Buzzing with anticipation

As happens every year around this time, I feel like my body is buzzing with anticipation this week. Christmas is SO CLOSE, but somehow, impossibly, sooooooo far away. I want to get everything ready, but there are so many things that just have to wait until closer to the time, and other things that could be done right now only they just aren't mine to control. Waiting drives me crazy. I'm literally vibrating with the need to do something and cross it off my list. But I love being excited about Christmas. I feel good -- so far!


I'm starting to learn that there is more than one meaning behind the concept of patience. There's patience with people, which involves compassion and understanding, and then there's patience with waiting, which involves calmness and, well, waiting. The first kind of patience, where you allow people to work things out without undue interference, is pretty important in my profession. I'm passionate about working with children and about facilitating their steps toward independence, so I have to be willing to let them go slowly and do things their own way, but still be there to observe and help them along.

As for the waiting calmly part, I'll admit I'm not always the best at that. I like efficiency, and like many people, I tend to think that the way I've worked out oh-so-logically is the most efficient possible way, and so I can be quick to jump in and take over when I forget myself. Ask any seven-year-old -- when you think you know the answer, it's hard to refrain from blurting it out.

However, I think what do I have tons of is compassion and understanding. When I have the patience to listen, and to ask questions that aim to help me understand the other person's narrative instead of to satisfy my own (admittedly voracious) curiosity, I'm pretty good at understanding others' perspectives, and empathy is something I sometimes feel like I'm up to my eyeballs in. I love the kids I work with, and to be honest, working with them helps me rethink the way I interact with adults as well.

Lately, I've been working (with middling success, but that's not exactly failure, right?) on listening more and offering my unsolicited opinion less. It's a work in progress; acceptance of things the way they are instead of the way I think they should be is a huge stumbling block that I'm slowly chipping away at, but obviously, as demonstrated by my little Christmas mini-freak-out above, important to the peaceful living of everyday life. So... patience.

One thing I wish there were a magical formula for is the "right" amount of involvement in other people's issues. How do you know who, how, when? Is there an age, or a degree of social separation, at which it is appropriate to offer one's opinions and advice and concerns without solicitation? Is there a certain type of body language or a certain set of key phrases that are supposed to cue us to action? As a teacher, as a family member, as a friend, I find it hard to know when to step in and when to butt out of other people's problems -- and it seems as though every person and every situation has a different threshold.


To those of you who have seen the know-it-all side of me (maybe that's all of you... well, so be it then), I apologize for those times when it gets annoying or uncomfortable, and I hope it's balanced by at least a few helpful instances. I promise you, I mean well. And please, please, feel free to simply say, "I'm not really looking for advice right now. I just want you to listen." Or, even better, tell me how you think I could be most helpful to you. I promise, I will do my best to have patience.

Serendipity with a side of caution

I just finished reading Inside Out Girl, by Canadian author Tish Cohen. It's the story of Olivia, a little girl with Non-verbal Learning Disorder (NLD), and of the people in her life.

Before reading this book, I'd never heard of NLD, but my understanding now is that it's a disorder that presents somewhat like and can often be conflated with Asperger's Syndrome. People with NLDs will often be very good with verbal learning and with using the meanings of words, but will have trouble understanding and gaining information from non-verbal cues, such as tone, facial expression, body language, symbols, etc. In addition, they may have fine motor difficulties, and other symptoms.

I sometimes have instances where I have to wonder if the universe is trying to tell me something very specific. You know that "huh" moment that comes when you pick up a book for no particular reason or just because it's been on your to-read list for a while or whatever, and it turns out to deal with the exact question that's been puzzling you recently, or to contain a direct solution to your current worry, even though you had no thought of these things when you chose it? That's what I felt while reading this book. Olivia's characteristics, the ones that are linked to her LD, remind me very much of a student that I have this year whom I've been puzzling over, and whom everyone -- parents, teachers, peers -- is kind of uncertain exactly how to help and interact with.

Sadly, Inside Out Girl does not contain answers, but what it did give me was lots of insight into the problems that a young person like Olivia might have, both academically and socially, and the neurological bases for those problems -- which helps me think of or look for ways to access strengths and bypass weaknesses. Also, knowing that the situation with my student is not a unique or unknown one tells me that I might find still more insight out there.

As for the book itself, I really enjoyed it. I fell in love with most of Cohen's characters, and was really into their stories. One thing that impressed me was that the author didn't cop out with a completely happy ending filled with miracles and rainbows. Bad things happened, bad choices were made, consequences stuck. But the fact that it managed to be very far from depressing with all that said, made me happy. I like happy endings. I like smart happy endings better.

I'm already onto my next Tish Cohen book. So far so good.

Christmas and "musical" moments: These are a few of my favourite things

I follow this blog, zenhabits, because it sometimes has good ideas for reducing clutter and upping your simple happiness factor. Today's post is about doing the things that truly inspire you and make you happy, and in it, the author linked to this video. (Scroll down to the middle of the page, to the youtube insert.)

Now, you all know I love flashmobs. This one is awesome and definitely no exception. While I watched it, I had to wonder how many people were originally part of the performance, and how many joined in spontaneously because they have performed the chorus in one form or another before and know it fairly well.

Happy holidays.

http://zenhabits.net/get-inspired/

A tragedy in moderation?

Just finished reading Annabel Lyon's The Golden Mean. The book was recommended to me by my aunt, and let me just say it now: my favourite thing about this book was, and still is, the image on the front cover. Yes, I am that kind of reader.

Aside from pictures of course, the novel itself was pretty good and quite interesting, but I have to admit to not having understood a great deal of it. Part of this is probably because my knowledge of the lives and histories of Alexander the Great and his teacher Aristotle -- the two central characters of the novel -- is, shall we say, porous.

