Home again... and home again. I went to Arizona to, among other things, cultivate relationships with the little girls before they stop being little girls.

Two red-haired girls. Their mother, my sister-in-law, has honey colored hair, a mixture of blonde, brown, and red, though I don't think she was ever a true redhead. In our family... well, I know there was a great aunt on my mother's side who had red hair; I believe there was also a redhead in that generation on my father's side. I was the only redhead for two generations.

The elder one... Well, I knew I wasn't overstaying my welcome in her eyes. She was glad to have an someone to play with, read her chapter book, direct activities. The little one... well, maybe she'll like me when she gets older. A year and a half ago, she buried her face in her father's chest when she saw me; this time, she buried her face in his chest. In the interim, she learned to speak complete sentences intelligibly, but she hasn't yet reached the stage of abstract thought...or of doing a lot of focused activity. For her, familiar faces are the best ones. And Daddy knows best.

Memory: Across Three Generations

Create your own video slideshow at animoto.com.

Here is a bit more Animoto animation, created the same night as the video of my two nieces. This one showcases three generations of my family, beginning with my mother's youth and continuing on chronologically to a picture of a toddler Chelsea. I was actually a little surprised when I watched it as one picture I thought I had included did not appear. Wow, is there a big chronological jump before that last picture! I had meant to include a family portrait taken when my brother and I were in our early 20's. Ah, well!

Reflection: Chelsea's and Callee's Video

Create your own video slideshow at animoto.com.

A video featuring my little nieces. Several of the shots were taken by me on Easter. There are a few from Christmases gone by.

Memory: From a Time Before Time

I have a memory of being in the bathroom with my mother, at a time when I had not yet stopped being her perfect little girl. I think she might have been checking me and my long hair for ticks -- a summertime ritual in Virginia. "When I'm 40, you'll be 80," I declared.

"80 is very old," she said, and even then, I knew that was a message that she might not make it to that far off time.

She did not. Not quite.

Some months back, I wrote that my mother's Alzheimers -- or whatever neurological disease caused the progressive loss of function -- had reached the point where she could no longer talk or be cognizant of her surroundings, and that she was asleep or half asleep most of the time. My brother thought then that she'd live only a couple more weeks. But she lived more than five months, slipping the rest of the way away only this morning.

Audio Reflection: Keepsake Mill

My folks couldn't have envisioned this when they took that picture years ago: By gummit, that old photo is talking! Actually, it's reciting "Keepsake Mill" -- a poem that (though you wouldn't guess from its somber tones) actually comes from a volume of classic children's poems; it's one of a couple poems where the author, Robert Louis Stevenson, steps out of his 'child's garden' and speaks from across a span of a great many years.

It's a pragmatic thing in a way, finding more ways to put up audio online. I can put up another site/ domain with my InMotion hosting, and I hope to have Audio Reflections up within a few weeks. The site can give some support to other things I have on the web, so it's a practical move as well as a pet project. You know I'll maintain it! (I can get too exhausted to write, but I seldom get too exhausted to read aloud.)

This particular poem is also for people in my life, and those I miss. Speaking of which... The phone just rang, and I didn't answer it. Oh, bad me! Of course I'm not avoiding anyone -- just news of them. (How very... me.) Got to ease myself back into gear: Breathe in, breathe out, center...

But here's a poem, a slightly abridged version as I needed to get the piece down to sixty seconds (without going at too ridiculous a pace).

Reflection: Community

That's my mother long ago with a group of Eastern Airlines pilots -- a big part of what was then her community(and, I will note, a different world than any that I knew her in). I myself have been a part of different communities at different times: a dorm, 2 co-ops...

I don't think there are more than a few people who really have an idea of the cascade of events that led me to find myself finding myself online. There's pain in the cascade of events, and there's a lot that's not ideal. But there are times I have had reason to love some of these virtual communities and some of these still-real people!

Now then... about another another community not quite so long ago as to be rendered yet in black and white: At my latest scanning session at Online Coffee, I also scanned one more photo for use in a second verse of "Time After Time".

Reflection: A Global Netbook

The picture is of my six-year-old niece with my netbook, taken when I was in Arizona. I was tutoring ESL via petite netbook this morning (a Cambridge student of Chinese background).

Just occasionally someone sends a session request via eduFire for a subject I don't necessarily promote a lot, like conversational ESL. I thought I might encounter difficulties this morning -- or issues regarding mechanics being in and out of the apartment (loudly) replacing the pipes -- but no, it went quite smoothly. (Hey, one needs to earn a bit of money to survive -- and it's been tough.)

Now about the talented little netbook that does tutoring... it has a Squidoo page: My Acer Netbook (Snookums). One of the first I put up after getting my giant squid status.

