Life in the Slow Lane

Mind Over Matter

2008-11-29T03:45:55Z

Who can sleep in the hospital? Not I. When I was in the rehab unit in San Francisco, I would lie in bed late at night or early in the morning pretending I was playing Mozart's 5th violin concerto. I don't remember why I picked that, but I would close my eyes and imagine I was playing. I figured maybe I could rewire my brain by "practicing". Sometimes I imagined it so perfectly that when I opened my eyes I was actually surprised that my left hand wasn't moving at all. I remembered that today as I warmed up my fingers for Nutcracker rehearsal. I've been having trouble getting focused on Nutcracker this year as high school kids are coming unglued, I'm wondering about where my life is going, thinking about the band, planning my upcoming Tango class, etc....so today I took hold of the reins and made myself practice differently. I would take a section, play it once, then think it through. I made sure I could imagine every finger and hear the note in my head. Then I would imagine what beautiful technique would feel like and sound like. Only then would I play it again--while I tried to copy the exact feeling I had just felt in my fingers and body without the violin. It's amazing. Yes, I know, studies have shown that focused imagining works the same muscles and same brain pathways as actually doing an activity, but it's just amazing to watch it working in the space of a few minutes. Without the violin, just imagining the sound and feel, I would notice places where I was holding tension-- my shoulder tightening as I was about to play a particular note, for example. I would "practice" the section until I could stay totally relaxed. Then I would take the violin and play, and it would be fixed. Flawless. It wouldn't last past a few times playing it through on the violin. Old habits would sneak back in. But this is the way to practice, for sure. I am laying new pathways.

The Missing Piece

2008-11-26T03:39:59Z

That's what's missing from my days. It's violin. I'm not playing enough violin. Tonight was the first Nutcracker rehearsal, and it was so nice to sit with wonderful violinist D. and be held to her high standards. It was such a relief knowing that the flubs I made can be fixed with some careful practice tomorrow. This is almost like normal violin playing. My fingers are almost there. Now I'm longing to take this body and actually move my playing beyond where it was pre-paralysis, for the first time in 7½ years. But practicing violin takes as much (maybe more) mental work as physical work. And mental energy is not something I have at the end of a day of teaching (or of a day of teaching followed by a night of teaching). Playing the violin heals my brain, I know it does. I've known it at different moments over the years. It calms me down and keeps me healthy. I'm thinking again about what I would give up to play the violin more, and thinking again about the tiny house, and thinking about conversations I've had this week about changing the way our school operates, and thinking about my multiple jobs. Lots of things are swirling around, but they haven't settled yet.

Things As They Are

2008-11-24T19:53:04Z

I've been slightly distracted lately trying to chill a crush. The bad thing is that I don't particularly want to chill this one, but it is necessary. The good thing is that it's made me go through the exercise of trying to figure out whether life is going well, in the direction that I want, or not. This is tough. It's seldom that I have a clear idea of where I'm going or of any long-term plan. I did a good job of training long-range planning out of me when I wound up with MS. At the risk of jinxing my fairly good health, though, I'm thinking that some visioning may be in order. I'm trying...but it's not happening. Argh! But today I was doodling in my notebook while eating lunch, and a phrase popped onto the page: "things as they are". It reminded me of when I'm teaching a violin lesson (or practicing something myself). The thing I always tell my students is: before you can fix something, you have to know what's wrong. I'll have a student play through something and then try to figure out exactly why it's not working or why it doesn't sound right. If a shift is going too high or too low, the next step is to figure out exactly how much too high or too low, and then why it's high or low, etc., to keep honing in and gathering more detailed information each time. 99.9% of the time, by the time you know enough about the details of what was going wrong, your body has fixed it. I figure maybe I can apply that to this whole visioning thing. Maybe the reason why I'm having trouble envisioning the future I want is because I don't have a detailed enough awareness of what I'm doing right now and why I'm doing the things I'm doing. That's the hypothesis, anyway. Time to get focused and gather some data.

Things I Like (Winter Version)

2008-11-24T19:30:21Z

baking biking building things Christmas lights cuddling with my cat dancing drinking cocoa eating toast fixing things that are broken growing things ice skating lying in the yard at night my band my family nice pens planning things playing the violin Portland's fabulous tango community sewing singing skiing visiting E. walking in the cold warm socks watching snow fall I wrote down this whole list and then realized that I'd left off the thing I spend most of my time doing these days: teaching. I do like teaching, but it didn't spring to mind. I never think I'm going to like teaching, and then when I'm in the middle of it and afterwards I realize that I do like it a lot. It's just that teaching requires me to be on stage. All day. I've often thought of myself as being right on the line between introvert and extravert, but looking at the rest of the list, it's pretty obvious to me that I'm more squarely on the introvert side than I realized. When necessary I've always been able to hurl myself to the extravert side. The kind of teaching I do, for the kind of results I want to get, requires me to be an extravert. It's gotten easier over time, but I think it will always be a bit of a stretch. It's probably good for me.

