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“Computer illiterate”

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Fairly frequently, people come into the library and they tell us that they are “computer illiterate” and they ask if there is someone who can help them with the computers.

They don’t ever tell us that they are illiterate and want someone to read the books to them.

Several years ago, they would say this with a certain amount of pride, like it was a good thing. They would say it as if dealing with computers was something that other people did, and they were above it. They would say it as if computers were just a passing fad that they could ignore.

They’ve started to realize that they aren’t going away, and that being “computer illiterate” isn’t such a great thing.

The library does teach classes in computers. They are free, and open to everybody. Our system also has books and DVDs that teach you how to use a computer if you can’t get to one of the classes.

The odd part is that often the people who say this are those who have to get on the computer to apply for a job. These days, a lot of job applications are online. No paper, no typewriter. It is all online, in part because the job itself uses computers. If you can’t fill out the application, you probably can’t do the job.

It is a hard, cold truth.

These days, being computer illiterate is the same as being illiterate. It is out in the cold, left behind, stuck with a low paying job.

The funny part is that these same people will say that their seven year old grandchild does better at computers than they do. The funny part there is that the only reason that a seven year old can work it is that the five year old doesn’t know he can’t. He just looks at it and tries. He thinks about the options and gives the best available one a try. If it doesn’t work, he tries something else. This is how anyone learns anything. Try. If it doesn’t work, try something else.

Maybe they should get their grandchildren to teach them how to work a computer, and for that matter, life in general. Maybe they have forgotten that the secret to everything is to give it your best guess and see what happens.

Knitting, sewing, and the relay race of knowledge

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My Mom tried to teach me how to knit. In a way, she did. She taught me how to knit insofar as she taught me how to move the needles so that I added to the piece.

But she only taught me the fun part of knitting. She didn’t teach me how to cast on (to get started) and she didn’t teach me how to fix the problem when I dropped a stitch or picked up another one. Most of the time I didn’t even know I had a problem. I certainly didn’t learn how to prevent it.

Part of being a good teacher is making sure your student can do everything on her own. If she still needs you around then she hasn’t really learned anything at all. The goal is independence.

I had the same problem with her and sewing. We had an old Singer sewing machine that was in a standalone cabinet. It was a huge piece of furniture. While it was cool how the machine folded up inside this thing that served as a sideboard when it wasn’t in use, it wasn’t cool how it worked as a sewing machine.

Of course, I didn’t know that the problems I was having were the machine’s fault and not mine. I thought that when it would jam up it was because I did something wrong, and not because it had a faulty design.

The problems were that my Mom didn’t tell me this, and that every time there was a problem she would fix it for me, rather than teaching me how to do it myself.

After she died, the sewing machine became my nemesis. A friend had taught me a little bit more about how to sew but I still was having a problem loading the bobbin or with having the top thread get stuck and jammed up with the bottom thread. It seemed like I spent more time fixing problems than sewing.

Somehow I came up with the idea of buying a used, portable sewing machine rather than getting that one fixed. It think it was cheaper to get a used one that works than fix the one I had. The new (-ish) one came with a manual. With pictures. I read it and understood how a sewing machine worked for a change. Somehow in time I learned that the Singer sewing machines were known for bobbin and thread problems. If you have bobbin and thread problems, you don’t really have a sewing machine.

I learned that my problems with that machine were not because of me. I learned how to work my new machine. I learned how to sew, for real.

To be a good teacher, you have to teach the good and the bad. You have to show the student the fun parts of the subject to get her interest, sure, but you also have to show her everything else. She has to be able to do it all on her own. Ideally, you’ll teach her everything you know, all your tricks and tips, all your hard earned knowledge, so that she will then be able to learn even more and pass that on.

It is the only form of immortality we have.

We can’t live forever. Our lives are far shorter than we realize. But our knowledge can last far beyond our bodies. If we pass it on well, then we have improved the lives of everyone who lives past us.

It is like a relay race. Every person does her best so that the next person can do her best. The team gets further along with each person who pushes herself. But if we are stingy with our knowledge or are just inept, we might as well not have been in the race at all.

Yoga in the morning.

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I’m rethinking my idea of yoga. I think it is better to do it every day, rather than just once a week at a class. I also think it is better for me to do it first thing in my morning routine rather than at the end.

I hear it is best to do yoga before having breakfast. This would certainly take care of my need to get my morning started but not be in the way of my husband. Our day overlaps by about thirty minutes and if I go into the kitchen where he is it is a little chaotic. I’ve discovered that it is best for both of us if I don’t try to start my morning in the same place where he is trying to finish his.