Part of it, I like to hope, is that the author seems to represent courtly intrigues and everyday slights with a realistic sort of opacity. You don't always realize you've been stabbed in the back by your host until you've left the party, had a couple of drinks, and have begun to lose yourself in your latest trashy vampire novel. It dawns on you in the middle of a paragraph that you might be bleeding dignity. You understand that something about their turn of phrase wasn't entirely on the level... but you're too far removed from it now and there's nothing you can do to help yourself make better sense of it, and so you're left with the fuzzy knowledge that you were the butt of a joke... of some kind... you think. That's how I felt about a lot of the seemingly pivotal yet wilfully vague scenes in the book, and it's how some of the characters felt too. You know, maybe.

Either way, one thing I thought Lyon did really well was to portray the Macedonians as real people, without that ponderous feeling of greatness by virtue of ancientness that you often get when reading about History(TM). These ancients were just folk, three-dimensional, earthy, petty, distractable, workaday. I felt they might, like me, enjoy something one day and like it rather less the next. They seemed capable of having intellectual opinions about stuff that didn't always jibe with their gut convictions. The most intelligent and emotionally astute ones were able to make mistakes in judgement, perhaps convinced that somebody was sweet and innocent when that person was actually a sociopath. The most sociopathic ones demonstrated frequently how sweet and lonely and loving and childish they could be.

The "golden mean" of the title represents a theme I've always found attractive: that of moderation between extremes. The protagonist, Aristotle, tried to teach his protege, the young Alexander, to be wary of becoming a caricature based on extremes, and instead to pursue greatness by finding the balance between intellectual and physical, philosophical and practical, hard and soft, etc. One of my frustrations is that only a brief summary of Alexander's adult life is offered as an Afterword, and so it's hard for me to say whether he managed to achieve this, or whether the author and/or protagonist saw him as having gone toward a tragic extreme. Theatrical tragedy was another important theme of the novel, and I feel like somehow I've failed because I'm not quite able to decide whether the novel was one. I think yes. But I'm not sure.

Aside from me not having as deep an understanding of it as I would have liked (which, I suppose, is no small thing), the one thing about this novel that disappointed me was the fact that several characters had important roles and perspectives that I would have liked to know more about. Several of the characters had specific mental illnesses that had a pretty huge impact on their lives, and these were frequently discussed and referred to, but with one exception, not explored or explained nearly to my satisfaction. I wanted to know more about Arridhaeus, Alexander's brother, and about his mother Olympias. Their lives had huge importance in the sequence of events in the book... but the fact that their perspectives were entirely left out even as their effects were widely felt was frustrating to me. I guess that's the way of things with HistoryTM though -- the perspective of women, of slaves, of the disabled, these are left off the books and the strong, healthy firstborn sons of sons get the last word. But I guess that's why I'm frustrated -- this was fiction, written by a Canadian female author. Shouldn't I have been able to expect a little equity??

The purpose of life is...

Well, report cards are done, I'm feeling more in charge of my teaching programs and my life, and I feel pretty good about my relationship with Nonsense these days. Since my major stressors are on the wane for the moment, I'm turning toward the more permanent deep-set stuff within me that often gets me down.

In Mind Over Mood, the authors talk about identifying "Core Beliefs". More ingrained than our "Automatic Thoughts" (the self-talk and flash images that spontaneously come up during our emotional reactions), Core Beliefs are absolutistic and generalistic ideas about ourselves, other people, and the way the world works that tend to govern the way we act and interact.

Chronicles of back-to-school (or: My week in stupid)

So this first week back to school has not be the glorious, uplifting rollercoaster of delight and frazzlement that I was so looking forward to all summer. Instead it's been an appalling rollercoaster of frazzlement and surprising social and organizational gaffes that I intend, after this post, to relegate to the abyss of That-Which-Must-Not-Be-Spoken.

That said, I shall simply list all of the icky stupid acts and non-acts of the week that I can remember, one after the other:

1. Arrived at school on the first day, as parents were arriving with the students, instead of nice and early as intended so I could be there and ready by the time they showed up.
2. Forgot (!) to attend the "Introduction of all teachers to all students" assembly on the first day of school.
3. Neglected to hand in my paysheet on Tuesday as previously explained to me.
4. Neglected to write down the details of a new tutoring student's tutoring plan when I had settled them and therefore needed to go around asking for the plans again.
5. Asked an innocently curious (read: nosy) question that precipitated a thorough and crushing answer and an unexpected journey I'm terrified to take.
6. Left my planner (the one that contains all my daily and weekly activities, directions for how to get to them, contacts and phone numbers, and to-do lists, which I don't have to remember because I always have them written in my planner -- oh aaaaand my chequebook) at my sister's in Ajax.
7. Spent a ton of time on long-range planning, and completely neglected short-range planning, with the result that all of my lessons this week have felt harried and unprofessional.
8. Forgot to bring the French-English dictionary I got out of the library for the purpose to my tutoring student's house so that we could look up words she (and I) didn't know.
9. Finished a conversation with my newest tutoring student's dad, after which I looked down to see that the top button of my blouse had come undone and the top third of my bra (thankfully a colour that went okay with the blouse itself) was hanging out there.
10. Forgot to respond to an urgent request for a last-minute tutoring session.
11. Received a call from my newest tutoring student's mom which informed me that in fact she hadn't been supposed to be tutored that day because mom had decided to give her a break from tutoring for a while.
12. Left my pencil case at the home of my tutoring student, where I won't visit again until next week, complete with my most useful pens, mechanical pencils and highlighers, as well as the game cards I made up to use during such tutoring sessions.

And there you have it. If I've forgotten anything, please just keep it to yourself. Next week will be great. Great.

Exercise.... who knew?

So this anti-anxiety, anti-depression medication that I'm taking has been taking me on a minor roller-coaster (think teacups, not days of thunder) of side-effects. At first I had a lot, but only for a few days. Eventually it leveled out so I seemed to only be having trouble with some jaw tension, and vivid yet mundane dreams that sometimes tire me out (which I've had for some time, but have become more frequent since the medication). I figured I could handle that, at least for a few months, as long as I was able to be comfortable most of the time.

