Meredith Kendall's Blog, page 32
July 20, 2015
teaching
I love teaching; I love seeing students think, reflect, create, synthesize, discern, overcome fear, and evolve.
July 17, 2015
pictures
I realized I see pictures in my head.
My friend Bets and I are getting older, aren't we all, and anyway sometimes I forget a word. Sometimes she forgets a word. I noticed that when we're talking and she's trying to think of a word I get a picture of an object in my head. The object; the thing she's trying to think of.
My friend Bets and I are getting older, aren't we all, and anyway sometimes I forget a word. Sometimes she forgets a word. I noticed that when we're talking and she's trying to think of a word I get a picture of an object in my head. The object; the thing she's trying to think of.
July 16, 2015
same phone
Well I didn't get that new phone. Got off the Edge, back back back to safety. Still have my laughable-to-some ancient 4-year-old phone. It works just fine. The problem was a simple billing glitch. Fixed with a phone call, bonus $10 credit for my trouble.
Back home, back to work. No carbon monoxide alarms, no kayak, no lake, no loons. Plenty of students to engage, papers to grade, and miles to go.
Monday I taught Reiki at the University, all day. We did attunements beside a froggy pond. Turtles too. Monday evening was a four-hour compassion inservice. We had Italian sandwiches and sweet gooey pumpkin roll. We did empathy role-playing: how to encourage dialogue and be comfortable with difficult topics.
Tuesday the contractor didn't come to measure windows. I need new windows. The windows are falling apart, painted shut but paradoxically drafty. I spread 6 bales of hay around the garden in the morning and went into the office at noon. Worked til supper: salad from the garden. Sat outside and read in the evening.
Yesterday and today I started work at 5:30 am, worked 12 hours with students at the hospital. We administered medications: intravenous fluids and narcotics, antiemetics, antibiotics, laxatives, and vitamins. After work yesterday I went to a planning meeting for an annual fundraiser. We met on a patio outside a big house on the lake. There was pizza, beer, salad, and eclairs. There were reports on progress. Chilly lake breezes after a warm day.
Today I sat in the garden after work, graded papers as the sun set. I picked raspberries, admired flowers, drew flowers on the students' papers, and watched the sky as pink and orange streaks developed and faded.
Tomorrow is a day of meetings, interviews, and curriculum planning. I hope to have time to work on student evaluations, grade Reiki posts for my online class, and analyze my Reiki research.
I miss the loons, lake, kayak, and laziness.
Back home, back to work. No carbon monoxide alarms, no kayak, no lake, no loons. Plenty of students to engage, papers to grade, and miles to go.
Monday I taught Reiki at the University, all day. We did attunements beside a froggy pond. Turtles too. Monday evening was a four-hour compassion inservice. We had Italian sandwiches and sweet gooey pumpkin roll. We did empathy role-playing: how to encourage dialogue and be comfortable with difficult topics.
Tuesday the contractor didn't come to measure windows. I need new windows. The windows are falling apart, painted shut but paradoxically drafty. I spread 6 bales of hay around the garden in the morning and went into the office at noon. Worked til supper: salad from the garden. Sat outside and read in the evening.
Yesterday and today I started work at 5:30 am, worked 12 hours with students at the hospital. We administered medications: intravenous fluids and narcotics, antiemetics, antibiotics, laxatives, and vitamins. After work yesterday I went to a planning meeting for an annual fundraiser. We met on a patio outside a big house on the lake. There was pizza, beer, salad, and eclairs. There were reports on progress. Chilly lake breezes after a warm day.
Today I sat in the garden after work, graded papers as the sun set. I picked raspberries, admired flowers, drew flowers on the students' papers, and watched the sky as pink and orange streaks developed and faded.
Tomorrow is a day of meetings, interviews, and curriculum planning. I hope to have time to work on student evaluations, grade Reiki posts for my online class, and analyze my Reiki research.
I miss the loons, lake, kayak, and laziness.
July 2, 2015
forgiveness
forgive that person most difficult to forgive: yourself
Reiki and a warning
At camp, out to camp, upta camp.
I'm staying in a cottage on a small lake in Maine. Yesterday was rainy.
So I got up early and set off to do laundry. Check. Went to a Sprint store to see why my mobile hot spot device, an Android phone, was not working. I'd tried everything I could think of to get it to work. Nothing. So the store. In a mostly deserted mall. A family came in while I was there. Large, loud, inquisitive people with big sweatshirts bearing nationalistic gun and flag graphics. They bought phones. We were all there a long time. The clerks tried everything I'd tried and more. No success. Perhaps it's maintenance on the towers the clerk told me. Perhaps.