Reflection: Synchronicity (Once in a Lullabye)

Back in Seattle. I did see my mother when I was in Phoenix. A month ago, my brother would have been quite surprised to know that that she would have lived anywhere near this amount of time, still waking enough from a late Altzeimer's slumber to take in a little water and nourishment. I had read that people may respond to music when they respond to little, so I sang something we used to sing in the car when was little, "Somewhere Over the Rainbow". (Of course my mother has not known who any of us are for quite a long time.)

On the way back to Seattle, I was thinking about it, and "Over the Rainbow" was going through my head. But then it was being sung out loud, too -- quite near me there in the Greyhound bus. A bored little girl, just four or five, was singing to amuse her mother and herself.

There's a land I heard of, once in a lullabye...

Photo: Tina Philips, Free Digital Photos

Reflection: Quality of Life

My brother and I had an interesting conversation. See, I still haven't gotten my ID replaced, and it's caused some minor inconveniences. So Kevin asked me if I would save time if I was more organized. I suppose I would save some time, yet I see no impact whatsoever on my quality of life. The real impasse, understanding-wise, is this: My brother -- and I suppose most people -- have an assumption that it somehow impacts my quality of life whether I'm convenienced or inconvenienced, whether I'm comfortable or uncomfortable, or clean or dirty, or whether my purse is stolen or not stolen. Why would my quality of life be different either way?

I think some people who are labeled as high-functioning autistic-- including some who are very highly accomplished in their particular field or area of obsession-- share this trait. They almost can't be motivated by their senses. And... they almost can't be motivated by anything but their own particular cause or obsession. I think the difference is taking place at a neurological level.

I think that relates to... Well, I think people mostly just assume that everyone sees it as more pleasurable for a loved one to give them flowers than to run around and squawk like a chicken. I am perfectly capable of understanding that it's supposed to matter to me. The fact remains -- it doesn't. (More about that in a previous post: The Kitty Carryall Metahor).

Reflection: Home Visit

And here I am in Phoenix. I haven't developed my latest pictures, so today's picture is a Greyhound bus station. Soon there will be pictures of the little nieces, Chelsea, 6 and Callee, 2.

I have been cruising the internet with a kindergartner today. Chelsea selected the paper dolls that she wanted printed out and read some online storybooks: "Monkey sees a red balloon. Monkey sees a green balloon..." She also explored some of the pictures I have saved on my USB stick. My brother says tomorrow he'll find me those long-ago pictures I need.

Reflection: The Paper Doll Page Rides Again...

Remember when I said paper dolls weren't such a funny topic for a Squidoo page? Well, putting the paper dolls online up was rather a pragmatic Squidoo move, actually. I have 54 lenses at this point (a 4 lens cushion above what I need to apply for Giant Squid status this round) and for several weeks now my top lens has been A Paper Doll Childhood. (It peaked at about a 3,000 lensrank, and is closer to 4,000 now.)

If a person interacts on the Squidoo forums and leaves comments on others' 'lenses', from time to time other Squidoo-ers will click through onto their profile. Many people browse through the lens list and visit whatever topics interest them; some, though, are more inclined to check out your top-ranked page. I would say that male Squid are less likely to drop in on a lens about paper dolls, though. It's generally quite a girlie crew that comments on that one.

Not today. Today someone wrote that he was going to be the first and possible only guy to leave a comment on my paper doll lens. He mentioned that he was trying to make a living as a freelancer and that he liked to read other people's internet writing and see what worked for them.

Well, here is one life lesson that can be drawn from my experiences with Squidoo: There is a place for people to simply be themselves. Paper doll pages can do quite well. The lens that made Lens of the Day and thus peaked highest (briefly in the top 1,000) was quite a personal one, Making Sense of Monotropism. That lens has had its champions.

As for making money with online writing, though... well, at this point it's a few dollars here and there. It's on the rise, but it's still quite low. Times are tough -- and tight -- for so many reasons. Putting out the money for a Greyhound ticket is tough. But I've got most of the remaining pieces to my kindergarten-aged niece's dollhouse packed, I've got a shoulderbag case for Snookums-the-netbook to ride in... and it looks like I'll begin my Arizona trip in a few hours. I'll be gone a week or so.

Reflection: Does Your Nose Dip Low?

Have you ever felt the need to document your ... nose? I do. I want the early history of my nose.

But no, that's not an old baby picture of me. That's a baby niece. Observe that she was a cute baby. Observe, too, the nasal bridge: the slope that rises up (and down) right there between her two eyes. Both my nieces were born with nasal bridges! I've seen those things on early pictures of my cousins and my brother, as well.

As for me... the pictures I have are small, they're less clear than ideal. I think there was very little in the way of nasal bridge -- it was low, ah, but how low did it go? I don't think anything I can dig up (medical records long gone) is going to get genetics testing actually paid for by insurance, but there are things I want to see.

