Day 19: Shieling update

Twenty-three squares down.  Seven more to go.  (And please don't remind me about the ends to be woven in or the whole putting-together part of this project.)

That is all.

Day 18: Making meaning

“For those of you accustomed to being taken from point A to point B to point C, this presentation may be somewhat difficult to follow. Pueblo expression resembles something like a spider’s web – with many little threads radiating from the centre, crisscrossing one another. As with the web, the structure emerges as it is made, and you must simply listen and trust, as the Pueblo people do, that meaning will be made."  
          - Leslie Marmon Silko


I was reading something written by a friend of mine, and she included this quote, and it just hit me in all the right places - so I thought I'd share.  It made me think of what I wrote yesterday, about not really knowing what themes would come up, but seeing that they are beginning to arise, and trusting that they will make sense.  That meaning will be made.  

And boy howdy, does this make me think of so much of my life.  Where I struggle through whatever is happening (usually a whole lot of whatevers all at once, and why does it work that way?), and what it all means is an ever-present question without much of an answer, except for the persistent sense that it does mean something if I can just hang on long enough to figure out what it is.

And then it speaks to the meaning-making part of my mind.  And, I think, of the minds of all humans (and probably other animals, too).  That we seek out patterns.  This is how epistemologies arise - we observe, we patiently listen and watch, and we trust that out of what appears at first to be structureless, unconnected bits and pieces, like magic - like a spider's web - meaning will be made.  I love that we are implicated in the meaning making. And I try to be respectful of the fact that we are implicated in the meaning making, because it suggests that each of us may make different meanings out of similar events - not because one of us has it right while others are viewing the world mistakenly, but because we are each part of the meaning-making process.  And that is something to respect and celebrate at the same time.

Day 17: Round up

So, I've been doing this for seventeen days, and I thought I'd step back and see what I think of it, and (if you're interested in telling me) what you're thinking of it.

First, thank you guys for leaving comments!  I've responded to the ones where I know your email address, but I can't, alas, respond when I don't.  (As before, if you are interested in that kind of conversational comment style, you can tell me your email address at knittinglinguistATgmailDOTcom, replacing the AT and the DOT as appropriate, of course.)  A few quick responses:

- Laine - a hairku!!  dude, thank you for that! my whole family and I thought that was awesome :)
- greenmtngirl - thank you for the kind words on the intent/impact post, I'm glad it seemed useful; I'd love to know more about your nonprofit
- Elizabeth, Jean Marie, TK, Portia, Allison, Willow, and Polly - thank you all for saying hi and encouraging the magpie theme; and especially, thank you for sticking with the vagaries of this particular blog, I'm really glad you're here.

Second, it's an interesting experience to have made this commitment to write something every day.  I wake up full of ideas, and my day only gives me more.  But I often find that, as with so many other things, my day gets away from me, and a few times I've hit the end of the day and found myself almost doing what I usually do with things like this (physical therapy exercises, I'm looking at you): thinking, ah well, I'll do better tomorrow.  In this case, though, the commitment to put something up here is an additional motivator.  I don't know if that motivation will fail at some point - it will be interesting to see how it goes over time.   (An unintended consequence of thinking about posts I could write is that what I refer to in my meditation practice as "narrator mind" is strengthened.  This is a phenomenon to observe; I'm sure I'll write about it at some point.)

Third, it's also interesting to see what themes come up for me most often.  I'm working on developing useful labels/categories/metadata.  It seems to me that there are posts and ideas that fall together in my mind, and if I can find the right label, it will help to collect them - and maybe even help me to see themes and connections that I didn't notice at the outset, but that arise as this project continues.  This is a sort of interesting unintended consequence, to begin to refine my understanding of my own lenses and areas of attention.  These labels seem to fall at different levels, too (I'm not sure that's a clear way to put it...).  So, for example, one is interconnection, which is rather philosophical, not to say metaphysical.  Another is a sort of observation of how my mind works (like the swimming laps one), and another is curiosity/fact-finding (soon you will all know more than you wanted about which strokes burn more calories, for example).  Those are much more concrete than the interconnection thing.  And, of course, there's the Venn diagram of themes; social justice and interconnection appear together, and mindfulness overlaps with both of those.  Only seventeen posts in, it's hard to tell what might happen, but, as I said, it's an intriguing (to me) outcome of this project.  Who knew metadata would become its own theme?

