My Arms are Crying

Sunday was soft and slow, once the big community dog walk was over. We went for our second walk late in the afternoon and then Her Highness stayed home while I went for dinner at Kris and Steve’s place, with Bryce, Stacy and a woman I didn’t know named Nancy. 

I knew I’d have a ball because I adore Stacy and Kris. They’re sisters and the warmest, most fun women imaginable. I ate carefully and had a great, great time. Nancy turned out to be a hoot. She went to the same high school as me, a year ahead of me. It was an extraordinary evening.

This morning, two more cords of wood arrived. Can you feel my pain? So today I’ll start schlepping and stacking today and do more tomorrow. My arms are crying.

Meet Mary-Beth

Sunday was really a lovely easy day. Again, I did no studying. I’ve decided that I want a break from studying for a while. I have been feeling the need to be indulgent. All I want to do is chill with a book by the fire in this inclement weather.

More wood is coming on Monday, or so Bob has said, and Tuesday bright sunny and warm weather is predicted to start and last until the end of the week. I hope both things are true because stacking in sunshine is much, much more pleasant.

•

I got a welcome comment on my blog yesterday morning from an ex-student. He did not, however, give me any contact information, so I answered him with another comment on my blog and hoped he’d come back to the site. I met some incredible young people when I was a high school teacher so long, long ago (1971/72). 

I learned young how much teachers can mean to a student. Mr. Fletcher and Miss Wheeler were teachers at my elementary school who touched me deeply in a way that still lives in me. They saw my distress, got me to talk about it and they asked me to stay after school with them.

They taught me, probably for an hour or more, about apples. They equated the grafting of apples to adoption, how roots of one can nourish material of different genetic origin. Beset of all, was how apples could grow even as a tree was dying. I thanked them publicly at the opening of my autobiographical play that included a scene about them.

But it wasn’t until late in life that I learned how important students can be. Several of them reached out to me decades after we’d parted and the high was like that of a drug. Stephanie, Dave, Gwynyth, Derrick, Tasha. They are not that much younger than me. I was 22 when I started teaching.

Late in the day, I think I found David, the student who’d left the comment on my blog this morning—his email address. I wrote and it didn’t bounce back. I may have found him. I hope so! I really hope so. He, like several other students, truly inspired me by things they did—usually in extra-curricular activities. Always acts of civility. I loved the relationships part of teaching but hated the job for a career. 

•

I had four seizures yesterday. But my body and energy are revived after the first wood stacking. I’m ready for round two.

 

When she heard her brother Adam knock on her open bedroom door, Mary-Beth’s enthusiasm for him was enough to make her turn her head, but her lips and eyes said ‘I am dead’ to he who was incapable of reading them.

“Come see what I found.”

Mabe, pronounced ‘Maybe,’ saw lots of problems with the proposition. Why would she want to be with him or see anything that somebody like him found interesting?

“Go away!” She turned back to her desk.

“You got a tattoo.”

He saw her head whip around, rise and come at him. She pinned him to the wall. 

“How to you know that?”

“That’s what I wanted to show you.”

Now he had her attention. He led her silently to the linen closet, stayin alert for parental eyes. And they her led her inside and closed the door behind them.

“Don’t turn the light on,” he whispered. “And be quiet.”

He took her hand and walked her in the dark to the back wall of the closet. And then a slit of faint light appeared as the wall appeared to slide open.

“What’s this?” She whispered into his ear.

“I found it when I was looking for Benji’s ball. My shoulder slid it open.”

He took her hand and led her into an unfinished space she’d never seen—an attic-like space. He slid the sliding wall closed behind them. 

“Over here,” he said, taking just a few steps and then he pointed at the wall where Mabe saw a perfectly round circle cut into the wall. She looked at him.

“What? It’s something not done just like everything else in this space. What’s the big deal?”

“Stay here, I’ll be right back. When you see light, look through the hole.” 

When she saw light, she peered through the hole and she could see Adam with his finger up over his lips shushing her. He was standing against the far wall of the guest bathroom, then he moved in close to the hole and whispered.

“There’s a mesh on the hole on this side. It looks like a vent from in here.”

“And you were watching me in there, you perve?”

“Stay there.” Soon thereafter, the light went out and then, shortly after that. she heard the wall behind her slide open, then closed.

“I found this place last Christmas and I’ve been using it ever since as a place to, you know, be at home but have real privacy.”

“And spy on me.”

“When I saw you was the first time I’d ever seen a light come through there. I peered in and saw you taking the bandage of your tattoo. I wasn’t perving out. Ever since, I’ve been wondering if that hole was an accident, something unfinished like you said, or something creepy, maybe very, very creepy.

“Who’s been in here lately?” 

“I wondered that myself, and everyone I could think of was female. It’s always mom’s guests who come to visit. Can you ever remember a man coming to stay?”

She thought about what he’s said.

“No.”

“Once I realized that….” 

He pointed at the hole.

“If this was something done long ago, something not finished, wouldn’t there be dust inside on the inside of the hole on the top of the gyprock? Or has CSI ruined my brain? Besides, there’s a fan in the ceiling. What’s the point of this vent? That’s a pretty big hole for a pipe, too.”

She lay on the floor. She closed her eyes and thought thoughts she didn’t want to think.

Adam took gentle hold of her arm. She looked at him and he gave her a ‘you’ve got me’ look.

What’re we gunna do, she wondered.

