Remember my student?

My student with Cerebral Palsy that got such great support from his friends for his Genius Hour presentation?

Well, he did it again!

He has promised himself that at high school graduation he would walk without his walker to pick up his diploma.  He changed his mind.

And surprised everyone by walking at middle school graduation.  His dad was his spotter, but this fighter did the work himself.  The audience burst into applause, of course.

Tribute

...to a class act.

Mom and I will join the fans of the Disneyland Band tomorrow to show our love and support to this icon of Disneyland history.  It is being replaced by something "comedic" and "high energy," presumably to entice a younger audience than those of us who have been loyal Disneyland visitors for sixty years.

I've done several posts about our joy from this group in this blog over the years.  They have been one of the few stable artifacts of the original park that Walt built.  It hurts to see them tossed aside.

By stupid management.

Really?  Do you really think a younger audience gives a rip about entertainment?

I teach middle school.  They don't stop to listen to a performance past the age of ten when they are old enough to be on their own in the park and race from one ride queue to the next.  They also don't stop to spend money.

Have you read  your Disneyland history lately, Disney management?  Walt wanted a park that would appeal to ALL AGES.  The Disneyland Band is a show for the very young who love to dance with them and for those of us who got over the whole ride thing years ago.  For the last five years, when I brought first both aging parents and, now that my dad is gone, my mother, we simply follow the music.  Our day used to be the Disneyland Band sets to Billy Hill and the Hillbillies (another huge entertainment mistake) to the ragtime piano.

Mom says her Disneyland days may be over if the band is gone.  Too bad, as she can't get out of the park without dropping at least $200 on food and souvenirs each trip.

And if her days are over, mine may be, too.  The park has become a progressively sadder place for me over the last five years as management makes one entertainment mistake after another.

I wondered what would happen to my beloved Park when there was no longer a Disney to keep watch over the Dream.  Apparently what is happening is a move into cheesy tackiness.  The 60th parade seems to have a theme of Las Vegas meets Mardi Gras and now to lose the Disneyland Band, an icon of high class entertainment.  So sad.  Maybe too sad to overcome.   A lifetime of joyful visits coming to a close.

Heads up, Disneyland.  If you want to attract the young adult audience, you need to start putting some money into Walt's park, starting with the rumored upgrade/update of Tomorrowland.  I don't know why you need to, since the place is constantly packed, but if that's the goal, taking away the entertainment that draws the older audience isn't going to make a bit of difference.

Disgusted with you.

Inversion

A very strange feeling.

Not scary, like implosion.  And not exactly introversion, which is where I live.

Quietly.

This is a feeling of folding in, accompanied by an overwhelming desire to be totally alone.

Really wishing I knew someone with a sweet little cottage they needed a house sitter for.

On the beach.

For about a month.

This is not unusual.  A couple of years ago I read an article about adults with autism and was very much like Charlie Brown when Lucy hits on his phobia:

 THAT'S IT!

I had all the signs.  Two that I really identified with were that it is easier for me to communicate through the written word than to converse.  And I cannot handle conflict.  My brain short-circuits.  Very much like the robot movies where you can see the wiring short-circuit, I can practically see the synapses struggling to make the connections.  One of my colleagues gave a staff meeting presentation on autism and one of the signs was poor core strength and thus poor posture (mentioned occasionally by my immediate family as "the weird way Mom sits.")  I took the online autism survey:

http://psychcentral.com/cgi-bin/autismquiz.cgi

A score of 34 or above suggest someone may be on the spectrum.

My score was 35.

I mentioned it to my colleague and friend who is our SPED teacher, and she nonchalantly said, "Oh, yeah, I've noticed that.  You have a hard time with eye contact."

It was marvelously freeing.

I was a silent child.  It was an era when perfect children were seen and not heard, and my mom is to this day ever so proud of her PERFECT daughter.

So to know that I'm probably on the spectrum is oddly comforting.  No wonder I could never talk myself out of it.

I have absolutely no memories of holding a conversation of any kind until late in high school.  I was everybody's sweetheart good listener.  I could perform in front of hundreds of people, but not come up with a meaningful question or - heaven forbid - engage in an argument.  About anything.

I continue to struggle with what I eventually nicknamed my social retardation, and still have a very difficult time expressing what I want.

Even to myself.

Which is why the infolding, the inversion.  The last year has been one of having the world impose its wishes, needs and desires onto me.  Much of it I cannot avoid.  Some of it has hurt as people I thought knew me demonstrated instead that their priority was what they believed to be best.  For me.

For example, when I came home in September and found my husband dead in his bed, I reacted as usual.  I'm good in a crisis, as long as I can go deep.  I find the steps and work them.  Call 911.  Who wouldn't get off the line until I had someone with me.  The EMT's arrived, followed by the deputy (someone I knew).  All of whom insisted I have someone with me.  I settled on my brother, with whom I had spent many quiet hours growing up.  He was the only one I wanted.  A calm presence to settle me as I took the difficult steps ahead. My mother was in heart failure and I absolutely did not want her to go through this with me.