However, more recently, a couple of somewhat more disturbing (in both the physical and emotional sense) side-effects have cropped up -- more than usually jittery legs after having lay in the same position for a while, and a weird involuntary movement of my diaphragm that disrupts my regular breathing pattern when I'm drifting toward sleep -- both of which seriously derail my ability to get a good night's sleep. And you know how I feel about sleep. Not only that, but my strange dreams kept me popping in and out of sleep and full of exhausting worry during the sleep I did get. So unfair! This, and not headaches and jaw tension, was enough to make me think about calling my doctor for a change.

I had these side-effects when I first started taking the medication, but since I'd had them less intensely before when not on medication, and since they died off as the initial jitteriness caused by the meds calmed down, I wasn't worried about them. But when they started cropping up again, they were both disruptive and worrisome.

But another cofactor, which may have seemed fairly inconsequential but which I'm now thinking may have an important effect on regulation of the medication's ability to make me jittery, is the fact that around the time I started taking this medication, I also started going to Goodlife and taking BodyFlow or aerobic classes once a week. I noticed that even though I was very jittery at first, the night after BodyFlow or BodyJam, I slept like a baby.

Eventually, the side effects completely died down and I thought nothing more of them, until late July, when I had a few interruptions to my gym schedule, and stayed away for probably about a month. About three weeks in, my jittery legs and diaphragm were back and I was noticing headaches and jaw tension more. I wondered if there was any coincidence, since even through the screen of my habitual reluctance to drag myself out to the gym, I felt a longing to go there. A few nights, I tried doing a sun-worship yoga flow once through on each side of my body before going to bed, and things improved measurably. I was able to get through a night's sleep. Perhaps I was really on to something.

I mentioned to my therapist the theory that getting back to the gym might calm my jitters. She didn't endorse it one way or the other (although she's all for exercise as a good way to combat depression and anxiety), but she suggested that I test it by using the following week (this past one) as a trial period, to step up (reinstate, really) my exercise routine and see if it helped.

So I went and did a quickie workout (a 15 minute run, a few weight machines, a couple stretches) on Friday the 27th, and that -- probably in combination with lots of walking in shopping malls and beaches during the following weekend -- took me through to about September 1 with no sleep issues. Around the night of the 2nd, I got a few jitters and a few breathing hiccups, but nothing that kept me from sleeping the night. Yesterday I went again and went all the way through Goodlife's "FitFix" gym, and last night I slept soundly, without even any weird dreams to tire me out.

My theory is that maybe this medication really elevates whatever it is that makes me hyper and full of energy, and that I need to siphon some of that off every once in a while so that it doesn't prevent me from having downtime. So exercise is the key for me to get a good night's sleep. How's that for motivation to go to the gym?

Operation Fruitfly Bust: Day 1

So Nonsense and I have been trying some different things with household chores and with arrangement of general stuff around the house. Significant to this post in particular, he took on all the cooking and the dishes, and I took on all other household chores, including, importantly, taking out the garbage.

Now, I don't mind taking out the garbage, but many of you will know how I feel in general about facing the elements, as well as about wasting time. So generally I like to kill two birds with one stone and take out the garbage when I'm actually going out somewhere for some other reason. The problem with this is that I usually either forget to take the garbage when I'm going somewhere, or I'm running late so I don't have time to round up all the bags. What this means is that sometimes our kitchen garbage is full to the point where the lid can't quite cover the top of the bag. And since we like fruits and veggies, what this means is a moderate infestation of fruit flies.

Now, normally this isn't so bad because we would keep the garbage under the sink, so not too many fruit flies end up making their way into the kitchen. Buuuuut, as I mentioned we've been trying some new things with arrangement of stuff. I found that having the kitchen garbage (which is in one of those pails you step on to lift the lid) in the cabinet under the sink reeeaally inconvenient. and I suddenly had a revelation that in fact, it didn't have to be there. So we decided to try it out in the kitchen, against a relatively out-of-the-way wall. Much more convenient. To us, and, unfortunately the fruit flies. What with the detritus of random meals and snacks in the garbage pail, each time we open the lid of our garbage can, about 10 fruit flies catapult up into our faces. We now have a more major infestation, and a few days ago Marcin was seriously pondering putting the garbage back under the sink. With this distasteful threat over my head after having tasted the convenience of having it out where I can actually step on the lever, I realized we'd have to get serious about busting these bugs.

The first thing I did was a bit of online research. Some of the simple, natural, and seemingly intuitive recommendations I've had for both preventing and getting rid of the pests are:

• rinsing fruits and veggies as soon as you buy them. Refrigerating unconsumed produce immediately is also a good tactic (Sadly, common fruit fly harbourers are of course also usually best left out rather than refrigerated. Bananas, tomatoes and peaches are all the worse for wear after the fridge, and around here we -- especially Nonsense, but lately myself also -- are big on fresh flavour.).
• making sure the garbage pail (not just the bag) is kept clean and free of decomposing foodstuffs, since fruit flies' habitat, food source and breeding ground is in fact rotting fruit.
• putting out a jar of apple cider vinegar, with a paper funnel sealing the top so that the fruit flies find their way in to get at the vinegar, and are then trapped inside the jar.
• putting out a ziploc bag of banana, apple, tomato or other fruit chunks with most of its zipper closed but enough open to allow the air and bugs to circulate, and then sealing the flies in or killing them as they come.

One thing I also thought to try was to see if I could prevent access to both the smell of fresh produce and the actual produce itself, by covering up my fruits.

So armed with this new knowledge, I've decided to experiment. I started in the afternoon by taking out all the garbage in the apartment, and thoroughly cleaning and disinfecting the kitchen garbage pail and the lid. I rinsed the bananas I'd bought before putting them out, and when I did, I tried a bunch of different coverings. Sadly, none were big enough to cover a bunch of 6 bananas. However, I did eventually happen upon a combination of two of our metal mixing bowls which, when I broke the banana bunch in two and faced one bunch down across the other, would form what will hopefully be a good enough seal to keep the little vermin out.

