been thinking about the rules of communication recently. Text, emails, messaging… Partly it’s because I got an email from a friend that made me unreasonably happy, which in turn sort of annoys me. Quit being so silly, self. Partly it’s because I have not gotten a return text from R, which makes me (possibly unreasonably) annoyed. Quit being so unsympathetic, self.

But also it’s because I joined OK Cupid a while ago, thinking I could find people to do fun things with along the path of my journey. I can tell already that’s not going to happen — it’s surprising how many people are looking for their One True Love rather than someone to go kayaking with, but perhaps I chose the wrong site. My ideas about the rules of online politeness are evolving rapidly, though. And I’m finding it sort of gratifying to realize that I don’t owe a stranger on the internet who calls me “sweetie” anything at all.

I think I’m letting go of two ideas: 1) that it’s polite to respond to people who talk to you and 2) that I have to be polite. I would never be mean or unkind, of course — I’m not going to troll people. But I was so well socialized to be a “nice girl” and I’m finding it very freeing to realize that silence is sufficient reply. It still seems to me that a polite rejection ought to be kinder than no reply at all, but sadly, I think the entitled assholes of the world have ruined that for everyone.

Also — unrelated thought — I am seriously mystified by the number of men who start with something like “hey, beautiful/cutie/sweetie/pretty woman/angel”. Is there a planet on which it’s appropriate to call women you don’t know by pet names? Because on my planet it’s patronizing as anything. If you walked up to me in person and said, “Hi, sweetie,” I would not respond positively. Why should that change online?

None of that, of course, has anything to do with feeling annoyed at R for not responding to my text. I have agreed to change my summer plans to give him a ride anywhere he wants to go, and while yes, that agreement did come with a lecture about initiative and settling, it is still a pretty damn generous offer. I deserve a thank you, even if it’s a sulky thank you. The longer I go without getting my thank you, the more I want to rescind the offer. On the other hand, I’m quite enjoying the uncertainty of having absolutely no idea where I’m going to be headed after June 2 or 3. It feels really freeing, even though I quite liked my June/July plans.

Last random note: I just put yogurt starter into the insta-pot. In approximately eight hours, I will be moving my homemade yogurt into the fridge and tomorrow morning, assuming this is not some total disaster, I’ll be eating my own yogurt with my breakfast. My happiness practice of appreciating my morning food is turning into a very entertaining creativity exercise in optimizing yogurt and granola. As with the granola, I really like the idea of not having to settle for lesser yogurt when stores don’t have the ones I like. It sort of defeats the mindfulness part of the exercise — I’m not exactly practicing acceptance by insisting on really good yogurt, not just average yogurt — but it’s going to be fun to see what I can make.

And now… to work. I really just meant to write about the osprey, but the sunshine in the van instead of darkness and the cool breeze instead of air-conditioning is making me feel really cheerful and chatty. I hope that translates into some good Grace words, too!

*****

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Sanders Cove

15 Wednesday Mar 2017

Posted by in Campground, Personal, R, Travel

≈ 6 Comments

On Sunday, I was chatting with R and he asked me how I was doing. For some reason, maybe because it was R, maybe because he sounded genuinely interested, maybe just because of the space I was in, I opened my mouth to answer, “Great,” and instead, “I’m really getting tired of camping,” slipped out.

There was a pause. And then he said, ever so politely, “How unfortunate.”

I laughed.

Yes, it is unfortunate to get tired of camping when one lives in a camper. I wrote to a friend recently that I’m one of those sensible campers who, when it gets too uncomfortable, says, “Okay, it’s time to go home now.” Ah, yes, home. That would be right where I am, right? Which at the time was a crowded campground in the dreary rain.

Fortunately, yesterday I left said campground and headed north. I was a little worried about the drive: I’ve been aiming for two hours between destinations but yesterday was five. I shouldn’t have worried. Five hours is actually better than two, I think, because somewhere past two hours but before three, I hit the fun driving zone where being on the road started to feel like an adventure again. I was driving through cute little Texas towns — Athens, Paris — and along roads with real ranches. Also roadkill galore — dead deer, skunks, armadillos. Younger R used to get upset about the roadkill in Florida, but northern Texas has Florida beat by a mile. Or maybe their vultures aren’t as efficient. And so many places with lawn statues for sale! Bugs on bicycles, giant dinosaurs, all kinds of fun stuff. I drove through a town called Canton that obviously has an incredible flea market (on the first weekend of the month), with probably a mile of road that felt like an event waiting to happen. A ghost flea market.