He showed up with her in tow.  Followed my his wife and my niece.  Who were followed by my sister and my nephew.  Who were shortly followed by my sister's husband and the girl they had taken in a few months prior but who I barely knew.  My SIL decided we needed food.  Food was the last thing I wanted.  I wanted - needed - them all gone so that I could go deep and deal with calling my sons - one in Tennessee and one in Japan - to tell them their father had died.  That was on Tuesday.  I got through my calls and the next day of grief with my boys.  Thursday was when I had to start digging through paperwork and shifted from grief to rage when I started to realize what a financial mess the man had left for me.  By Friday all I wanted was the quiet dinner my Mom and I had shared every Friday night since my dad died in 2010.  Instead she informed me that she had decided she needed the family there.  Somewhat shell-shocked, I could at least let them know the date of the memorial service.  My SIL asked incredulously if I was going to attend and my sister informed me that her son's high school band had a fundraiser that night.  I made it through the dinner and then, when home with my Mom, had a breakdown when I asked if she would please come to the service for my kids' sake.

More recently I had the marvelous, once-in-a-career special teaching experience that I wrote about here previously.  At lunch I was telling my colleagues about it.  Subbing that day was someone I consider a good friend, a BFF status friend.  Mid-way through the story, in the middle of a sentence, she blurted out something about my fingernails.  It was like being hit on the side of the head with a baseball bat.  Really?  My fingernails?  My students showed ultimate kindness and support to one of the class, and she is distracted by my fingernails.

Normally by today I would be giddy.  I said goodbye to that class.  My school year is almost over.  Two more days.  Graduation tomorrow, packing the classroom Friday and I am done.  By now I usually have happy lists with smiley faces and hearts as codes for all the fun projects I am looking forward to.

And I got nothing.

Just this desire to crawl into a box on the beach somewhere.

Genius Hour Tears

For the better part of this school year I've had my 8th grade students involved in Genius Hour (also called 20% time).  They had class time every Friday to pull together a presentation on whatever they wanted.  My only hard-and-fast criterion was that they had to show how their chosen topic (from cupcakes to surfing to how The Hunger Games is reflected in today's political climate to common traits of American Nobel Peace Prize winners to animal abuse to cheerleading as a sport to landfills and the Pacific gyre to Fender guitars and on and on) related to the United States Federal government.    The medium was student's choice.  They had access to a Chromebook for the period and most students chose a Google slides presentation for their project.

By far my favorite was a Google slides presentation called "Thinknoodles."  Thinknoodles is a youtuber, and one of my students is a huge fan.

His presentation - and what happened with it - brought me to tears.

You, see, this wonderful young man has Cerebral Palsy.  He has a one-on-one aide to do his writing for him to help him keep up with the daily classwork.  He walks with a walker, unless he gets too tired or is ill, and then he will reluctantly use the wheelchair his aide has with her at all times.  He sits at his own large table at the side of the classroom because it's easier to drag himself in and out of the walker and into the chair.  He is intelligent, funny and when he is fully grown is going to be movie star handsome.   He goes to the school dances, wears his Renaissance shirt with pride and insists on doing everything that the other kids do in class.  It is difficult for him to speak clearly (although a true listener has no trouble understanding him). 

Over the years I've had many special education students in my history class.  Too many of them have been trained to use their disability to slack off.  Usually in a presentation like this they (followed by their SPED caseworker and parents)  ask to give a presentation to me alone during lunch. 

Not this kid.

I was thrilled, but not surprised, when he chose to drag himself in his walker to the front of classroom and narrate his slide show.  Himself.   In front of a full class of middle school peers.

The presentations were to be 3-5 minutes long, but students who wanted more time simply told me what they needed and I programmed the days accordingly.  I allotted ten minutes for my brave young student.   Sadly, our district bandwidth wasn't sufficient to really pull this off smoothly. The Chromebooks took longer to load each presentation than the presentations lasted. And with this student's disabilities, the loading and reloading of his show caused it to run over by about 15 minutes.

Into the lunch period.

On Renaissance pizza reward day.

On pizza reward day, the students getting the pizza form a separate line from the usual lunch line.  The school never really knows how many kids will actually eat the pizza that day.  When they run out of kids in the line, the people handing out the pizza pack up the leftovers and leave them in the staff room.

When the lunch bell first rang, nobody twitched. They stayed to watch the end of the presentation. But five minutes later, worried that they might miss their chance to get their pizza,  I interrupted the presentation and invited the kids to go get their lunch if they wanted to.

Not one kid left.

Not one.