So I guess all of this is to say that, reflecting on the last few weeks, I see some of the shape of what I might learn from doing this, and also the shape of the challenges the project will offer me.  (I think I should keep rereading that post I wrote on swimming laps, because when I think about how many more days there are left to go, it's intimidating and tempting to let myself off the hook by quitting now; when I think about tomorrow's post, or one more week of posts, it's less overwhelming.)  The semester approaches; that will be a significant challenge for me.  Another is whether and to what degree I want to take risks with my writing here.  I posted a few narrative/descriptive type pieces in the period of my off-again on-again writing; it felt risky, but also like something I'd like to challenge myself to do more often.  So that, too, will be interesting to observe - what do I end up "using" this for?

In any case, here I am.  It's a beautiful day, and the sun is shining where I am.  I hope each of you has at least a bit of brightness in your day, too.

Day 16: Synchronicity

It was warm today.  I really shouldn't gripe about muggy weather - I know that our humidity issues aren't the same as those in other parts of the country (to be fair, neither do those other parts get humidity in the single digits, so I figure I get to complain a little bit when ours goes over 50%, right?), but the air just feels warm and heavy, in a kind of annoying way. 

At the barn this morning (where it was abundantly clear that there was no way to get there early enough that I could beat the heat), I figured it was a good day to give Disco a bath.  Not only did she really need it, but she's also been off lately, so it was going to be a handwalking day - a good time for a horse to dry after a bath (read: before rolling around in her stall to really grind the dirt in her wet coat).  You know it's hot when, instead of fussing about the hose, she stands quietly and looks almost happy (except for the face-spraying part - she's not so sure about that).

Afterwards, we walked around rather slowly.  She's off.  And I'm off.  And I don't know if I've mentioned, but poor Tilly has been limping lately, too.  All of us in our left lower/hind limbs.  It occurred to me today that we'd make a funny sort of conga line all walking along together - step, hitch, step, hitch!  (Or, with them, stepstepstep hitch! stepstepstep hitch!  but you get the idea.) 

We're all going to get better, I'm sure, but in the meantime, it's nice to know that the hitch in my gitalong and I are in good company.

Day 15: Making progress

When Tess went off to college, I knitted her a blanket. 

 

 Knowing how long it had taken me to knit it, I decided to make sure that I'd have plenty of time to knit Kivrin's, as her time for college approached.  Like her sister, she has very good taste (and no sympathy for how long it might take to knit something), and chose this. 

Sigh.

I ordered the yarn, and got started last fall, figuring I'd have lots of time.  I knew that I also had some graduation knitting to get done (I decided years ago that each of my friends' kids would get something hand-knitted when they graduated from college: shawl-type objects for the women, and socks for the men; I have a few who have gone a different route, and so I need to figure out a nice milestone-type occasion to knit them something)(the flaw in this plan is that they tend to come in batches, which has meant some very busy knitting years for me).

Then things, which had been difficult, kind of fell apart.  (I write all this with Kivrin's permission.)  Briefly, Kiv has several learning disabilities* which don't have an impact on her ability to actually comprehend high-level course material, but which do have an impact on her ability to process verbal instructions and to organize herself.  And her school has the most ass-backward way of managing disability accommodations that I have ever heard of.  Basically, her teachers decide what they think she needs, on the basis of, apparently, watching her in the classroom.  (Rather than, oh say, reading her diagnosis.  Or talking to a professional.)(Some of the teachers who were deciding what  accommodations were reasonable literally did not know that she had cognitive disorders, and the school counselor kept trying to tell us she has ADHD, suggesting that they did not read the diagnosis put together after an eight-hour battery of tests by a neuropsychiatrist.**)  Because she is smart and articulate and (and I kid you not, this is what one of her teachers said in a meeting) dresses well and looks put-together, and because she was working towards her International Baccalaureate diploma, they decided that she was using her "disabilities" as an excuse to get extra stuff (they actually said this).  And that she therefore didn't need the most crucial of the accommodations that she requested: assignments and due dates, ahead of time, in one place (read: a syllabus); and the ability to turn things in late when she missed getting the assignment because they wouldn't give her that first accommodation.  Teachers also refused to proactively check in with her (as in: I'm collecting assignments now, do you have yours), or to help her remember to get a list of what she heard them assigning in class signed to confirm its accuracy.  There's more, and I won't go into it all, but there was a very strong sense of, smart and learning disabilities don't go together, so she must just be trying to get away with something. (That was actually said out loud several times at one memorable meeting, where it was suggested that she stop doing the IB program, and stop doing theater tech, rather than providing reasonable accommodations for her disabilities.)(Pointing out to them that she was very successful in a college summer class when she was given - gasp - a syllabus with the schedule of assignments so that she could track them more easily was totally dismissed.) 