Thirdly, I felt the ziploc bag trap would be more practical for me than the jar trap, so I put a banana peel and a few chunks of fruit into a ziploc sandwich bag and zipped it partway (I had to try a few different ways to make sure it stood up enough to allow air to flow in and out. Eventually I stood the bag up between the microwave and espresso machine).

By the end of the night the bagged banana chunks were browning and the fruit flies were definitely interested. The bits of onion and celery in the nearly empty garbage can did not seem to have drawn any flies, nor did the bananas in the bowls. My nefarious plan was working... not yet sure what to do with the bag, and when, but that could wait until morning.

I dreamed a dream (or: A very un-portent state)

Here's why I don't believe that dreams are portents sent from some outside entity to forewarn of present or future events.

The content, intensity and memorability of my dreams is heavily based on what I've been thinking about over the past month, whether or not I'm on medication, and what I've eaten that evening. In other words, my dreams are made up of my inner life. To me, this signals something that can have direct bearing only on that inner life, and can go further only via my choices.

Last night, I dreamed (among other dreams) that G, K and I went on a jaunt to Paris, secure in the knowledge of having rented an apartment from somebody that G knew. When we arrived, we realized none of us had thought to google the place to find out where it was. All we knew, collectively, was that it was in Paris, and that it had an address on rue Ste-Bernadette. No problem right? We'll just poke around town til we find it? D'oh.

So we started asking people -- Ou se trouve rue Ste-Bernadette? -- Euhhh... je ne connais pas rue Ste-Bernadette... So we started looking in the phone books... no such of a road. The apartment could not have existed, we had been had!

(Incidentally, I have since googled it, and found that indeed, there is no rue Ste-Bernadette in Paris, though there is a place Ste-Bernadette in a nearby suburb. So there you go.)

As I drifted toward wakefulness, I was still pondering the possibilities for moving forward -- perhaps I could get a job tutoring English to teens wanting to go abroad, or French to ex-pats and tourists, to support my sisters and I while we tried to eke out food and lodgings and entertainment during our stay...

I found the dream slightly disconcerting in its verisimilitude (colour, reality of character, intensity of real life, plausibility), but all of the elements can easily be traced back to things I know and frequently think about. I have no worry that I will soon embark on a botched overseas trip. If you know me, you know I wouldn't budge without personally knowing exactly where I was going first.

I've never believed in dreams as a hard and fast set of symbols that are universal to everyone, or even to a given cultural set, and I've never really understood the thinking that says that they are. I think the dreams of an individual have unique representations for the individual and any commonality can only be owing to the experiences and imagery that any set of people may happen to have in common. No matter what else is true, I believe that dreams are built from whatever is within the person, and if a given person does not have a deep-seated idea of, for example, a voyage as something that represents an inheritance (or, in my case, a disastrous voyage that represents incompetence and false loves), then I don't believe that such a dream can possibly represent those things for that person.

This is not to say that I don't believe dreams can have meaning, or that they can sometimes reveal shocking things to people. I think dreams can be a medium to reveal truths that may be within a person's sensory grasp but outside of their ability to effectively process. That is to say, I think dreams are exclusively a way for the self to communicate with the self, but that information gleaned from unconventional information (i.e. ESP) could find its way to a person's understanding through dreams. You might have a momentary bad feeling when all seems well, but through a dream realize that something bad is happening so far away that you could not have perceived it through the regular sensory channels.

However, I don't believe that this particular dream -- or last night's other dream where my aunts were secretly hosting a family event that would effectively sabotage another aunt's annual family gathering unbeknownst to her -- has any sort of implication beyond the idle musings and overfed turmoil of my anxious and creative brain. Though maybe I will email my aunts, just to make sure.

Decisions, decisions (or: Yes, Virginia, you CAN press the pause button on life)

Today, I had an episode of panicky overwhelmed-ness when I read an email sent to me by the agency I tutor for, asking if I could take on another student for September.

What, another student!? I thought. I've already got three and I've only met one of them, and I'm not even sure I have the energy for that, let alone the other two, not even considering a third. Eight to ten hours a week? What was I thinking! But how can I say no? I gave her a perfectly reasonable number of hours, and if I say no I'll look like a spaz. Not only that, but this student needs exactly my skill set, and if I say no, how will he get the help he needs!? I have to say yes, but oh my god how will I handle it and still have serenity? Why won't the world stop attacking my serenity?!!!

This sort of thought pattern is distressingly common for me. Any time something new comes along, I panic a little (or a lot), particularly if it involves added or changed responsibilities for me.

I voiced my thought spiral aloud to Nonsense. After a few minutes of attempting to suggest reasonable solutions ("You could just say no;" "If you're overwhelmed just looking at it, it's probably too much for the moment") which I countered with the reasonable arguments ("But I did say I could do a certain number of hours";"But I'll always have a moment of panic at the thought of new responsibility"), and a moment of baffled silence in which he marvelled at my ability to turn interested queries into life-threatening full frontal assaults, he said: "But you don't have to decide right now."

Over the past four years of my life, the one plan for continued serenity and safe boundaries that has been suggested for me by my therapist, my former life coach and myself, and that actually worked for me may times, is simply this: do not make a decision right away.

Let me repeat that, it's important. DO NOT MAKE A DECISION RIGHT AWAY.

Once I'm over my habitual moment of panic, you see, I am in fact able to think rationally about whether I want to say yes or no, which response makes more sense, and how to effectively yet politely respond with whichever decision I've come to. But when I think I'm being backed into a corner, oddly enough, I'll promise all sorts of silly things I later realize I should under no circumstance have pledged. Maybe it's bravado?

