How do you learn best? How do your children learn best, if you have children? When I think of learning, some part of me remembers Elle Woods in the movie Legally Blonde. She has a refreshing learning style, wrapped with compassion and kindness. And she always comes out on top. She is much smarter than she is given credit for, and it all makes for good comedy.
They know enough who know how to learn. -Henry Adams (1838-1918)
I think it goes a long way to know yourself well enough to know your own learning style, while at the same time trying to broaden your abilities, if you like to learn or consider yourself a life-long learner — some people don’t — whether it seems like anything new has crossed your radar in a while or not.
Some of us are aural learners; some of us learn verbally; some learn best by doing.
For myself, it’s harder for me to learn by listening, using only my ears, than it is if I incorporate some writing. I learn best if I take some notes or have something to look at while I listen. Still, I try occasionally to simply listen, so I don’t get even more rusty with the skill.
I also learn best if the one teaching respects the audience. As a child, I would work hard for the teacher who acted like they liked me and expected the best of me. That is true for my children too. It is as true for me today as it was then.
I do not like learning through the school of hard knocks; I’d prefer to learn from the knowledge and the mistakes of others, or through inspiration, though I’ve taken some hard hits along the way. It’s a truism that the only one who makes no mistakes is the one who does nothing. None (few?) of us earned perfect papers all through school without a single mistake, and we learn to accept it in that context, but we don’t like mistakes in real life. I loved this idea:
Failure should be our teacher, not our undertaker. Failure is delay, not defeat. It is a temporary detour, not a dead end. Failure is something we can avoid only by saying nothing, doing nothing, and being nothing. Denis Waitley
Well, I loved the next one! I never thought that just admitting one is wrong is a way of saying one is wiser than he was before. Of course, that is true, because we learn as much from our errors as through books, or we should, but it made me smile anyway. I also thought of some I know who have never admitted they are wrong, or at least the words “I’m sorry” never have passed their lips. How is that possible?
A man should never be ashamed to own that he has been in the wrong, which is but saying that he is wiser today than he was yesterday. Alexander Pope (1688-1744) English Poet
The following one made me think. Can you think of specifics?
There are some defeats more triumphant than victories. Michel de Montaigne
It’s nice to contemplate a somewhat triumphant life, wherein our defeats, or some of them, hold as much honor as our victories.
How do you learn best? Do you like a challenge? What do you think?
I thought this was interesting. It’s funny how much of this was off my radar screen in the time frame in which it was happening. I liked listening to her from the perspective of where I am now, where she is now and where we both were at the time. It says a lot to me that she is (was) still friends with her exes. Lotta stuff goes on as we go through the years. I would like to read her book. How about you?
He is so fluid! And one of my favorite songs…and how good to see Johnny Carson again, no wonder we loved him. The interview is a little poignant as he speaks a bit about being ill.
Sammy died the same day as Jim Henson. One of the cartoons in our paper showed Kermit dancing with Sammy Davis in heaven. I’d like to think so! What an amazing performance that would be.
keep digging within yourself to keep making it fresh, for the one who has never seen it before.
I have high hopes that Elijah Kelley who plays Seaweed in Hairspray (the movie) will follow in his footsteps. He sure reminded me of SDJ.
I came across this quote after I was thinking about what dreams the older women might have held or what the younger women expected from life. I loved the idea of nourishing and protecting our dreams, nursing them through bad days.
Not every dream comes to fruition effortlessly. Some take a good deal of patience and perseverance to bring to life.
Are you holding onto a dream, perhaps in the face of naysayers? One thing for me, was waiting on our first adoption from China. It took a lot, and a lot of time, before it came to pass. But that didn’t mean it wasn’t going to happen.
Karin
All big men are dreamers. They see things in the soft haze of a spring day or in the red fire of a long winter’s evening. Some of us let our dreams die, but others nourish and protect them, nurse them through bad days till they bring them to sunshine and light, which always come to those who sincerely believe that their dreams will come true. Woodrow Wilson
One of the things I like to do, though unconsciously, is people watch. Likely it is because I grew up in the fashion world, so I enjoy seeing what people wear and how they wear it. I am not critical, I am just looking with a critical eye to analyze, because I’ve been a buyer. At a young age I was buying not only for youth but for older men and women. I know too well the fleeting nature of fashion and of trying to stay ahead of the game to anticipate trends when shopping the markets to buy for the next season.