As an alternative, I’ve been bringing my Kindle into the bedroom to write during that time, and while I may still do some of that, I think that doing yoga then would be good too.

I’d been leaving yoga for the end, just after my shower. Somehow I was running out of time and I was either rushing through the poses or just skipping them entirely. So that isn’t working. When I had been making time to do it I’d also been doing an example of “Praying in Color” and that was good too. In the past several months if I’d done either they were done as a sort of afterthought.

If I do them first, they are done. No excuses.

I like how I feel during the day if I’ve done a little yoga. Things seem to go better. I’ve actually found myself sort of checking in with myself. Did I write? Yes. Did I do yoga? Yes. It is like taking a multivitamin for my soul. If I’ve done it, I feel better.

Now, do I feel better because I’ve done yoga, or because I’ve done something I feel is good for me? I don’t know. This has long been something I’ve wondered about. Is it the activity that matters or the commitment and discipline that matters? Sometimes I think what helps me the most is intentionally living my life, rather than just drifting aimlessly through it.

This is part of why I write. Writing keeps me awake. Writing means I face things, rather than running away from them. Writing means I don’t hide behind the unknowing, behind the questions. When I write, I dig, and when I dig, I learn. I start to uncover, and recover, the truth, and with it, myself.

Writing is yoga too, like that. Yoga isn’t just poses. Yoga is a way of thinking. Yoga is sticking with it and working through it. Yoga is leaning in and being patient. Yoga is trying. Yoga is sometimes just showing up, bored and tired, but there anyway. Yoga is finding the center calm. Yoga is better lived off the mat. Yoga is being awake in the moment.

So why wouldn’t I do this every day? Why wouldn’t everybody?

A ring makes it real.

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I don’t wear diamonds very often. They get in the way. They draw attention.

When we got engaged, I insisted on a diamond ring. A ring makes it real, and a diamond ring is traditional. Not only did I want other people to know we were engaged, I wanted to know I was engaged.

I’d had two previous boyfriends who had asked me to marry them. It turns out that what they were really asking was if they were to ask me for real, would I say yes. There was no sincerity to their question, unbeknownst to me. I thought I was engaged but I ended up just being embarrassed. The one constant in both situations was that there was no ring.

I wasn’t about to make the same mistake a third time. When my husband and I started talking about getting married, I called his bluff. We’d talked about what we would wear at our wedding and who would be there and what kind of food we would have. It was fun in a daydreaming kind of way but I was getting tired of playing the fool. Are we serious about getting married or not? And if we are serious, where’s my ring?

When I said this, slightly more gently than that, he balked a bit. His concern wasn’t about getting married to me, or even getting married in general. His concern was price. He balked at the idea of spending two months’ salary on a ring.

I pointed out that it is the diamond industry that says that, and I’m a cheap date. I don’t need a big flashy ring. I am not a girly girl. But I do need something to be sure of his intentions.

Now, while I didn’t want a big flashy ring, I also didn’t want a ring made up of a bunch of diamond chips. I’ve seen these in the past, but I haven’t seen any in a while. They look sparkly from far away but really cheap close up. And I don’t just mean inexpensive. I mean low class, in that trailer park kind of way. These rings have a simple shank and a flat disk soldered on top. This is to maximize the surface area. It is about half an inch across. The tiny pieces are set in it, without prongs. It kind of looks like a tiny lotus pod, but without the symbolism. It kind of looks like it came out of a vending machine or a box of Cracker Jacks.

I needed something a little more than that. Something that wouldn’t draw attention or break the bank, but also something that wouldn’t elicit sympathy and be purchased with pocket change.

We settled on a happy medium. The funny thing is that I don’t even wear it anymore. It sticks up a bit, and that makes it hard to wear at work or in the winter when I have to wear gloves. I ended up getting another ring that is channel set. I wear it when I’m not going to the Y, because I take my rings off then and I don’t want to lose it.

I’ve also bought another ring for myself and it is a “diamond in the rough.” It is a raw diamond set into a sterling silver band that has been hammered. It is one of a kind, and I love the symbolism. If it were to be cut to make it sparkle, it would lose a lot of its size. I also like the idea of learning to see beauty in simple things.

Meltdown

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All people want to be noticed and loved. All people want to have their needs met. This is especially true in children. They are helpless to help themselves in many situations. They have not been taught how to take care of themselves, so when they wear out they tend to lose that thin veneer of calm.