I need to keep reminding myself that I don't have to say yes (or even no) right away, and that I need, no, I am obliged, to take that moment of away time to make decisions that actually reflect my position on things.

Defining D (or: The Life of the Spirited Adult)

Today my therapist used the word "spirited" in reference to some of the personal traits I was describing to her.

We were talking about how I feel the impact of small events, particularly small disappointments, very strongly, and how I have a really tough time emotionally, when it comes to handling transitions smoothly and positively. I had said that, like any person who's done a few undergrad psych courses, I sometimes look at the characteristics they mention of certain disorders and see myself. A major recognizable trait that can help diagnose Asperger's Syndrome, for example, is difficulty handling transitions. I have difficulty handling transitions, so it makes me wonder...

But no, my therapist said. The difference is that for me, I have difficulty handling transitions, but, you know, I do handle them, if poorly. Whereas a person with autism or Asperger's, on encountering an unexpected transitional moment, might instead, to use the vulgar term, lose their shit.

So, "spirited".

Apparently it's a term mostly used to refer to children when they have one or more specific character traits, such as liveliness, sensitivity, persistence, in intensity higher than most children. These traits may tend to make their own childhoods and the task of parenting and teaching them more challenging than usual.

I thought it an interesting and highly specific use of a word that usually has a fairly obvious, everyday connotation. Previously, hearing somebody use the term "spirited child" I would have directly equated this to hyperactivity or defiance, and not thought any other interpretation possible. Since I'm by no means a hyper or defiant person, I decided to look up this particular usage in order to better understand its meaning. What I found was pretty interesting to me, both personally and as a teacher of young kids.

First of all, I get the sense that the term is not incredibly well-known. Although Yahoo.ca produced some 13 million results for "spirited children", Google.ca produced less than 60,000 (I suspect some of the difference may include results from the same website, which Google may have counted as the same and Yahoo as different results, but not sure). Furthermore, I've never heard the word used this way, and I work with children on a daily basis. Nonetheless, taken by itself, the term "spirited" to refer to people who tend to do things differently from the mainstream of society, and as a result may have trouble conforming, seems like a much nicer and more positive way of identifying those characteristics than "difficult" or even the more politically correct "high-needs". It may be less specific, but it's certainly more encouraging. 

My research wasn't exhaustive, but in the pages I did look at, the most helpful description I found of what a "spirited child" is was on the "canadianparents.com" forum, where they have a subforum specifically called "Spirited Children". One user posts both a description, and a list of character traits as follows (I've edited for ease of reading), though so far I have not figured out her source: 

Description

All children possess the characteristics of being intense, persistent, sensitive, perceptive, and uncomfortable with change, but a spirited child experiences one or more of these characteristics more than another child. There is more depth, and range to a spirited child's characteristics and emotions.

Characteristics

Here is a quick rundown of the characteristics of a spirited child, and the bonus characteristics.
Remember that your spirited child may or may not possess all these characteristics, but they will experience one or more of them more than others.

Intensity:

• An intense child is loud, dramatic; they don't cry, they shriek. They are noisy at play, laughing, and love to sing at the top of their lungs.
• They can also be the quiet intent observant child. They assess the situation and size it up before entering a situation. Their intensity is focused inward.
• No matter where their intensity is focused their temper tantrums are raw and enduring.

Persistence:

• They lock into what is important to them -- ideas, activities or tasks. They are goal oriented and don't give up easily. They love to debate and getting them to change their minds is a great undertaking. They are not afraid to assert themselves.

Sensitivity:

• Quick to respond to noise smells lights, textures, or changes in mood. They are overwhelmed in crowds and are keenly aware. Every sensation and emotion is absorbed by them, including your feelings.
• This is the child who can't stand a tag in their shirt, or being in crowds, or tells you when you are in a bad mood before you realize you're in a bad mood.

Perceptiveness:

• They notice everything! They are often accused of not listening. They are distracted easily by the birds in the window, or a commercial on the television. You send them to put their shoes on, but they get distracted by the toy they found beside their shoe.

Adaptability:

• Uncomfortable with change. They don't like surprises and have a hard time shifting from one activity to another, or from one idea to another. This is the child who gets upset if they were expecting to go to the park but couldn't because it rained.

Here are some of the "bonus" characteristics. Bonus characteristics are not common with all spirited children.

Regularity:

• Impossible to to get them on any schedule. It's hard to figure out when they will sleep or be hungry.

Energy:

• Not all spirited children are energetic; those who are take things apart then put them back together again. They are jumping crawling and climbing. They are on the go until they fall asleep. They may seem wild, but their energy usually has a purpose.

First Reaction:

• Quick withdrawal from anything new. Unfamiliar ideas, places, people or situations may result in a vehement no. They need time to warm up before they are ready to participate or talk to someone new.

Mood:

• They are analytical, pick apart experiences, find flaws, and make suggestions for change. Smiles are rare, and their world is a serious place for spirited children.

I see myself in a lot of these characteristics, I'm not a high-energy person, but most of the other traits apply to me to a fairly high degree. I think if I had to be specific, my most notable charcteristics would be sensitivity, perceptiveness, low adaptability, and standoffish first reactions.

Interestingly, I found it tough to find information on how to deal with these traits of spiritedness positively as an adult, in circumstances where they become maladaptive. However, that's what therapy's for, I suppose. And just having a word for myself that encompasses both my normalness and my abnormalness, and doesn't make me feel crazy for feeling generally uneasy in the world though I constantly seek peace, and though everyone else seems to think I'm fiiiiiine, lets me breathe easier. Right now I'm working on being proactive and turning uncomfortable experiences into learning for the future (i.e. what would I do differently next time?), as well as acknowledging and accepting my difficulty with transitions and dealing with that in a way that will let me move on from the emotional upset more quickly (i.e. yep, it rained and we were stuck indoors, but I couldn't have prevented it, and hopefully getting some exercise now will make me feel better.).