The last two years of high school have been brutal, frustrating, and exhausting for both of us.  For some time, I was reading textbooks out loud to her each night, and taking dictation on assignments (just to name one example).  Long story short, there came a point in her senior year where it was unclear whether she'd graduate in June or have to finish up in summer school.  And since she was waitlisted at the two colleges she really wanted to attend, we were all rethinking this coming year as a year for her to take classes that interest and excite her at our local college, regain some confidence in her ability to function in an academic setting, and participate in some of the fantastic theater programs in the area. 

In the middle of all that, the college blanket took a backseat.

And then, Seattle University (her top choice school) accepted her.  And she graduated.  (I literally had so braced myself for things to go sideways at the last minute that I couldn't believe it, even once they handed her a diploma with her actual name on it.)  And, in July, she received her International Baccalaureate diploma (which is totally no joke at all, dudes - that's a demanding program). 

So guys, she's going to college.  In September. 

!!

I have been knitting madly since it hit me that this is all real.  I did the math at one point, and calculated that it's taking me about five hours per square of knitting time; then there's the putting it all together.  I figure if I have the squares done by the end of August, drop dead, I should have enough time in the first two weeks of September to put it together.  Right?  (right?)

 Twenty-one squares down, half a square OTN, eight and a half left to go.  I've got this.

*Dyslexia, auditory processing disorder, visual-spatial processing disorder.
** Guys, if we had this much trouble, with all of the resources we were able to access, up to and including an accurate diagnosis, can you even imagine what it's like to be fighting this system without time, money, and information?  Your kid would be on ritalin, sitting in the back of the classroom, faster than you can say, get out of our hair.  As we come out of the other side of this, I keep wondering where I can leverage what I know and have to benefit folks who just aren't as lucky as I have been.  The system seems intractable, though.  At some point, I may expand on this with a post about what I learned about disability accommodations in education, and what we learned from the lawyer we consulted.  In any case, I'm mulling it over.

Day 14: Exciting Tour!

Spoiler alert - don't read if you watch the Tour and haven't seen today's (Stage 18) results.











Just finished watching today's stage, and I am so excited - Julian Alaphilippe has hung on to the yellow jersey!  Only two stages left where he could lose it.  (And the received wisdom is that he probably will.  I may have mentioned my love of the underdog, however, so I remain undeterred in my optimism.)  He lost contact with the second place rider (Geraint Thomas - last year's winner) on the final climb, but it wasn't a mountain-top finish.  And man, can Alaphilippe descend.  That man dropped like an elevator.  I almost couldn't look - it was terrifying.  (I was literally clutching my hair at one point.)  But he caught up with Thomas, who, in fact, has falled into third place behind his teammate Egan Bernal. 

OK, maybe this isn't your cup of tea.  Sorry.  But I am just so in awe of what it takes to ride 2200 miles in three weeks.  And more than that, to track everything that's going on from day to day.  What kind of stage is this? Whom does it suit?  What's your job on this particular stage? Whom do you have to watch out for?  Which of your team's goals is the priority for this particular day?  (Remember, there are about seven different competitions to keep track of: yellow jersey - that's the overall winner - green jersey, white jersey, polka dot jersey, stage win, most aggressive rider for the day, best overall team.)  All of those calculations change from day to day, over 21 stages (many of which are well over 100 miles).  It's insanity.  It's so clear that, much more than a physical feat, this is a mental game.  What it takes to get up each day and race - each day's race is already a world class event by itself - day after day.  I can't imagine it.

Which means I probably shouldn't be already griping in my head about getting up to swim tomorrow....

Day 14: A question for the ages

Why do spiders insist upon building their webs across the paths where I walk?  (These are big spiders, but I honestly don't think they have any hope of catching a human.)

Also, why do they keep building their webs when things (read: me) walk through those webs and break them? (Please note: I don't do this on purpose.  I don't do this on purpose for two reasons, actually: one, it would be mean; two, I might end up with a spider in my hair.)

Does this mean that the kinds of things that spiders actually hope to catch and eat are flying along the same paths where I walk? 

I imagine that this must be frustrating for the spiders.  I can see the blog post now:

Weaving Spider
Day 14:  WTF?
Why do humans persist in walking into my web every morning??  I just finish getting the darned thing woven, and I settle down for a nice rest before the gnats start flying around, and bam!  Human!  You'd think they'd learn!