Tell Me How You Really Feel

2008-11-23T03:37:10Z

Sometimes I nail it. Sometimes when a student snaps my head off in response to something I say I'm calm, finish what I'm doing, and ask the student to see me in my office for a few minutes. "You seem a little edgy today, what's up?" usually yields, in varying amounts of time, the real problem. Last week all of those students were very consistent: heads full of too many things, too many thoughts and feelings bouncing around in there. Talking helped, but also just writing it all down to get it out of the head and onto the page. I'm both surprised and not surprised at what students write for me to see. It makes sense for them to trust me because I'm trustworthy, but also: holy smokes. And sometimes I don't nail it at all. Sometimes, after school, I catch myself thinking "so-and-so was probably not just trying to be annoying or trying to distract the class," and I'll wonder how I could talk to that student and then wonder how I can change my reaction to that student--why didn't I call that student into my office instead of just getting annoyed? Because I didn't recognize that the behavior, in that case, had an underlying cause. Well of course it did. It always has an underlying cause. I feel dumb about only catching it sometimes--or only wanting to spend the extra energy trying to communicate about it to a certain student. I would like to improve at this, because I want all of my students to develop the skills to modify their behaviors if they want to. It's funny to think about this because it carries over into the rest of my life: somebody says something and I'll think, "I bet s/he doesn't really mean that." But in most cases in my life outside of school, I have to assume people are saying what they mean, because they're adults and it's not my role to question their behaviors. Sometimes I probe when I think it will be interesting or when it's someone I love or know well. Most times it's a good thing.

Tango Bomb!

2008-11-23T03:35:33Z

On Friday night, Portland tangueras gathered, ate, and departed in cars. In other parts of town, Portland tangueros gathered, ate, and departed in cars. Cars full of girl and boy vibes arrived in Portsmouth, and when the fire truck showed up later, it was just proof of what we already know: Portland tango dancers are hot, hot, hot! I need to get them dancing in my apartment, which is not, not, not. This challenge of not turning on the heat before Thanksgiving? Hmmmm. Well, it's giving me a whole lot of incentive to get the house insulated this summer. Meanwhile, here's how I'll be keeping warm on Monday nights in December and January.

So This is Teaching

2008-11-19T01:17:33Z

We're doing goal-setting in class, but it's hard for a kid to set goals when he feels like his life is falling apart. I saw it in his posture and in his face today and pulled him into my office. I took his worksheet from him, and instead gave him a long hug and a shoulder to cry on. What to do next, though? He knows what he needs to change, but is in no mental state to change it. Seems like this is often the case...just when you need your wits about you, emotion erases all logic. And some of it is out of his hands. I'll try to help, but he needs so much more than I can give him. All I can do is tell him that his life will get better, but it's going to suck for a while, and I'll do whatever I can. This has been happening a lot lately, situations in which I suddenly feel like my role as teacher has suddenly morphed into part therapist, part friend, part coach, part mother, part grandmother, and part devil's advocate. And I feel pretty unprepared to do any of it. I love these kids, though. Sometimes it's hugs and sometimes it's tough love they need. I just hope I'm doing the right things.

Unutterable

2008-11-16T02:05:54Z

This year I have a little clique of students who banter through the entire class period. "Your mom" this, "That's what she said" as a response to various statements, "I'll float your

", and so on. And of course getting yelled at (or glared at) by me for various profanities, degenerating into things that sound like profanities, ("thuck", for example). Finally it was affecting some other students' abilities to work. So how to stop the verbal pollution? I can't dock them points ("so go ahead, flunk me"...these kids, mostly, are not ones who care about grades or in some cases even about passing). I can't send them to the office (our administrators are overloaded already, and often not in the office or even in the building). Therefore, I requested that they vent in non-verbal ways. Vent in the waitlist (a web app I wrote last year that students use to record that they need help, when it gets really busy). Vent to each other by e-mail. And I did say that I would not penalize them for any of this as long as it was written, not spoken. Yes. I. Did. Result: as students hand in work, (very good work, actually), it comes in e-mails with subjects such as "HOLY SHIT my personal page is a SEXY BEAST!" That's the tamest one, the only one I feel I can print in this blog. And the stuff that's rolling through the waitlist? Suffice to say that I'm getting a good education in today's teenage profanity and slang. Yowza. This is not what I remember from when I was in high school.