A few minutes later I asked one of the speaker's instructional aides to go tell the folks distributing the pizza to wait for the class. When she returned she said she had told the principal, who started to cry.
When the presentation was over, the class filed out, gifted the speaker with high fives and "great presentation!"

As the last four girls headed toward the door, I lost it and started to cry.  They were immediately concerned and asked if I was all right.  I grabbed the closest one for a hug.  All I could say was, "You guys just don't know what you just did.  You just don't know."

And I was so glad they didn't.  This is just how they are.

As the girls left, the principal flew into my classroom still in shock.  Days later, the speaker's mom told me her son had been on Cloud Nine ever since.  The SPED staff that works with him tell me he is still telling the story to anyone who will listen.

And now he plans to walk graduation.  And I know the students will all wait with pride for their friend to take his diploma with them.

Do not fear our future.

The kids are great.

http://www.pvsd.k12.ca.us/Page/5944

Love Wins. Again.

Equality won in Ireland yesterday.  It didn't eek by.  It was a landslide.

Equal rights in marriage for my gay friends and relatives.

Early in this movement, a young gay friend complained that in his eyes, this was an insignificant concern in a world filled with more important, more tragic issues for all humanity.

I didn't agree, but I couldn't communicate why because I couldn't quite interpret what I was feeling.  I can do better now.

This has been an important movement, an important issue because it has brought out the love in so many.  I'm mostly referring to straight people, not acquainted with the hate thrown at our homosexual community mainly because we were unaware of it.  The Marriage Equality movement brings our gay brothers and sisters into our point of view.  And for a majority, the image is one of "What's the big deal?  If two people love each other enough to commit to the challenges of creating a LIFE together, why shouldn't that be encouraged?"

Hence, the enormous shift in a very short amount of time from rejection to acceptance to celebration.

As a historian, a student of civil rights and in some ways an observer of a historical shift in a belief system, it has been a thrill to watch a group targeted for hate and discrimination rather quickly work closer and closer to true equality in our communities.

As someone lucky enough to have gay friends and family, it has been a thrill to experience with them the relief of knowing they are not only NOT universally hated, but are more and more universally accepted and, by many, loved for all of who they are rather than for the masks they feel safe to show.

Comhghairdeas (and man, I hope I'm using that correctly).  Thank you for letting us celebrate with you, and thank you for setting the world on the right path.

Masteryear

A special birthday.

I was a fan of a musician.  So was my mom.  I wanted to buy her an album of his music, so went searching the internet.  In the process of hunting an album I found he had a website, and through his website learned about the gift of the Masteryear.

He credited the concept to his best friend, a comedienne named Lotus Weinstock.  I was completely taken by the idea and a little sad that I hadn't learned of it before.

As I understand it, when you reach a birthday of double digits (11, 22, 33...) you take the opportunity to reflect on and celebrate all you have learned, matured into, developed, adopted, enjoyed.

You embrace the whole wonderful package of you and have a blow-out year where you put all of that in action to achieve.  Something?  I guess I'll learn the fine points when I launch my own.  I have a couple of years yet.

But today my sister steps into one of hers.  She's already done some of the preparation.  And is thrilled to be started this year.

55

Kind of jealous.

Wouldn't it have been wonderful to have been able to help my boys in their first Masteryear, and then watched them launch their own?

What a genius concept.

Trust

To trust just one person in your life like this.  What a gift that would be.

Reprieve

Lovely Mother's Day present.

Mom is home again from the hospital.

20 pounds lighter.  Able to walk easily and converse without getting winded.  In good spirits.

And minus 2.8 gallons of excess fluid.

The family is transmogrifying into bullies.   We give no quarter.

I have no memories of her parents, my grandma and grandpa.  Grandma was 51 when she died (of "toxic hypertension") and Grandpa had a stroke and died six months later at 58.   Nobody - especially my mom - expected her to live to 83 and beyond.

We're kind of selfish about her.  Like, we will do what it takes to keep her around as long as possible.  Horrible tortures like kale and smoothies and foods made with things like cumin and turmeric instead of salt.

And we are bullies about her taking her diuretics.  Unbelievably, she tried to weasel out of taking one just three hours after getting home this afternoon.

This might not be pretty.

Mom's in the Hospital

She's been in heart failure for a couple of years.

Now the fluid build up is drowning her.  They seem optimistic that a couple of days of diuretic therapy will empty all that out.

I choose to be hopeful.

I took her to Disneyland Saturday.  It was a rough day for her in some ways, joyful in others.  We heard that the suits were in from Orlando and EVERY entertainer was at the top of their form.  After we had seen everyone (she even wanted to stay for multiple piano sets at the Coke Corner, and she doesn't particularly like that piano player) I asked if she was ready to go home and she said no.  So we wandered the Emporium for a long time - aimlessly.  I couldn't figure out why she was stalling our leaving.