Stores in our area had a hard time sustaining themselves when they used northern buyers for our market. It just didn’t fly. Think hot, humid, and tropical and you would be right. What you’d wear in NYC or Chicago, you would likely not wear here. Also, the majority of us grew up somewhere else and came here for the space industry, so our fashion tends to be eclectic, but geared toward extreme heat.
The other day I was on a college campus with my 11 yo who had a function there. There were parents, as well as kids from 5th grade to 12th. Three college girls parted a swath amidst us. One was striking; one was average; one was OK. It was clear the striking one was leading the others and they deferred to her. They were an island to themselves. She was head of the pack, and she knew it. Confident. The rest of us of whatever age were invisible to them. I wondered what they would look like as parents. It was hard to imagine. But the day is coming whether they parent or not.
The next day I stood in a long line at the post office. Two young girls were in the front, one might have been an exchange student. One wore a dress; one wore shorts and a T. Both were modest and circumspect in their clothing. In front of me were two women older than I am. They both were invisible, in their demeanor and in their clothing. Behind me were women, invisible, looking hot and tired, none young. More or less patient in the line. I tried to imagine them the age of the young girls and failed. I tried to imagine what the young girls would look like at the age of these women or of me, or the ones behind me, how they might dress, and it was near impossible. I wondered what the hopes and dreams of the older women had been, and if they had achieved them. I wondered if the young girls would achieve theirs.
Next came me, fading into invisibility, maybe, wearing my uniform for the heat: shorts and a T. And don’t forget I wore a lot of bracelets before they came back in style. Or I set the style, LOL. I am fashionable, but not a fashion plate. And I’m recycling things I loved from years gone by.
It reminded me of Dylan Thomas:
Do not go gentle into that good night
Do not go gentle into that good night,
Old age should burn and rave at close of day;
Rage, rage against the dying of the light.
Though wise men at their end know dark is right,
Because their words had forked no lightning they
Do not go gentle into that good night.
Good men, the last wave by, crying how bright
Their frail deeds might have danced in a green bay,
Rage, rage against the dying of the light.
Wild men who caught and sang the sun in flight,
And learn, too late, they grieve it on its way,
Do not go gentle into that good night.
Grave men, near death, who see with blinding sight
Blind eyes could blaze like meteors and be gay,
Rage, rage against the dying of the light.
And you, my father, there on the sad height,
Curse, bless, me now with your fierce tears, I pray.
Do not go gentle into that good night.
Rage, rage against the dying of the light.
Or Robert Frost’s
The woods are lovely, dark and deep,
But I have promises to keep,
And miles to go before I sleep,
And miles to go before I sleep.
I don’t think of myself as old, though to some I might be, and there are moments when I definitely look older than I would like to. I don’t intend to go quietly. I hope never to be invisible. I’ve got a long ways to go before I end up there. Maybe I’ll be like the 107 yo woman blogger and still be blogging. That would be something! But I hope it is an interesting ride. And she is clearly not invisible.
Someone I know once said to me that she couldn’t wait until she was old enough not to care what she looked like. How old is that, pray tell? I’ll never forget the striking much older woman on the arm of a younger man in Paris, her head scarf twisted into a flower by her ear. High heels and tasteful makeup. I have something to aim for, but skip the heels!
How about you? do you think of yourself as invisible, or do you know better?
Karin
Here it is in full:
Stopping by Woods on a Snowy Evening
Poem lyrics of Stopping by Woods on a Snowy Evening by Robert Frost.
Whose woods these are I think I know.
His house is in the village, though;
He will not see me stopping here
To watch his woods fill up with snow.
My little horse must think it queer
To stop without a farmhouse near
Between the woods and frozen lake
The darkest evening of the year.
He gives his harness bells a shake
To ask if there’s some mistake.
The only other sound’s the sweep
Of easy wind and downy flake.
The woods are lovely, dark and deep,
But I have promises to keep,
And miles to go before I sleep,
And miles to go before I sleep.