Meet Heugette

Friday was a bit of a blur. I walked Her Highness with our friends, barely speaking to anyone and walking last in the line. My hip was killing me, and I was running on empty. The dawn of the walking dead.

I went into the village after the walk to get a brace with which to fix a step of the kitty ladder that allows Fred and Ethel access and egress to and from the loft where they love to hang out. It’s their private space. But one step broke last week, and I had to repair it yesterday. All is in order now.

Then I had a simple lunch and got into my large comfy chair by the fire, pulled a blanket over me and picked up Louise Penny. And then I drifted off to sleep. In fact, I drifted off a couple of time. Then I had to do some homework for Gus with whom I met for a signing session at 4:00.

When I met with Gus, I cancelled my sessions with him for the next few weeks. I get too tired to study when I do the wood stacking. Plus, he is unavailable for much of April. So, I’m on a bit of a break with him.

At 5:00, Sheba and I went to Eoin’s and François’ place for dinner, and Jay came too. It’s always fun visiting them, seeing their pigs, ducks and wonderful doggies. Plus, they had hatched some new baby ducks. They are so stinking cute! I love visiting these boys. They always make absolutely delicious food—some of which I didn’t eat. I had their salad and picked out the onions, and their divine sausages and the chocolate tart for dessert. 

Something did not agree with me. I paid for the thrill of their fabulous food. I’ll be very glad when this FODMAP diet is over and I know what exactly the problem foods are.           

•

When I was in college, a friend and I did volunteer work with a community centre in Vancouver’s downtown east side. This was in the 1970s. We were there as part of a course, earning credit for our work. The director asked my friend and I to partner and to try to nourish a young boy who wouldn’t speak. The story that follows has absolutely no relation to his story. I just remember the question? Why is he choosing not to speak? 

Heugette was disturbingly reluctant to speak. She could when required to, but with as few words as possible. She came to us as a lovely young woman who cared well for herself and was bright—particularly in mathematics.  She presented as a woman who loved to laugh and play sports and one who was accepted as silent. She was a healthy and sound young woman. 

She chose to stop speaking over two years before we heard about her. By then, she’d been told that she might be on the spectrum and placed in a non-stimulating special education class. She also refused to continue with mathematics, her best subject. Desperate to improve her wellbeing, her parents decided to home school her. Again, however, she refused to have anything to do with math.

Her parents started noting down things she wouldn’t do: She refused to use the telephone, walk near hopscotch games chalked on the sidewalk, she insisted that the numbers be covered of their address on the front door, and she hated using money. The worst aspect of her condition was that no matter how many counselors or therapists she saw, she absolutely refused to talk.

My partner, Jacob, found out about her at a party he attended. Heugette’s parents were at the party. And that’s how we came to invite her to our lab and offices.

I need to make one thing very, very clear. We study synesthesia. We’re neurologists; we are not psychologists. But her aversion to the phone, hopscotch and her address suggested something to us, and we thought that she might have synesthesia and be confused by how she was responding to numbers. We thought, if she did have synesthesia and had it explained to her, it might help her.

We felt her choice not to speak was something she’d have to work out with a psychiatrist or counselor. We had no reason to believe her disinclination to speak had anything to do with synesthesia. But meeting her and seeing her condition was a valuable experience for us. It was remarkable to witness so vividly and personally, the transformative power of knowledge.

Heugette is a very bright woman. We taught her about synesthesia and neurological misfunction; we explained how and why she was seeing such vivid colours when she saw numbers, and we could see the relief on her face that our teaching brought to her. She was a very enthusiastic and capable student. And as we taught her, she started asking questions and then more complex and sophisticated questions. 

Discovering that her condition had a name, that other people had it and that she wasn’t mad changed her almost overnight. She’d kept her condition secret; her shame had built up over the years and had silenced her.

After only a few sessions with her, I asked her out for dinner, and soon that became a regular thing. And then we married and had two kids, neither of whom have synesthesia.

Ibuprofen is My Best Friend

This is what two cords looks like.

It was clear all night Wednesday night. When I woke up yesterday, I was happy to think of warm sunshine heating me up as I worked. But no, it soon clouded over, trapping the cool air, and preventing the sun from heating me up. It was dispiriting to have to work in such cool air and so dull a day.

I kept thinking about all the fires I’d enjoy next Fall, Winter and Spring, as a way to get myself started yesterday. I reluctantly began as soon as I got back from walking Sheba. Sigh. Starting over at 1 barrow load and hoping to work my way up to 30 of them, fearing that there were that many remaining to do.

I did 5 barrows full and was ready to call it a day. My right arm ached. So, I rested before doing 5 more. Then it was time for lunch. I love my breaks. And I loved seeing the pile diminish. I ate lunch suspecting I had less than 30 barrows full to do to finish.

As I headed out to do barrows 11 to 15, I was not thinking about next Winter’s fires, I was thinking about how good the couch would feel last night. At 1:30, I finished stacking load 15. It was time for a break, and … to celebrate. There were only two more barrows full of big wood to stack. And 2 loads of little pieces that I stacked separately. 

I did it. I did it! I even folded up the tarpaulins and put them away. What an epic job, finished! I walked Her Highness and went into the village for cookies. I needed a reward

I don’t light the fire during the days anymore. I do in the morning, to heat up the house after the coolness of the nights. And I light another small fire at dinner time to be cozy warm with my pet buddies as we fade into sleep. That’s what I did last night.

And today is a day off. I have a signing session at 4:00, other than that, I plan to do nada all day today, except to read and relax after two gruelling days of labour—and with more coming next week.