Grow a spine! (or: How to decline with grace?)

I'm a pleaser.

I work hard -- too hard, usually -- to be liked and trusted, and when it works in my favour (when I'm getting the affection, the companionship, the career opportunities that I hope for), that can be rewarding, but overall, I think I hate it. I think it sucks being a yes-woman. I think I need to follow the advice I'm always giving others, and grow a spine.

I need to stop turning myself inside out, upside down and backwards to be able to say yes to every opportunity offered up to me by anybody at any time. Not every offer is given in order to do me a personal favour -- regardless of how guilty and ungrateful it makes me feel to even consider saying no. Not every possibility will take me in a way I actually want to go. Not every missed chance is a last chance. Not every opportunity needs to be seized regardless of what i'm working on at the moment or planning to do. Not every impression is a lasting impression. Not every disagreement will burn bridges.

I do not have to say yes, always, to everything put in my path by everyone.

Now I just have to figure out how to remember this, and act on it.

In search of extra-curricular activity. (no. not that kind.)

This week I've been pondering and prodding at the idea of how to expand and strengthen my social network so that I don't feel isolated or at a loss for people with whom to do the activities I love.

Since finishing school, there's been a decided lack of consistent creative production in my life, and one of my main complaints has been that, as an adult in the "real world", outside of the structured environment of school, it's a lot less simple to participate in the 'extra-curricular' activities that were commonplace, especially in grade school. In highschool, my job was to be a student, and as such, I spent my day taking drama, music, creative writing and the like, cost-free (what did I know of taxes!) -- and my friends were already there because they, surprise surprise, had the same job I did.

But once you leave that structure behind, it gets harder to work in creative social activity on a daily basis. Working a "freelance" job as I basically do right now, the hours are great, but it's hard to socialize when you're in a different school among a different set of co-workers every day.

If I do ever settle into a single school rather than supply-teaching, I'm hoping I'll be amongst a fun, caring, social, activity-loving school community. I may even try to fix that in mind as my primary goal for getting a contract (currently, foremost in my semi-conscious thoughts on contract work is the hope that I'll get the kind of class I'd love to have -- specifically at the moment, English-language full-day Jr./Sr. Kindergarten).

But for the moment, I'm not even supplying, and if all goes according to my current plan, I will be back to supplying when school is in. This means I have to make my social network a priority separate from my work community -- and also separate from most of family and friends who, understandably, cannot be at  my beck and call all the time, all having, as they do, separate friends, family, work-lives and interests than me. It's great having just a small, tight circle of friends and family, when you all live in the same town and go to the same school and attend the same events. But now that that's all changed (and been changed for quite some time I might add), I think maybe something broader, and possibly (this is still just an idea) more specialized is called for.

Now, so far that all sounds great, but as you may or may not know, I am really standoffish and shy when it comes to new people and new situations. I basically need to get into situations where I meet outgoing people who'll do the work for me, or situations where I meet with the same people so often over so long a period that I can't help having interesting stories in common to talk about and reminisce over. My French Additional Qualification course was great for that -- nothing like getting together for three months with a bunch of people you just finished spending a year in teacher's college with, and learning the same stuff over again in French to create camaraderie based on mutual "aha" moments and eyerolls! But without forking over a thousand dollars and 150 hours every three months to take another course, how am I going to create the right environment for myself to build more social ties?

Well, my current hopes rest in meetup.com -- a website that allows you to search for groups in your area that hold meets for things that interest you. Currently I'm favouring mostly women-centric clubs that do activities like ladies nights out, coffee chats, bookclubs and stuff like that.

Bookclubs, in particular, are an idea I'd been considering with some hope, and which was also recently suggested to me by Nonsense as a way to meet and interact with like-minded people. It occurred to me recently that maybe part of my reluctance these days to read all the deep, heavy (and usually literally thick) books that are coming out by authors I loved in highschool and university might be the fact that there's less motivation to possess a literary education and broad, up-to-date knowledge of current literature when your main conversation partners are five years old. I need people to talk to about what I've read, people to suggest good reads to me and be interested in what I think is a good read. People for whom my sudden insight about the parallels between character development, plot arc and theme in "The Jane Austen Book Club" might mean something and provoke a response.

That all said, it's harder than you might think to find a decent bookclub in the western half of Toronto. However, I've joined a few promising meetup groups, at least two of which have monthly bookclubs, along with other activities. I'm hoping they'll motivate me to both read new stuff, and make new friends.

Wish me luck!

I am a cookie monster. Admit it, you are too.

Good times this Canada Day/Pride weekend.

Friday I went to see sis's show, A Freudian Slip of the Jung, which was really hilarious. The acting, especially by the actors playing Freud and Jung, is fantastic, and if you like "fourth-wall" humour, this show does it really well. If you get a chance, go see it, you'll enjoy! 

Saturday was Geekbeep's final-twentieth birthday. Met and chatted with some fun folks at the barbeque, and had loads of great food -- always a given at her parties! As a birthday gift I brought a batch of chocolate crinkle cookies, which seem to have been a hit. These are a few of my favourite things -- in terms of return on investment, these babies are easy to make and crazy tasty. As promised, I'm posting the recipe here for your consumption.

My quest for this recipe began when I tasted Le Gourmand's highly addictive, insanely delicious, sinfully gooey Nookie Cookies. I haven't been able to find anything exactly like them (according to one of the employees there, their cookies are made with almond flour and without wheat or eggs), but these are pretty close and sooooo good. They don't actually contain any cocaine, but don't be surprised if you become addicted.

Chocolate Crinkle Cookies 

(originally from http://www.1001recipe.com/recipes/food/chocolate_crinkle_cookies/. I haven't made changes to her recipe, I just omitted or added information as it suited my cooking style.)

Yield: Last time I made these, I got 17 cookies, a bit larger than one inch. 