My brother tells me the old photos still exist -- more than the paltry few in my possession -- and I have a use for them beyond digital storytelling.

It's Spring Break. I'll talk to my brother again in a little bit, and I think I'm going home. A hard journey in a lot of ways.

Memory (From Before My Time): Women Who Flew

The woman in the musical slideshow is Bessie Coleman, a famous aviator from before any of our time -- I think somebody selected a stunning song for that video. Bessie was African American, but I do see a bit of resemblance (appearance or aspect?) between some of her pictures and long long ago pictures of my mother.

One of the more surprising things about 'the mother I never really knew' is that she earned a pilot license. I have a new piece on Squidoo titled Pioneering Women Pilots . The name may change to "My Mother and Other Women Who Flew" particularly if my brother is able to put his hands on enough artifacts.

Reflection: Across Miles and Years

My brother was at the hospital most of the time for the last week my father was alive. I went by Greyhound and got there later than I should have; I did spend the last two nights there -- and gave him water from a water dropper the last night.

And now... here I still sit. Kevin reports that he's rarely over there with himself with Mother -- even in those brief semi-awake moments she has no idea who he is. She hasn't known that for a long time. (It's been well over a year and a half since my father died, but even then she was beginning to ask us, "Do you know that my husband died?" She still knew he was her husband, then, but she wasn't clear on him being our father.)

Tears in the morning... diphenhydramine and chamomile in my system when I went off to work. Chamomile has mood brightening effects, as well as preventing body aches, but it doesn't make me sleepy. That's my brain for you: Chamomile in the morning, caffeine by night. Every substance that I react strongly to you better believe I have done a major internet study of -- but until the blood and genes there's a limit to how much I can say for sure.

Reflection: Memoir of...

I've been continuing to ask what it's appropriate to post this week... and I've been continuing to put up memoir.

Ravenna-the-big-old-computer didn't explode when its monitor did. I was able to retrieve a flash memoir, "Playing With Fire", and use it as part of a Squidoo lens, Memoir of a Hyporesponsive Child which continues the 'underwhelment' theme. I'd written some time back in "Tagging: A Metaphor for Monotropism": "This is just a theory, but it seems to fit. Deficient in body signals, deficient in the very mechanics of attraction (interest) and repulsion, I just want my favorite. I just want whatever it is I've tagged as my favorite."

I didn't know how much scientific evidence there was to back up the idea of hyporesponsive sensory processing and high-intensity thresholds. I didn't know the key words to enter, but a week or two ago, I stumbled into some material. So this resulting piece is a combination of memoir and scientific ramblings and annotation.

My brother will remember the girl who appears in the opening module of this Squidoo lens, though I did change the name. He asked me if he could access my lenses from this blog. Well, not all of them -- and especially not easily -- but I'm going to add some more to the sidebar list shortly.

Reflection: News

My brother called yesterday to say he that it looks like our mother isn’t going to live much longer; I had known that there comes a point where dementia — or the disease that causes it — takes away not just memory but the basic neurological functions necessary for life. It’s good to hear from my brother — I don't think he realizes that I am the type who would feel frightened when I don't hear from him, but instead of responding by calling I would respond by not calling. I don't think that he realizes that there are a few people in this world who perennially trigger my protectiveness and fear of bad news, and that he's one of them. That's why I used to tell people that if anything happened to anyone in the family, it had to be my brother who called. They didn't really listen to me... until more and more it got to be where he was the only one who could call.

I'm asking myself what it's appropriate for me to write on the internet this week -- what would a normal person write. This is a week for memoir. I'd told myself long ago that when I finally heard from my brother (assuming I did) "Best Superman Brother Ever" would go up on Squidoo. I did that. I got my old computer, Ravenna, going; it's sluggish, yes, but I can retrieve the creative writing pieces from "My Documents". There is a piece of flash memoir that focuses on the granddaughter of a neighbor from back when I was small. I wanted to incorporate that into a piece that I put on Squidoo connecting it to some of my recent readings and thoughts. I hope people think that it's okay for me to continue with that plan this week, even though that piece doesn't focus on family.

Squidoo (Best) Ever Project: Best Superman Brother Ever

Reflection: Underwhelment (Again)

I've got some big time fears in some areas, but not others. Different forms of fear can be dissociated from each other in striking ways: social from nonsocial anxiety, and phobic or narrow fears from vigilant or paranoid ones. It's only when friends realize this that they can consider that I'm not overwhelmed but seriously underwhelmed by most social situations. There's some evidence of underwhelment, I think: I lived five years in a dorm and seven years in housing co-ops. I frequently slept on the couch in the common area of a sixteen bedroom housing co-op --by day, amidst frequent chaos and confusion. Since girlhood, too, I've been drawn to people with very intense energies, including those who are majorly hyperactive and those who are clinically bipolar.

