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This blog was created for OLIT class at UNM on Adult Learning and Wisdom

Starters and screwdrivers

Sometimes things are lost. And we are frantic, panicked to find them. We say a quick prayer, summon our guardian angel to help us.

I tend to lose keys. If I have a guardian angel she has one VERY large ring of keys. I have tried fancy key chains, key chains that lock to my belt and making multiple copies to hide (usually from myself). It may be because growing up our front door didn't have a lock, and you could use a screwdriver to start the truck. But I really think it has to do with every single key meaning I am responsible for some room, some vehicle, some house somewhere and maybe losing the key is a way of screaming, "too MANY things to worry about!!!!"

I really don't mind having this rich and amazing life...but I really could use less keys. (and that drawer full of keys, who knows what there for?!)

The other option is getting rid of locks entirely. (this would help prevent me from breaking into my own house when I lose my keys, which I must say I have gotten really handy at) However I might be thought irresponsible if I don't lock my house, or car. Hmmm.

I guess for now the best I can do is put my keys on one ring, keep them in my purse (don't even talk about misplaced purses for the moment) and just do the best I can at keeping track of things.

And I do find that the less I panic, the better at keeping track of things I am. And I do need to remember I am very handy at breaking and entering...and I am handy with starters and screwdrivers.

weighted

Live as if you liked yourself, and it may happen:
reach out, keep reaching out, keep bringing in.
This is how we are going to live for a long time: not always,
for every gardener knows that after the digging, after
the planting,
after the long season of tending and growth, the harvest comes.- Marge Piercy


I need to work out more with weights. No, No, really, I can see you smiling at me, but I do. I need to pump some iron. I used to be triathlon ready. That was when I was thirty-one. Before the baby, marriage, working full-time, attending grad school. But, lo and behold after years off the photo film circuit I get a call to lens a movie, for pay. Now I realize my body is soft and that lifting 35 pound cameras is going to be tough, that injuries might be involved if I don't get back to pumping some iron. I am sort of stressed about it.

Then today I lift up my 45 pound six year old, toss him over my shoulder spin around until the world swims and  collapse in the grass. I don't break. I feel great. I am laughing. So we do it again, and again. Spinning like tops. I am strong. I might not be working out at the gym, but I am running with my son, painting the shed, fixing the car, baking cupcakes for every function imaginable and weeding the garden. I am active and yes, a little softer, too. And that may be why I got the call to shoot this film. The call that I didn't get ten years ago.

the red guys and the white guys: the fight to altruism

Oliver is 6. He sometimes has a fit about something. He hasn't learned the adult way to have a fit; suppression. So sometimes his fits are loud, crazy and really the all around temper tantrum. He told us on his walk to school that there are these bad guys inside his gut that make him do these bad things. My husband told him that, well, there are good guys in there too making him do good things. He agreed. The bad guys are white, he said. And I think the good guys are red.

Balancing out the good and the bad, the red and the white guys inside. Learning to personify our own behaviors. I think I may try that this week. Thinking about my feelings being a part of this family inside me and applying the same tools I use with my family; compassion, love and understanding. Far better than beating myself up for doing things that are just part of me.

Psych Monday

I am not really that psyched, but it just happened to be a day that included a student heckling from the front row, a crisis of equipment eligibility, an adjunct with a BIG issue, an advisee with GI Bill non-payment and older mother not doing well issues and on top of that the copier/printer started eating paper, blinking colors I have never seen before and ruining original documents that it forgot it was copying. This was all between 8am and 1pm. But I did get this little note from a fellow colleague, "Saw Jay this weekend, old student of yours, continuing on with school. Said he really appreciated that you cared so much for people in your program, that he just doesn't feel that camaraderie at the new school. Wanted you to know that. Knew he used to give you a real hard time. Best, K."

So there's the gift. The chug chug chugging along pays off. And maybe, who knows, I will get that Ed Psych Doctorate eventually, if I don't die first.

Spring sunday

Palm Sunday...it was a huge day for my family growing up... The beginning of Holy Week. A week of masses, parties, a new dress, hat and white patent leather shoes. Now we are far from family and we decided to skip services and hike under the Ponderosa pines and piñon. The sweet smell of sap running, like warm caramel. Dust covered toes in Tevas. Our own parade of celebration. The beauty of rebirth. Snow gone, earth worms swarming in the garden. Spring blossoms scattered like confetti in the air. I sit comfortable under the old budding willow watching Oliver scamp around finding forgotten yard toys that survived the winter. This continuance. This reassurance that spring will always come. I may be different but the tulips are bound to bloom and the trees will leaf. When death is inevitable it is nice to know the mountain I climb today will be here long after me. I am comforted by this thought. The inevitability of rebirth. This is why I celebrate this week and why I will pack baskets full of goodies. To share the smiles of this time of year. Spring has sprung!

middle of term

It is that time in the semester where we begin to race to the end. In the next six weeks I will be completing the shooting of interviews for the ethics awards, I will be trying to wrangle my students to make passing grades, tutoring, getting them study help and trying very hard for them to realize the importance of these last few weeks of the semester. And me? As a student I will be designing a class lesson plan that teaches wisdom, writing a paper about someone who is wise and I will be creating the basis for my thesis at UNM.

I am using my Spring Break to write, research, think and in many cases wrestle my printer to try and get it to output what I need. I also am trying to work on my relationship building. In the winter months I tend not to venture out as much. After Christmas there is a lull of gathering...a huddling inside after the winter equinox. The spring equinox is upon us. Suddenly the whole world has the same amount of light and dark, at least for 24 hours. And it is time for me to build again my personal and professional relationships, the ones that get put back into the nooks and crannies during the winter.

As I research material for my class with wisdom, I am revisiting cognitive film theory. Film theory. The thought of it makes me groan...but I realize all this studying of the brain is exactly what cognitive film theory is. Why define emotion? Why understand emotion? Because I now believe our impulses are what drives us towards wisdom or away from it. Synapse is the brain, impulse is the heart.