In Paris, I stopped for groceries.  Google let me know that I had a choice between two local stores or Walmart, so of course I went to one of the local stores. Wrong choice, I guess, but at least I didn’t need much. The dog food was $16.99 (instead of the $12.99 I usually pay); the only granola that was gluten-free was actually Chex Mix; and I should have read the label on the yogurt before I bought it because I took one bite this morning, and only then discovered that the second ingredient is sugar. Oh, well. They did have these mega packs of meat that I wavered over for a while: $19.95 for four or five packages of different things — pork, chicken, ground beef. If I had a bigger freezer, I might have gone for it. Generally speaking, though, it was not a grocery store conducive to the shopping habits of a single person on a restrictive diet. I bought myself some spice gum drops as a consolation prize and even they were a disappointment. (I can’t remember if I mentioned this before but HEB, another local Texas store, has the best spice gumdrops I have ever tested. They might have spoiled me for all other versions.) It was still fun, though. In the past month, I’ve been to Trader Joe’s, CostCo, and Walmart, because they had things that I needed/wanted. But they’re all alike. Trader Joe’s in Texas might as well be Trader Joe’s in Florida or in California. Wandering around someplace different was good for me.

Post grocery store, I continued north to my campground. It’s my first Army Corps of Engineers campground and what a pleasant surprise. I’m not particularly good at researching my campground destinations. It takes a ton of time, it uses up my precious internet data at an appalling rate, and I haven’t figured out my priorities yet. Does a good view beat a level spot? Sometimes. Is proximity to the showers good or bad? It depends. Most everything feels like “it depends” to me, except space between campers (the more the better) and access to nature. I would never have figured out how nice this campground was from the internet because one of its advantages is that it’s really hilly. The sites are terraced up the hill, so that they all get a wonderful view of the lake. And it’s still winter here! Unlike southern Texas, the trees are mostly bare, with the occasional exception of a white flowering tree that might be a sweet olive. I can’t say for sure, because I haven’t gotten close enough to smell them and it is so cold — 37 degrees when I was walking Zelda this morning — that the smell isn’t carrying on the breeze. Or maybe I’m just too congested to tell.

But my window looks directly west, over the lake. Last night, my neighbors down the hill from me were sitting out around their table, chatting with one another. I felt sort of silly as I kept opening the window to take picture after picture of the scene behind them, because they were looking toward me. But I also wanted to call down to them, “turn around, turn around, look at what’s behind you.” It was the most beautiful sunset I’ve seen in weeks.

sunset at Sanders Cove in Texas

No filter, no enhancement. It was really that beautiful.

Last night, I left all the windows in the van uncovered. In most campgrounds, it feels… vulnerable, I guess, to be sitting in the camper with the darkness all around me. When it gets dark, I put the covers over the windshield and front windows, close the blinds on the kitchen window, pull down the shades over the side windows, hang up a magnetic curtain over the sliding door window, and pull the shower curtain in the back. It’s part of the evening routine, usually done before washing all the dishes and taking the trash out. But I didn’t bother last night. Instead I went to sleep looking at the stars in the black sky, between the bare branches of trees.

So this morning — ridiculously early — I woke up when it got light. Not light because of the sunrise, light because of the full moon. Zelda thought it was probably time to get up and it took me a while to convince her that no, we were not going outside in the not-quite-freezing cold to walk. I wanted to say “walk in the dark” but it really wasn’t dark. The light wasn’t warm, it was a cool blue light, but it was definitely bright enough that we could have wandered around the campground without worrying about tripping or running into things.

When we finally did get up, at sunrise instead of moonrise, the moon was still in the sky. So were huge flocks of birds. I have no idea what the birds were, but hundreds of them flew overhead, close enough that I could hear the beating of their wings, like taffeta rustling. They were sort of quacky birds, not cheeping or trilling, but I don’t think they were ducks. As I’m writing, another huge flock is floating down the river. They’re white — sea gulls, maybe? Geese? I’m going to have to try to get a closer look, because I really can’t tell. They’re just white dots drifting along the blue water. The flock this morning was the typical dark spots against the sky, definitely not geese because they were much too small.