I know friends have tended to look to my childhood seek answers for some oddities. Ah but what if, in some ways, I am what I am not because of my childhood, but despite it. When I was fifteen, my foster mother commented that I wasn't an introvert but rather an extrovert trying to get out. Both my parents said that in our earliest years (quite a bit before the photo you see here!) it was my brother, two years my senior, who was the painfully shy one. I was the friendlier child, the bolder child, the more outgoing child. (I don't think I was truly outgoing, actually, but enough so that I stood out in contrast to my brother.) My father said in later years that he wished he'd known to be concerned about me -- that he hadn't because I acted like a child who could take on the world.

I have to take care how I explain the next thing, so it doesn't come across as arrogant: People vary in how they process stimuli -- in how much neural activity takes in response to particular things. What's overstimulating to one person may be felt as a mere blip by another. So I think some things just trigger a milder neural response in me than they do in a lot of people. It seems to me that the majority of social situations (including those that have the potential to be sexual) don't have that much at stake -- it just seems to me they hold neither aversion nor the promise of real reward. (I know that I stand in contrast to a lot of people when I express that.)

Don't we all try to make sense of one another's behaviors using our own as a guide? People who are overwhelmed by, say, a party or a date are not going to realize I have a sense of underwhelment -- of too little being at stake. There have been so many times when people have been sure they saw overwhelment in me, when something very other was going on inside. For instance, I don't get overwhelmed by the thought of changing for another person; in most situations, I'm too underwhelmed -- I have too little a sense of anything really being at stake -- to experience strong motivation. And that's actually very painful for me. I don't thrive in situations of too little 'whelment'.

Reflection: Lenses and Lensographies

I type my blog entries at home, but often I do most of the composing out and about. A few hours back (on a bus) my mind was tossing around a possible 'clever lead-in' for this post. Tired now, I decided to forego the witticisms, and just discuss and give links to some off-site writings...

I put up a second Williams Syndrome piece, Williams Syndrome and Music. I've got several videos included in the piece-- it can be good to enter some more esoteric key word strings sometimes: The video of the little girl giving a rocking (literally!) rendition of "Jesus Loves Me" has been viewed by many people, but the fifteen-year-old with the piano compositions... well, that hasn't been watched much at all. A lot of quality things get buried on YouTube and Google and life.

One of the other things I put up... well, it's a term most people wouldn't recognize because some 'squid' invented it. Most people who write 'seriously' for Squidoo put up a lensography: They arrange their writings/lenses by topic and maybe write a bit of autobiography around them. It's for one's friends and fellow writers, moreso than for the world at large, but it can help people find your writings. I put up Evening Nigh Reflections Lensography. (The web personas are sharing an account, but that doesn't mean they're going to share a lensography -- ah, no, this one belongs to Evening Nigh.)

I've had that lensography up for the better part of a week, and it's the one, among the very recent ones, that's doing best in Squid-Land -- it has a few 'squid angel' blessings at this point. There are links on it to a few pieces that I haven't discussed on this blog. Someone might want to locate A Paper Doll Childhood and print out some dolls for my little niece; the little niece who's old enough to wield scissors will find some interesting cutting there. (I'll add that paper dolls is not such an odd topic for a lens -- there are a handful of modestly successful lenses on the topic on Squidoo -- and that one is off to a pretty good start, too.)

Reflection: Listening to Lenses Again

Two of my 'lenses', both music-related, were quietly added to the sidebar a couple days back. Yup, I've been listening to lenses again. The one that I most enjoy listening to is Mental Illness: Songs For the Journey. I included an Amazon MP3 module with a dozen or so songs, and also three videos whose creators must have poured a lot of care into them. Two are music slideshows. The "Let Your Soul Be Your Pilot" video gives pretty much a line by line interpretation of Sting's song, and I would describe it as quite clever... "I'll Stand By You" I would describe as absolutely stunning. It's one of those YouTube videos that has been watched about a gazillion times and may well have more 'page rank' than anything else its creator has ever put on the internet.

The other webpage, Songs of My Childhood, is lighter fare. That piece also includes an Amazon MP3 module and a few videos; part of the text came from an essay I wrote a few years back. It was a response to a challenge posted on the forums... and if I were someone's brother, I would view a particular photo, and what it says under the photo, with a sense of humor.

Reflection: Aunt Karen Reads "A Visit From St Nicholas"

It's Christmas Eve, and here I am still. If I don't don't manage that Greyhound trip before post-holiday responsibilities, there is a semester break in another month. Now here is my read of "Twas the Night Before Christmas".

If you know me, stay tuned. There will be more Christmas gifts online. Other things will have to wait.

PS: That picture is from quite an old Christmas card!