Until the next day.

I think she was seeing it as our last visit.

Ever.

So, I choose to be hopeful.

We have a 60th anniversary to celebrate.

Marshall Davis Jones

This fits my mood.

I will pour these words
into a mason jar built of the shatterproof and the breakable
An hour glass with the sand of infinity and time quickly running out
I will pour my heart here ...
Until I can leave it on the shelf
Forget about it for years

Then one day
My great grandchildren
Can search the attic
Rummage through nostalgia
And old things

That were once new

Stumble upon this jar
And when they ask

What is this?
No one will know
But somehow they will

They will feel

That this is where
My love went

When I knew for sure
It could never belong to you

 

 

Things are actually going pretty OK.  Still some financial mysteries to solve, issues that come to smack me from behind and make me fearful to check my email and phone messages.  Still not sure exactly where I'm going to find $12,000 to pay off the equity line that I did not know my husband had spent and is now due June 15.  At worst it will be just another maxed out credit card until I can sell the Utah property, so it's not a disaster.

 

But I crave the calm of a stable income/outgo.

 

So I can forget about it.  And focus on the best of my life.

 

Weary.  And lonesome.

 

And in a mood.

 

Don't know where it came from, really.

 

My uncle and aunt came to visit my mom and I rearranged my day to spend time with them. They were so supportive through my trials this time last spring.  We went to my favorite restaurant for lunch and had a lovely time.  It cheered Mom to spend some time with her brother and his wife.  We have a Disneyland trip planned for next week.  I'm hopeful it works out because I know it will cheer her, too.

 

Afterward I drove to Fillmore for the Otto & Sons Rose Days and spent some quality time wandering through their 22 acres of roses.  Three of them begged to come home with me and I'm such a pushover.  Anna's Promise, Tuscan Sun and - YES - another Disneyland.

 

I've been lusting over a large ceramic pot with a gorgeous green glaze at Costco for the last month or so.  I've decided to buy it and plant one of these Disneyland roses in in.  It will sit next to my front door with the gardenia "First Love" (and her heavenly fragrance) and my blued-up hydrangea.  The colors should set each other off and be stunning.

 

Something to look forward to.

 

I've decided not to have knee replacement surgery this summer.  The orthopedist said summer 2016 at the latest so I was thinking of getting it out of the way this year.  The problem with my knee is that the cartilage is much thinner on the outside of the joint than the inside, so the joint tilts to the outside.  To stay attached, the femur is bending.  Both knees have arthritis (as does my spine) and will need replacement, but if I don't have the left done before the femur bends too far, the surgeon won't be able to hammer the rod in.  In the meantime, my dog greeted me too enthusiastically fall of 2013 and gifted me with a torn meniscus.  I haven't had that surgery because I figured the knee replacement would take care of that problem, and had decided to have the surgery this summer.

 

But I just can't.  I've been through too much this year and am pretty desperately in need of a break.  So, I will hobble around this summer and take care of my soul.    Time in my garden or at the sewing machine or with a piece of stitchery in my hand (although it's slow going with my eye not right enough for close work like that.)  I need to spend time with all three books in progress or at least settle into one.  I need trips to wonderful places like the Getty or the Echo Park lotus pond or El Descanso Gardens.  Even just a trip to Corona del Mar and Roger's Gardens with lunch at Andrew Weil's healthy food restaurant.  Time on the beach and near the beach and on the sea.

 

Feathers.  I need the feathers of sea birds and flat stones and maybe I'll find my first piece of sea glass.

 

The sea calls.  I had the most wonderful experience on my first whale watch out of Santa Barbara.

 

 

Just a splendid day.

 

A mama and her calf spent an hour pretty much circling our boat.  I managed to catch them blowing at the same time.

 

 

The whales were a bonus.  It was just an incredible day.  Perfect weather, perfect people and the beauty of the sea and the sky.  I have to find out what other kinds of cruises they do and get out there again, even though the whale watch season is over.  I think they said they do a sunset cruise in the summer, and wouldn't that be spectacular?

 

Also had a great trip over Spring Break to Utah.  My sassy red car loved hustling up the 15 at 80 mph.

 

Right beside my balcony.   This fellow had a beautiful song to greet me every morning.

Sunrise on the mountain.  Fireplace and chocolate.  Perfect way to greet my day.

Clouds never disappoint.

Still enough snow to be beautiful.  Temps were brisk and the wind could be downright cold.
 

I hope to get back up for at least one longer visit this summer.  The condo needs a good cleaning and I need a long summer escape.

 

So tired.

 

I need time.  Time alone to figure myself out.  If I could figure out what I want, I could go for it.  Or at least go for what I can.

 

I think it's time for that hot air balloon ride.  Maybe facing that fear will break something free.