Between the sunset, the stars, the moon, the birds, the water — well, and most likely, the fact that it did not rain yesterday and might not today either! — I am, at least for today, no longer tired of camping.

Welcome to 2017

02 Monday Jan 2017

Posted by in Books, R, Zelda

≈ 2 Comments

I had the loveliest/weirdest New Year’s Eve. It was R’s 21st birthday and I was prepared to be sad about not getting to spend time with him on his birthday. Obviously, now that he is an adult, that’s going to happen less and less often anyway. It is certainly within the realm of possibility that I will never spend his birthday with him again. Although having written that out, it seems very unlikely. I didn’t often spend my birthday with my parents between the ages of 20-30, but after that, I sometimes did, especially the major birthdays. I definitely saw them on my 30th and 40th.

Anyway, it’s a nostalgic day, of course. As always, I remembered details of the day 21 years ago, mostly how madly, head-over-heels, totally joyfully in love I was. I know some moms don’t get that. My midwife told me it was the endorphins from a very long labor. It might also have been some exhaustion delirium—my water broke on Thursday and R was finally born on Sunday morning and there was not a lot of sleep during those three intervening nights—but whatever, I was dazzled and awed and infatuated beyond anything I have ever experienced before or since.

But I was also trying to remember details of the year before that — 22 years ago, the New Year’s Eve when I had no idea, none, of how dramatically and permanently my life would change in the next 12 months. I couldn’t remember a thing. I assume I spent it with the boyfriend that I was coming to realize I ought to be breaking up with and probably that we both drank too much, but no specifics beyond that.

And then my thoughts turned to last New Year’s Eve. It was just a year ago. I had no idea it would be my last new year in my house. If you’d asked me then, I would have predicted this new year’s to be just as the previous seven or so had been: quiet, at home, probably including a nice meal with R…

Instead, he was in Paris. And I was sitting in a friend’s driveway watching the best fireworks display ever. Best, not because the fireworks were out of reason spectacular — Disney has some great fireworks shows with music and fireworks that create designs in the sky, ie Mickey Mouse ears, so I’ve seen some impressive fireworks — but because it went on and on and on, and I could watch it from the cozy comfort of my own bed with the dogs on top of me.

I would love to know what Zelda thought about the whole thing. She’s always hated fireworks, but she’s never figured out that they’re the flashing lights in the sky. She started to get agitated, barking and pacing, when she first smelled the smoke and heard the banging, but then she came and sat on me and watched them with me. Ears up, eyes alert, I really think she paid attention to the whole thing. And they were beautiful, big fireworks, some simple explosions of blue and red and green, others those swishing things like one little explosion after another in white sparkles.

It was a lovely night. Not what I meant to write about this morning, but I’m glad to save the memory.

The other lovely thing that happened was that Andrea Host released a new book in her Touchstone series. I don’t know whether I’ve mentioned the series here before — I know I have elsewhere on social media. But those books somehow became comfort reads for me, such that a few months after reading them for the first time, I got sick and the only thing I wanted to do was reread the series. They’re fantasy/science fiction, but the new book, In Arcadia, is very much a romance: it’s a calm, quiet, slice-of-life story that tells the tale of the main character’s mom from the previous books falling in love. I read it between fireworks and thoroughly enjoyed it. If you haven’t tried her books and you like fantasy/sci-fi/romance, I really do recommend them—she creates worlds that I love escaping into. I’ve reread almost all of them, I think.

In fact, my one regret about In Arcadia is that it makes me want to reread all Andrea’s books, one right after another, and I really shouldn’t. I should be writing my own books!

Resolution for 2017: write lots of words.

Change

11 Monday Jul 2016

Posted by in Personal, R

≈ 4 Comments

R came home for the weekend, which was lovely.