I was making a cart of books in the workroom the other day and I heard a loud wail. It sounded like some child was very upset. It kind of sounded like a child was being harmed in a permanent kind of way. I waited a little bit and wondered what was going on. Surely the parents would come soon. The voice sounded like it was coming from a small child – too small to be in the library by herself. The wail continued. There was no Doppler effect – the child was staying in one place. So she wasn’t running around trying to get either to or from parents. So she would be easy to locate. Why weren’t the parents doing anything? Why wasn’t a person-in-charge (the manager on duty) doing anything?

So I did something. I had no idea what was going on, but I had to do something. This child sounded like she was in killed by this point. I was pretty sure she wasn’t, but I wasn’t going to take any chances. Generally people don’t do such insane things in public spaces. If nothing else, she was definitely disturbing the other patrons. She was certainly disturbing me. So something had to be done – and since nobody in charge (parents or staff) was going, it was time for me to do it.

I went to the low wall that surrounds the children’s area. It is like a little fortress. I looked over and saw the child lying on her back, waving her feet and arms. The chair was upright – so she hadn’t fallen out of it and hit her head. I called out to her “What is wrong?” I said it in a sing-song voice. Sometimes that alone is enough to break the spell of the meltdown. I got nothing out of this. Then I looked nearby. What looked like her grandmother was sitting across from her, hands in her lap. She smiled at me, like this is normal, like she can’t do anything about it. I looked next to the grandmother and what looked like the child’s Mom was there. Same body language. They didn’t look like this was a total surprise. But they also didn’t seem to want to do anything about it.

Their child is their responsibility. Her well being is their job. If she is wailing like that, something is wrong. Their first concern should be to soothe her. The second concern should be the fact that she is being very loud and disturbing in a public place, and most especially a library. Being loud just isn’t what you do. If they fixed the first issue, the second issue would sort itself out. But they were doing nothing.

So I did. I went around the low wall and went up to her. I crouched down next to her and just started talking to her. She looked like she was about 2. I could tell from looking in her eyes she was very tired. It was around 4 that all of this was happening. I’m willing to bet these clueless guardians hadn’t thought to let her have a nap. Children can only handle so much. They aren’t short adults. They need more rest. They don’t know how to take care of themselves. That is why they have guardians – who are supposed to help them. These two were less than useless.

Even if you don’t know what is going on, at least pick your child up and hold her. Even if you don’t know what is going on, start with the basics. Give her some water or food (NOT sugar). Talk with her and ask her what is going on.

Sometimes children are so worn out that they can’t tell you what is wrong. They know something is, but they can’t figure it out. They are too young to know what the problem is. They just know they don’t feel well and the situation is getting worse. They yell and scream as a way to ask for help. In theory, the parent should be self-aware enough to prevent this from happening by ensuring the child has enough rest and exercise and water and healthy food.

A child who is “acting out” isn’t a bad child. It is a sign of a parent who doesn’t know how to take care of a child. Sometimes it is because that parent was in turn raised by bad parents. How can you learn how to take care of another person when you were raised by selfish people?

While I was talking to her, her mom and grandmother just stared. They didn’t intervene. I wear a name tag, but I’m not an expert. But something had to be done. I talked to this little girl. I suggested some things – “Are you tired?” “Are you thirsty?” “Are you hungry?” hoping that either she would respond to one of those or that it would wake the guardians up – maybe there was something really simple going on. Maybe they would listen to what I was suggesting and learn to ask the same questions in the future. From their lack of interest in the situation I think that this wasn’t a fluke situation. They didn’t seem surprised by her outburst. So, in a way, I was trying to help their daughter but also to teach them to help her in the future.

She calmed down, got up from the floor, and went to the bookshelf. She pulled out a random book and brought it to me. She wanted me to read it to her. I didn’t have the time for that – and she had two guardians there. I pointed to them. “Have your Mom read it to you” I said – and Mom smiled and waved the child to her.

She was quiet the rest of the time there, which was about an hour. She just wanted some attention. This isn’t being needy. This is being normal. I can’t tell you how often I see parents sitting in the same area with their children but they aren’t interacting with them. They care more about their cell phone than they care about their child.

They are there in body only. They expect the child to do all the work. The child cannot learn to read just by picking up a book.

Don’t have children if you aren’t ready to raise children. If you aren’t ready, then put them up for adoption. There are hundreds of people who want children and can’t have them. Or find a parenting class. There is no reason for a child to be emotionally abused because of the immaturity of the parents.

I’m not a parent but I have the basics figured out. Feed them. Give them water. Let them have a nap. Let them go run and play. Do this every day, several times a day. And spend time with them. They need love and attention. Children are just like plants. If you don’t nurture them, they grow up a little stunted and warped.