Ingredients:

3/4 cup flour

3/4 cup granulated sugar

3/4 tsp. baking powder

1/4 tsp. salt

1/4 cup sweet butter

1/3 cup cocoa powder (not Dutch processed)

1 egg (room temp.)

1/2 tsp vanilla (or 1 tsp instant coffee granules dissolved in 2 tbsp hot water)

1/3 cup semisweet or dark chocolate chips or 2 oz./60 g semisweet or dark chocolate, chopped

3/4 cup powdered sugar

Directions:

- Stir together flour, sugar, baking powder, salt.

- In a small bowl or saucepan, melt butter. Add cocoa, whisking until smooth. Stir in egg until fully blended. Stir in vanilla.

- Stir flour mix into cocoa mix until just combined. Do not overmix. Fold in chocolate chips. (I usually use my hands as it's quite stiff at this point).

- Can refrigerate a few days if desired (but note that if you do, forming the cookie balls will take more work ane patience!)

- Preheat oven to 350F. Line baking sheets with parchment paper. 

- Scoop small pieces of dough and roll in palm to make 1-inch balls. Roll twice in powdered sugar and place on baking sheet, 2 inches apart.

- Bake 10-12 minutes or until cracked and still soft. Do not overbake.

- Let cool on baking sheets 5 minutes. Transfer to wire rack to cool completely.

After Geekbeep's barbeque, I went down to the Village for some pre-parade partying with friends. A fun drag show and some dancing was a nice ending to the night. 

Sunday was kind of odd. I was looking forward to meandering through the Pride marketplace with few girlfriends, and since I know Nonsense generally enjoys the Pride day events and since we hadn't hung out much of the weekend, I asked at the last minute if he wanted to join. We headed out in the afternoon but, on the way, found that various complications meant our girlfriends probably would not make it, so it was just the two of us. Once we got downtown, I began powering through the crowds as if I was trying to get somewhere, but once I got to where I thought I was going, I found I didn't know what I was trying to get there for, so I just continued pushing through the crowds and the market areas, at a reasonable walking pace now but still in a straight line and with none of the meandering I had originally pictured, with Nonsense wandering alongside.

I think I was vaguely interested in wandering the market stalls, but knowing that that's not my beloved's thing, I walked on, perhaps in search of a stall at which one or the other of us actually did want to make a purchase. But since there weren't any where I could have justified the purchase as something other than "frivolous" impulse buying, we just kept walking until we'd done the circuit... and then we went home, me feeling strangely deflated and bemused.

In retrospect, I think I was kind of at a loss, what with the change in expected grouping. Have I mentioned how easily I get thrown off by change?

See, I know my girls like the whole festival atmosphere, the wandering with little purpose, the checking out of random merchandise at the stalls, the chatting about life, the universe and everything as you go. I also know that this is something Nonsense would not be as into, but would suffer for the sake of being agreeable to those he's with. And while it's perfectly acceptable for him to be agreeable to me, I don't like to drag him into things he's not going to enjoy, especially if it might mean he has to find his kicks in gently taking the piss out of me -- which while funny, can be irksome when you're not trying to be cute and peculiar.

So yeah, clearly in need of a better plan next time. A plan for dealing with change in general, and for enjoying unplanned fun with my boyfriend specifically. Hmmm.

Happy Canada Day! (or: Hello HST, Goodbye Free TV)

I learned something today that brought my dreams of a leisurely summer spent catching up on my various stories to a screeching halt.

Ninjavideo and Surfthechannel are dead. WHAT!?

But I was in the middle of the third season of House! And what about the whole final season of Battlestar Galactica that I have yet to start on? I don't want to own it, I just want to watch it! But surely this is only temporary, right? Right?... RIGHT?!


All this might have been taken with equanimity, but for the fact that Nonsense and I are now down to our last episode of Lost: Season 5, and the final season doesn't come out on DVD until the end of August. Boondocks: Season 3? Doesn't even finish airing in the U.S. until midsummer. And just so you know, I would totally do the right thing! But I'm a fan of owning whole collections, rather than just a season here or there. I can't afford to buy all my shows on DVD -- especially not if I want to be able to spend all summer watching them instead of getting a job. What am I going to do? How am I going to entertain myself for the next two months?

Ah well, so far I've been having fun, and the prospect for the next half-week, at least, is looking good.

Today, G, K, Nonsense and I went to the park for Ribfest and general Canada Day festivities. I almost tried a deep-fried Mars Bar, but that'll have to wait for next year, since in the end I couldn't resist getting an elephant ear with strawberries and ice cream instead. Jealous? I thought so.

Tomorrow I'm going to see a fringe show, and the next day will be happily spent eating more tasty barbeque in honour of the happy day of Geek's birth. After that, the rest of the weekend will most likely be spent on Pride frivolities of one kind or another. I know, it sounds busy, but really, I can rest when I'm dead. Or on Monday. Whichever comes first.


All this might have been taken with equanimity, but for the fact that Nonsense and I are now down to our last episode of Lost: Season 5, and the final season doesn't come out on DVD until the end of August. Boondocks: Season 3? Doesn't even finish airing in the U.S. until midsummer. And just so you know, I would totally do the right thing! But I'm a fan of owning whole collections, rather than just a season here or there. I can't afford to buy all my shows on DVD -- especially not if I want to be able to spend all summer watching them instead of getting a job. What am I going to do? How am I going to entertain myself for the next two months?

The Austen Marathon (in which D expounds on the ups and downs of being 'Lost in Austen')

I like a challenge. I like a twist. I'm a fan of the gimmick, when it suits me. And I really like allusions to stuff I know in my cultural consumption (i.e. pop culture references in movies and books and songs). It's part of the thrill for me of things like High Fidelity, Gilmore Girls, Love Walked In, a lot of hip-hop, etc. If I don't get the reference (but yet know enough even to recognize that there IS a reference), I hie me directly to Ye Olde Wikipaedia to "improve my mind".