We went out for sushi at our favorite sushi place on Friday night. Saturday morning he slept in. For breakfast, I took small slices of some melon halfway between cantaloupe and honeydew and topped them with prosciutto and a sprinkle of ginger. I saved him some so he ate a little of that when he woke up and then we had a big brunch of bacon and eggs*, scrambled with sautéed onion, cilantro and avocado. Plus coffee with coconut milk and cinnamon.

We watched a movie while we ate. Inception, I think, with a break in the middle to swim and read in the sun. Then we ran some errands: another load of stuff to Goodwill and also a run to the storage unit. He went out for a while and when he came home, we watched Ocean’s Eleven, and ate salad with roast beef, sweet corn, radishes, cucumber, avocado, and a dressing of balsamic, olive oil, italian herbs, fresh cilantro, and finely diced red onion. I’m sort of into the diced red onion salad dressing. It’s got a really nice but subtle kick.

On Sunday, he woke up late, then went out to lunch with a friend. When he came home, we watched Interstellar. Afterwards, he helped me drag some stuff out to the curb — his box spring and mattress, an old washing machine that’s been in the garage for the past seven years.

We put Serenity’s name on her. He’d been joking about my spaceship since he first saw her, but when he looked at the name lettering I’d gotten, he told me I’d picked a very Christian font. I was a little taken aback, but he viewed this as a good thing. He said that when I was broken down by the side of the road, people would be inspired to want to help me.

We talked about Ireland and his job, his thoughts for the future, ideas about plays he’s writing and his thesis, places he wants to go, and the movies we were watching. Whether Christopher Nolan can get away with anything. A show he’s watching on Netflix that I would really hate but that makes him laugh. Game of Thrones, which neither of us watch, but both of us know much too much about.

And then he got into his car and drove away. And I will not see him again until 2017. And we will probably never live in the same house again. And I am so sad.

Also completely congested, eyes puffy, face tear-stained, and so, moving on. Change happens. It’s not always easy. This change is enormously better for me than sitting in this house, waiting for him to visit, so I know it’s right. But a little grieving, that’s right, too.

*Cooking note for future reference: I cooked the eggs in red palm oil, which is supposed to be a butter substitute. It worked pretty well. They’re not kidding about the “red” part, though — it turned my onions orange and gave the eggs a deep, rich color. It doesn’t have much taste, which is a positive, I guess. Eggs cooked in olive oil or coconut oil are definitely flavored with the oil. Well, as are eggs cooked in butter. Funnily enough, though, I think I’ve adapted to eggs cooked in coconut oil. They give the eggs a flavor of sweetness that I missed. I’d still prefer butter, though, if only dairy didn’t make my immune system crazy.

Mother’s Day

09 Monday May 2016

Posted by in Grace, Mom, Movies, Personal, R, Randomness, WIP, Writing

≈ 4 Comments

On Saturday, I was bracing myself for the Mother’s Day blues.

Five years ago, I didn’t see my mom on Mother’s Day. I called her, I expect, but I didn’t do flowers or a card or a gift — I was in grad school, quitting my job, life was busy. I didn’t know, because we so rarely do, that it would be our last holiday. I don’t feel guilty about that — she would scoff at me if I did. But I do think of her and miss her more on the holiday. At the best of times, it’s still a teary holiday for me. And this year, R was busy with finals, so I expected a solitary day. As I said, bracing myself.

Instead, there was an after-dark knock on the door on Saturday evening. I went to answer it with trepidation, that sense of ‘uh-oh, who could that be?’ But yay! It was R, home to surprise me, and a delightful surprise it was.

Instead of my solitary day, I made us a big breakfast and then we headed off to our annual Mother’s Day super-hero movie tradition. We saw Captain America: Civil War, which was unexpectedly good. I’d been careful not to read or see anything about it — I actually didn’t want to be spoiled, because my expectations were so low. I usually don’t mind spoilers, but in this case, I anticipated that spoilers would reveal things that would make me unhappy and I didn’t want to dread the movie, if that makes any sense. But it was surprisingly enjoyable and far more fun than I expected it to be.

Afterwards, he worked on his final papers and I thought about Grace. Didn’t write a word, but did finally decide to go backwards again. R came into my room at one point and I told him I was debating throwing the whole thing away and he forbid it, very sternly, so I guess I’m not doing that. But the last six weeks of words just don’t work for me, so I’ve deleted them from my file (saving them, of course, for when I change my mind again) and am starting over again from the point where I think it stopped working. I’m hoping that I’ll be able to re-use some parts, but I’m going to work on writing it as if it’s a clean slate.