I happened to be driving at the right time tonight to see the moon in the night sky, looking as bright and red as the sun against the depth of the sky. About 40 minutes later, it was no longer red, but bright white. It was one of those gifts from the universe that makes me appreciate the present moment and made me glad to be out and about. It is good to be alive! There is always something good if we are open to it.
The moon hanging bright
like a silent companion
against the night sky.
I think I forgot to mention the night we hung out either laying on the dock or in chairs or along the deck watching the night sky in Tahoe. We were in one of the prime spots for meteor watching, although we did not see the 100s that they predicted. Some of us saw several. I saw one that streaked across the sky in a huge swath. The stars hung so bright against the dark of the sky that it seemed as though you could just pick one up like a firefly. It surely makes a difference viewing the sky from a place that has few lights at night to interfere with the sky.
Meteors shot by
quickly among firefly stars
chart the zodiac.
THE RECLUSE
In my ten-foot bamboo hut this spring
There is nothing; there is everything.
–Sodo
LETTER AND SPIRIT
My ears had found the sermon dull and stale;
But in the woods outside– the nightingale!
–Shiki
ALIVE
So much vitality in so few inches:
A perch of hopping, chirping, spotted finches!
–Ho-o
The question was asked of APs something like this: why do you stick around a list that is tough to listen to because the adoptees tell it like it is? Here’s one of the answers, with permission.
OK, here’s my story: I had a conversion experience.
When dd was age three we serendipitously discovered that dd has an identical twin living 10 hours away from us. Brought up all the fears I was hiding from even myself about adoption. Would I “lose” dd to twin? What if dd loved the twin more than me? What if dd liked twin’s mothers more than us?
Found a good adoption therapist. Who sort of said “this is about your daughter not you so you better wake up, smell the coffee and get on board because the train is leaving the station with you or without you.”
So the conversion, coming at an embarrassingly late date in my parenting journey was that “it’s not about me.”
Don’t know how much I really have learned or changed (how much can you really ever know about yourself regarding your own self centeredness?) And after all, it was my own self centered wish to have a continuing relationship with my daughter that led me to try to give up my self centeredness.
making an honest effort to keep ears and heart open to all voices is the least I can do.
I love to get perfume compliments but they are rare. For the most part, I wear perfume to please myself.
I am very careful in large groups or going to dinner or around people who can’t handle some fragrances. My husband can’t smell many perfumes so unless I put my arm under his nose directly, he usually is unaware. Another family member is quite sensitive, so it is rare that I wear any perfume around him. And a friend can’t handle any scents. She has to be extremely careful with shampoos or body soaps. For the most part she doesn’t even know I wear fragrance because by the time I’m around her, it’s been a while since I spritzed.
My younger children always say I smell good. But I’m talking about a genuine, grown up compliment. Those are worth waiting for.
Yesterday I stopped in at place of business, then went back later for a second visit. The woman helping me asked me what I was wearing earlier as everyone loved it and wanted to know what it was.
Interestingly enough the last time I wore this fragrance, it bothered me, though I loved it when I first bought it. So, I’ve not chosen to wear it for a while. That day, some note in it got stronger, instead of blending, and as I like to layer up, I got tired of it during the day, it never softened.
But yesterday it was so soft I couldn’t smell it without effort, so it surprised me that others could. After the second visit, I respritzed just because. That’s when my daughter wanted some.
top: Sicilian citron, bluebell, and granny smith
heart: jasmine sambac, bamboo, white rose
bottom: cedar wood, musk, amber
It really is a lovely fragrance. My 9 year old wanted some for herself, and then asked for it again after her shower. I think I might make her up a small spray of her own. I don’t know what was going on with it (or me) the day I didn’t like the way it wore me.
Maybe it needs to be summer and hot, hot, hot for it to wear well. Do you wear it? Do you get compliments? I think I will wear it again today. I like the way the apple stays true in it, unlike another apple scent(s) that goes sharp. It is bright and happy, yet not artificial. It has enough other notes in it that keep it from being too sweetish. And it held my interest all day yesterday, which is saying a lot.
My son, the computer guy, worked this up for me to keep track of various perfume bloggers he found. He asked me to give him a list of blogs (some he found linked here) but before I had time to get back to him, he added what he found on his own.
If you want your blog to be included, let us know. It’s a great way to keep in touch with the posts.
.