Teaching Moment

2008-11-12T21:15:45Z

A student confessed that he'd been copying other students' work today. I kind of knew this, but didn't know to what extent. Apparently he's been copying almost everything, and now he's depressed because he feels like he's so behind. He's a smart kid, and could be really good at this stuff, but just made the choice early on to coast. Today I sat with him and looked for some tutorials online to catch him up. I will sometimes call kids out for cheating, when I am sure of it and when I think it will provoke a good discussion. Sometimes it exposes bad teaching on my part, and that's useful (though sometimes initially hard to take, depending on how much sleep I've had). In this case, I knew that he would eventually get to the point in the curriculum where he would realize he could no longer cheat, and that realization would be a more effective motivator than me badgering him to do his own work. That's happened. He'll have a rough time now, for a little while, and that will be hard for both of us. I think it's what he needs, though. And a good chance for me to practice being gentle and firm at the same time.

Comments on the New Ride

2008-11-09T05:20:28Z

Last night I took the Xtracycle off of the Mongoose, stripped the brakes, wheel, and derailleur off of the Trek, ran new cables, and installed the Xtra on the Trek. It went quickly, especially because I now have a new repair stand that I built for $25. Then I picked up the rear wheel...and discovered that it was too big to fit into the Xtra's dropouts without bumping the front stay of the Xtra. Disbelief. I read the size marked on the tire: 700c x 35c. I read the size marked on the tire of the Mongoose: 700c x 38c. Do I not understand wheel sizes? How can the Trek's be bigger than the Mongoose's? Anyway. It was late, so I gave up and went to bed. This morning I got the back wheel on by taking off the derailleur. In the future, I can probably get the wheel on and off if it's fully deflated. In any case, now I have a new ride! Comments: - It is so, so, so much nicer to run a new derailleur cable through something that is not a grip shift. - The Trek wheel is big enough that even my super adjustable V-brake rubs on the top of the tire when I pull the brake. Hmmm. Time to price a disc brake for the rear? - The Trek geometry is much more comfortable than the Mongoose. Yay. - The Trek's tires are only 3 years old, unlike the slightly crispy 13-year-old tires on the Mongoose. - Unfortunately the cool reflective sidewall on the Trek's rear wheel is mostly hidden by the Xtra's side bags. Dang. - I need some boots for wet weather riding (I thought tonight as I pedaled home after swing dancing at the North Star). Is it too ridiculous to put my calf-length stiletto boots into service as wet weather biking gear? I'm thinking I will try it. But it may require me to sew myself some superfabulous rain pants to go with the boots. It's a slippery slope.

Troublemaker

2008-11-06T02:39:14Z

I'm about to ruffle some feathers at school, I think. But I also think it's necessary for the long-term health of our school, and that's why I'm going to stick my neck out. Here goes.

No Secrets

2008-11-05T02:31:17Z

The new apartment is colder than my old apartment. The doorbell ring is a descending minor third rather than the major third of the old apartment. It's making me always have Depeche Mode's "I Want You Now" in my head (also a descending minor third). I like living downstairs, closer to the garden, with a view of the hoop house(s) from the kitchen. I like the apartment layout better for violin teaching; I think it's friendlier. I like the hardwood floors for tango dancing. But one thing this apartment does not have is something secret. After spending a childhood in the library reading the Bobbsey Twins and Nancy Drew, it seems mandatory that I live in a place that has a secret escape tunnel behind a fireplace, or a torch on the wall that I pull to reveal a hidden door behind a revolving bookcase, or something. Upstairs, the Murphy bed sort of fulfilled that. Maybe I should start small...a drawer with a false bottom? Or a hidden hatch into the basement through one of the now-unused heating registers? Hmmmm.

Home

2008-11-04T00:11:45Z

My flight back into Portland yesterday arrived at 2:45 p.m. We flew out to the east and then curved back toward the airport, banking to do a perfect tourist flyover. As we breezed past Portland Head and over my favorite lighthouse (Ram Island Ledge Light) in the sun, I couldn't keep a big smile off of my face. There's just nothing like the Maine coast.

Global Warming

2008-10-26T23:46:36Z

Wow, what was today's weather all about? Warm, sunny, Bonita outside chasing her tail in the crispy leaves...pretty soon I won't even need the hoop houses. But yesterday I finished getting them ready, and today they were hot and steamy. I planted lettuce, shiso, and herbs. This year I set them up together as one long house with 2 doors. In their new spot, they'll get more Spring sun than last year, and with my new design, they won't be flapping open in the Winter winds. I hope.

Future Xtracycle

2008-10-26T23:38:17Z

After riding the Mongoose/Xtracycle all summer, I wasn't quite satisfied with the Mongoose, so when I heard that Summerfeet Cycle Tours was selling some 3- and 4-year-old bikes, I called up to see when I could take a look. Today was a freaky warm, sunny day--I had stripped down to my T shirt by the time I arrived in Westbrook. One spin around the block on a Trek 73.5 (?) confirmed that it was far better than the Mongoose. An easy sale, and a fun ride home with both bikes!