Meanwhile, a friend taught me to knit on Saturday, so I have been knitting and thinking and knitting and thinking. No words written (unless I count these) but at least I’m not feeling frozen anymore which is how I spent the last week. I’m trying to remind myself to put progress before perfection, like a good positive discipline parent.

But I’m also thinking that maybe knitting would be a good metaphor for how I should be treating writing. Because in my knitting, I’m trying really hard to focus on process, not product. I finished off my first skein of yarn, and then I ripped it all out and started over. Not because I was worried about it not being good enough, but because the point of knitting for me is not to produce usable objects, but to have the mindful meditative process. I’m trying to find flow states, not create scarves. Maybe I should be treating my writing the same way. The goal isn’t to produce an end result that follows other people’s rules of storytelling and satisfies every single person who ever picks it up — the goal is to love what I do while I’m doing it.

Process, not product. It feels right. So now let’s see what the words are like when my only goal is to enjoy writing them.

Dyslexics Have More Fnu

07 Monday Aug 2006

Posted by in Personal, R

≈ Comments Off on Dyslexics Have More Fnu

I ran into an old friend in the grocery store today. Well, I’d guess I’d call her more of an acquaintance, really. We met through mutual friends, had dinner once, and talked about getting together, but never quite made it past our mutual inertia to become friends.

But when she commented on the bumper sticker on my car, I realized how long it had really been. It feels like a lifetime since that first meeting at DLS when John said “I can’t truly diagnose after thirty minutes, but he’s presenting to me as classically severely dyslexic: you need to have him tested.” Really, a lifetime. So long ago that it feels like I’ve always known. But it was less than two years ago, and K didn’t know.

And it was strange telling someone new. Eighteen months ago, I went through the telling again and again, and I hardly ever managed without having to fight back tears and look away in order to not cry. I spent six months in turmoil where it felt like the most important thing in my life was this “special needs” label that had dropped on us out of the blue.

And I grew so sick of the people who said, “Oh, my brother was dyslexic; he didn’t get diagnosed until he was sixteen but he’s doing great now.” Right. Like that’s the same thing as someone who’s five standard deviations off the norm, and reading on a pre-K level in 3rd grade. It felt to me a lot like saying to someone who’s blind, “oh, I know someone with glasses.” There are shades of experience, and the assumption of commonality made me grit my teeth and want to scream.

But honestly, it was a long time ago. And it doesn’t feel that bad anymore. I named this blog after that moment–that stunned numb minute where the words clicked into place in my head and I realized that everything was different and that nothing was what I thought it was. But I also named it Learning Shock because learning about learning has been revelatory. I wouldn’t say I was happy about everything I’ve had to learn in the past eighteen months, but it’s definitely been interesting!

The bumper sticker is, of course, “Dyslexics have more fnu.” You might think it’s inappropriate, whether or not you are dyslexic or know someone who is. But Rory thinks it’s funny, and I think that it is a wonderful thing that we can celebrate something that was so painful such a brief time ago.

Summer reading program

06 Sunday Aug 2006

Posted by in Personal, R

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I debated this summer about sending Rory to a summer school/reading program. He really didn’t want to go, but I (of course) wanted him to keep working on those skills.

At his resource teacher’s suggestion, we went the cheap route. I pay him $1 for every fifteen minutes of reading, up to $3 if he reads 45 minutes in a day. Last week, I had to pay him $3 for the first time all summer. I played it really cool, although I threw in a $2 bonus. But inside I was jumping up and down, because he did it for exactly the reason I dreamed of–because he really wanted to know what happened next. At least I think that’s why he did it. He might tell me that it was for the money. But either way, he did it!

Yesterday we concluded he hadn’t done his reading (an okay choice on Saturday and Sunday, although the first fifteen minutes is required on the weekdays). But when I woke up this morning, I remembered seeing him read yesterday, a different book than the one he’s been working on. I think maybe he thought that didn’t count. But to me, it counts even more–he was reading for pleasure! Woo-hoo!!!