Recently I picked up Karen Fowler's The Jane Austen Book Club in the library. Movie notwithstanding (I don't remember thinking it was anything to shake a stick at), the concept seemed to me to promise a pretty good book, so I checked it out.

Now, in spite of my love of allusion, I have this problem with book club-style references -- see, my short-term memory for factoids, trivia, quotes and the like is, well, poor. I have trouble remembering anything beyond "It was awesome!" or "There was that girl, you know, the one with the... hair... and... you know, the dude, whatshisname..."

I thought this deficit might dampen some of the joy of reading a good book about life's comparability, in plot and character, to other good books I've read in the moderately distant past. A reference to "that bit where [Willoughby] confesses to Elinor" in Sense and Sensibility would leave me mostly lost, which would be annoying, and might or might not affect my better understanding of the book itself.

So what did I do? I checked six Jane Austen novels out of the library, and began rereading them in tandem with The Jane Austen Book Club, in the order in which they're addressed in its chapters. Obviously.

(aside: And I wonder why my clutter's toppling over...)

I've only read one and a half so far (finished Emma, started Mansfield Park), and consequently, my pace through Book Club is sloooow. But not as slow as it could be, since I convinced myself to cheat a little by skipping Sense and Sensibilty, which I've read within the last couple years AND own the movie version of. I plan to do this with Pride and Prejudice as well, though I still have both books handy.

So far my little Austen Marathon is going well. I feel like it's not only helped me enjoy the direct references in the book-discussion parts of the book (which are interspersed with parts dealing with the lives of the characters themselves), and the more indirect yet more important comparisons between the characters' lives and personalities and those of Austen's own characters. It's also really nice to reread Austen's books, and for a purpose (so as not to feel humdrum and boring about rereading six books in a row without venturing into anything new!) and get something new out of them through Fowler's characters' very different takes. It never occurred to me that Marianne might not have been perfectly happy marrying Brandon... but now that I think about it, love may have had little to do with it.

Though the women in the book are appalled by his unconventional spins, I'm really enjoying the character Grigg's ideas -- Austen's characters would totally work in sitcoms! "The Elinor Show". Or Everybody Loves Raymond.

Anyway, perhaps more on this later -- or perhaps something new!

Wearing my worry on my sleeve

I seem to have developed a disturbingly persistent Bejeweled Blitz habit.

I'm not sure what exactly is behind it. I mean I like puzzle games, like Tetris, Puzzlequest, Bejeweled and such, stuff that requires a good eye and good processing skills but little strategy, so it's a natural enough thing for me to use as a frequent pastime. But I feel like it's gotten ridiculous! I mean... there's no thought involved, and not a whole lot in terms of progress to be made (currently I'm trying to see if I can give the coin counter a meltdown by acquiring enough coins to increase the digit count by one, but it failed to break when I hit 100,000, so I'm not betting on success).

Mostly these days, it's a tool for occupying my restless hands and numbing my restless mind. I'm bored. Bored and kind of lonely, really. It's a problem I'm not sure at this point how to solve, since despite being rather timid and reserved in strange company, I've discovered I'm almost wholly a creature of social pleasures, and my social net is kind of strained thin lately for various reasons. Still, it's good to be able to know it and say it.

I recently started taking medication to alleviate anxiety and depression, and as of now, one promising effect has been to relieve me of a lot of the spiralling-out-of-proportion thought compulsions I was used to being embroiled in much of the time. The realization that I probably should find a minute in the next week or so to cut my toenails no longer sends me into a morass of panicky thoughts about how I just will never be able to find the time to do all the things I need to do over and over again just to keep myself fit for polite society for the rest of my life!

However, on the other side of this coin, the disconcerting nakedness I feel without my constant stream of worry leaves me uneasy. Not only that, but sometimes I feel decidedly apathetic about things I'm not sure it's appropriate to feel apathetic about, especially if you're me. Which I am. I haven't had an "okay, it's time to get rid of the clutter before it topples over on you" moment in quite some time, and my clutter, as a consequence, is now threatening to topple over on me in a way it hasn't been allowed to do in quite some time. Even though I know I'm starving for connection, unsought opportunities go untaken, messages unanswered -- and I feel like it's more than my usual scatteredness. Apathy isn't like me -- at least I don't think it is.


Nonetheless, it's really, really nice to experience what it's like to float on an even keel for a while. For that, I'm definitely willing to continue giving the current chemistry a chance to work itself out.

Design what?

First-off, let me make clear that if you're searching for a web-savvy designer who's looking to get her name out or test out some innovative visual concepts and you've landed here, you'll probably want to try your search again. Don't get me wrong -- I love visitors. However, in spite of the title, this is far from being a blog about design, and I am far from being a designer.

The phrase "my own design", from John Mayer's "Something's Missing", has a three-fold meaning here.

• Firstly, the meaning implied by the song itself, that we can sometimes create our own states of mind, our own sadness, our own lack, our own loneliness, without realizing it. I believe that I do this, but I also know that much of it is beyond my sole control, and I am taking steps (more on this later, most likely) to acquire whatever assistance I need to start getting out of my own way.
• Secondly, I am both exploring and constructing the answers to the question "Who am I?" What's behind D, how is she put together, what makes her work, or not work as the case may be -- in other words, what is my own design?
• Thirdly, since I began to be more aware of myself and the things I and the world can do to get in my way, I have been conscious of the fact that there are ways to do what needs to be done in ways better or worse for me, and that these ways only sometimes conform to the ways that are adopted as normal or acceptable. Sometimes I need a little trial and error and a little self-awareness to recognize the best way for me to go about something, but once I do recognize it, I adopt it -- by design.

This blog isn't necessarily about anything, other than whatever I have to say when I say it here. However, I have in mind, as a possible theme of the moment, a loose documentation of my path to increased self-awareness, self-care, inter- and intrapersonal well-being, and (I ultimately hope) happiness. We shall see how things move forward.