Walking to Nashville

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A lady came up to me at work a few days ago and said “I’m walking. How do I get downtown?” She was middle aged and looked healthy in mind and body. This was around 6 pm.

Now, you need to understand that downtown Nashville is about twenty minutes away, by car, from where we were.

I said that was going to take her hours. She said it didn’t matter, she had to get to work in the morning and she didn’t have any money for a taxi and she didn’t understand the bus routes. She again asked for directions on how to walk to downtown Nashville.

I was torn, a little. Should I give her money? She didn’t ask for it. She looked like she was in her right mind, even though I didn’t think she was acting like it.

So I gave her directions. If you walk north to the main road and go left it is a straight shot to downtown. It is how I go, but I drive. The freeway traffic in Nashville is terrible. I hope to never walk to downtown, but if I had to I’d go this way.

This all raised more questions.

Why doesn’t she have a car?
Why doesn’t she have any money?
Where are friends she could call for a ride?
Where is she going to sleep – or is she?
How did she get here to start off with?
How did she get to be my age and be in such a situation?

But then again, I think I was more concerned about her than she was. I felt that this was a bad situation, but one brought about by bad choices. She seemed rather matter of fact about it, blasé even. I got the impression that this was her normal.

While I wanted to rescue her by giving her money for a cab, I got the impression didn’t feel like she needed to be rescued. And I knew deep down that if I bailed her out this time, it wouldn’t prevent the next time. If she hasn’t learned how to plan ahead by now it is highly unlikely that she is going to any time soon.

I wonder if she made it to where she was going. I wonder if she knew what to do when she got there.

I gave her the help she asked for, and secretly I was relieved that she didn’t ask for money. I’m always wary of panhandlers. I never know if they are going to spend the money I give them on what they asked for. I don’t want to aid and abet an addiction.

I wanted to save her from what I saw as bad choices. If I’m being honest, I wanted her to be me. I wanted her to be independent and self sufficient. But if I’m digging even further and being really honest I have to admit that she already was, she just wasn’t in a way that I recognized and approved of.

Money, cash, and addiction

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I’m really getting into this idea of saving money by using cash. It has only been two weeks into this experiment and the results are pretty amazing.

Before, I’d really get a rise out of spending money. Now I’m getting excited about not spending it.

When I first started I felt like I should carry my whole week’s allowance with me. I thought I might need money on hand, more than I normally did. You know, just in case I had to buy something. Like there would be a random need to buy, like an itch that needed to be scratched.

It is weird. I realize now that money was like a drug for me. I got a high out of using it. I started to get nervous if I didn’t have enough on me.

Now, I hadn’t gone totally cash free in all these years. I normally carried some cash on me even when I used credit cards all the time. It made me feel better to have it. Every now and then the credit card machine wasn’t working. Some places don’t take cards at all. Sometimes it was faster to pay in cash. Sometimes there would be a collection being taken up at work for a gift for a coworker who was leaving or having a baby or both. It is better to tip in cash.

I was always grateful to have it when I needed it. I just didn’t get that I’d be better off using it.

Now I carry a credit card as the backup instead of the default. I’m not quite comfortable going without it yet. Last week I needed it because I went to the dentist for a filling. I’d forgotten that dental insurance isn’t like medical insurance. The bill I got upon leaving was a lot bigger than my usual twenty dollar co-pay. Even with that, I still spent less than I had been spending when I used the credit card all the time.

I don’t know how I’ve been doing it. For the past few years I was spending $300 to $500 a week on my credit card. I paid it off every week. This is a lot of money, especially for a government employee. We get paid in benefits, not in actual money. I didn’t get toys. I bought things that were needed, or so I thought.

The first week I pulled out $300 in cash. I overspent by $40 because of the dentist. So still, pretty good. Far better than $500. This week I pulled out $200 and I’ve only spent half of that. This includes buying groceries. A lot of my money was going to eating out. Now that I’m cooking fresh food I’m not only eating better I’m saving money.

I’d not planned on this additional part to my New Year’s resolution, but I’ll take it.

Clean plate club

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Are you a member of the clean plate club? Remember that from childhood? Remember the shame your parents would put on you to finish everything on your plate?

Even if you were full, even if there was something on your plate that disagreed with you, that made you sick, you were expected to finish it off.

I get it. Our parents didn’t want us to be wasteful. They needed us to learn to appreciate what we had. They also didn’t want to have to feed us at irregular times. If we didn’t eat at lunch time, we’d be hungry at 2, and they would have to make more food for us. That is inconvenient for them. It also teaches the child that he is in charge, and that is a bad precedent.

But there is a problem here. The child didn’t fill his own plate. There may be too much on it. There may be items on it he is allergic to.

Children are not small adults. Their stomachs are smaller. To insist that they eat the same amount and at the same times as adults is to ignore that fact.

To insist that they clean their plate when they had no say as to what and how much went on it is to teach them to ignore their own body’s needs and their own feelings. It is to tell them that their own needs and feelings do not matter.

It is exactly the same as force feeding the child. Actually it is worse. It is expecting the child to force feed himself. It sets him up for a lifetime of not listening to his own body’s needs. It sets him up for obesity, at a minimum.

At the worst it teaches him that his own needs and feelings do not matter, do not count. It teaches him that he, himself, as a person does not matter and does not count.

Book – what to include?

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Dear Readers –

I am going to put some of this blog into a book. Do you have any particular posts that come to mind that you think I should include? What has spoken to you? What resonates? What fires you up and gets you going? What consoles you? Please let me know the title.

And, what do you think is a fair price that you would be willing to pay for a such a collection?

Thanks!

-Betsy

Keep the patient happy and comfortable – especially at a dentist’s office.

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Dentist chairs need to be way more comfortable. This is a time of extreme discomfort. Whatever they can do to make you feel at ease is a good idea.

How about a support for my knees? How about a wider chair? Basically, how about a recliner, but in a cleanable fabric. Because sometimes dental work can get messy, and stains don’t inspire confidence. I’m pretty sure a dentist would hate to have to get a whole new chair because of slobber. So there has to be some balance between comfort and cleanability.

Having a small beanbag for a pillow is nice, as well as a blanket. Arm supports that cradle your arms are essential. Well, I had one of those, but a girl can dream. Making sure your patient is comfortable will ensure that your patient is easy to work on. My chiropractor seems to be the only person who understands this. Very few doctors seem to get how important it is to put their patients at ease by using soft colors and lights, and nice furnishings.

I dislike going to the dentist for fillings. I don’t know anybody who does like it to be honest. It is really an invasion of space. The majority of your sense organs are right there where they are working, and what they are doing isn’t that awesome.

For somebody with sensory processing disorder it can be a bit overwhelming.

Feeling the pinch in my gums and the tugging on my cheek when he gives me the shot. Hearing the sound of the drill. Seeing the spray of powder from my tooth when he drills. Smelling the burning from said tooth being drilled. All senses are being engaged, and none of them are getting good signals to work with.

I see and hear and smell things very deeply. This is part of why I am an artist. But it is also why it is hard to deal with really intense experiences like going to the dentist.

I’ve brought my phone. I can write in between bits. I can listen to a podcast during. I know a bit about meditation. Maybe some yoga practice will help.

I had a dentist when I was growing up who didn’t use anesthesia. He thought he didn’t need to. He thought he was gentle and careful. For the most part he was. But just being tense, worrying about the possibility of being hurt, was pretty bad. That alone made me never want to go back to the dentist, until not going really wasn’t an option anymore. My first trip back involved a root canal.

But at least that dentist had something interesting to look at. He had a mural on the wall that I was facing that had a huge scene. All these people doing all these things. It was kind of like the blue and white Chinese pottery called “Blue Willow”. I could get lost in it. I did. I had to. It was there that I learned to dissociate, to just not be there when something bad was going on.

My current dentist is very gentle and he uses anesthesia, but his rooms are really boring. There’s nothing to stare at or to fall in to with my mind. Today I found a spot of light shining through the blinds. It was something. The assistant kept asking me if I was OK. Yeah – until you had to bring me back to thinking about what is going on…

I’ve learned that bringing my iPhone helps. I listen to a podcast while it is all going on and that not only does that cut out the noise of the drill, my mind is occupied with something educational. I’ve also learned to consciously relax a lot. I mean a lot because I have to keep reminding myself to do it. I keep tensing up so I have to keep relaxing. Normally I’d work on my breathing, but that isn’t easy there. Too many bad smells.

In the meantime, I’ll keep brushing three times a day. The cavity that developed was around an old filling. It had lasted a long time. It was an old mercury filling so I was glad to see it go anyway. For a long time I was an old pro at getting fillings. It was so normal to me. Every time I’d go to the dentist I’d have to get a filling. Fortunately I’ve learned how to eat better and take better care of myself, so fillings aren’t my norm anymore. But I still think that the whole experience could be made better.

Maybe I need to get my chiropractor to talk to my dentist. Mood lighting is a good start. And no news or tabloid junk on the TV in the waiting room. And a nice welcoming paint job on the walls…or a mural. Yeah, that. Something to get lost in. I kind of miss that mural. I sure don’t miss that dentist.