The clerks laughed a little at my 4-year-old phone. So I asked them to sell me a new one. They did and I'll pick it up on Saturday. Android 6 Edge. I'll be living on the edge, hanging with U2, edgy and new.
I got back to camp late afternoon. Still raining. Chilly. I turned on the gas heater, read, took a nap on the couch, read some more, spun some alpaca fleece, watched TV, did some self-Reiki and meditation. Read. Thought I'd go to bed early. By then it was toasty warm in the camp. Turned off the gas heater and heard a shrieking beep. Noticed a yellow light flashing on a wall-mounted electronic device. Burglar alarm?
Carbon monoxide detector.
Can I just ignore that thing and go to bed? Probably not.
I opened windows, turned on fans, emailed the camp owner, and looked up carbon monoxide FAQs online. The shriek was obnoxious, the online warnings dire. The owner emailed back that it prob just needed a new battery, sleep with a window open, that if it were truly carbon monoxide the beep would be very loud. Well, I could hear it from my car, parked up beside the road, so I guess that's loud enough.
Eventually the beeping stopped and I went back inside. The yellow light had subsided. Safe to sleep.
I'm staying in a cottage on a small lake in Maine. Yesterday was rainy.
So I got up early and set off to do laundry. Check. Went to a Sprint store to see why my mobile hot spot device, an Android phone, was not working. I'd tried everything I could think of to get it to work. Nothing. So the store. In a mostly deserted mall. A family came in while I was there. Large, loud, inquisitive people with big sweatshirts bearing nationalistic gun and flag graphics. They bought phones. We were all there a long time. The clerks tried everything I'd tried and more. No success. Perhaps it's maintenance on the towers the clerk told me. Perhaps.
The clerks laughed a little at my 4-year-old phone. So I asked them to sell me a new one. They did and I'll pick it up on Saturday. Android 6 Edge. I'll be living on the edge, hanging with U2, edgy and new.
I got back to camp late afternoon. Still raining. Chilly. I turned on the gas heater, read, took a nap on the couch, read some more, spun some alpaca fleece, watched TV, did some self-Reiki and meditation. Read. Thought I'd go to bed early. By then it was toasty warm in the camp. Turned off the gas heater and heard a shrieking beep. Noticed a yellow light flashing on a wall-mounted electronic device. Burglar alarm?
Carbon monoxide detector.
Can I just ignore that thing and go to bed? Probably not.
I opened windows, turned on fans, emailed the camp owner, and looked up carbon monoxide FAQs online. The shriek was obnoxious, the online warnings dire. The owner emailed back that it prob just needed a new battery, sleep with a window open, that if it were truly carbon monoxide the beep would be very loud. Well, I could hear it from my car, parked up beside the road, so I guess that's loud enough.
Eventually the beeping stopped and I went back inside. The yellow light had subsided. Safe to sleep.
temperate and not so temperatures
On vacation, bought a newspaper, looked at the weather map. I love weather maps.
Nearly the entire US was red: temps in the 80s and up. The same temp way high in Alaska as in Tucson, Arizona. There was one little green oval: Maine, temps in 50s. There was a yellow circle around the green: temps in 60s.
It shocked me to see all that red, and I'm grateful for our green, even though I'm at a lake. I don't mind the grey and rain, perfect weather for a good book. It's just, wow, all that red, and what goes along: tornadoes, floods, heatstroke, drought. Changes.
Nearly the entire US was red: temps in the 80s and up. The same temp way high in Alaska as in Tucson, Arizona. There was one little green oval: Maine, temps in 50s. There was a yellow circle around the green: temps in 60s.
It shocked me to see all that red, and I'm grateful for our green, even though I'm at a lake. I don't mind the grey and rain, perfect weather for a good book. It's just, wow, all that red, and what goes along: tornadoes, floods, heatstroke, drought. Changes.
June 19, 2015
stray thought
startled and wounded
by violence and anger
healed in the garden
by violence and anger
healed in the garden
Reiki is
touch without touching, moved without moving, healed without pills, communication without speaking.
Students' papers
Reiki reflection papers were moving, insightful, considered, and enlightening. Students wrote that at the first class they were: scared, doubtful, and skeptical. By the last class they were feeling vibrations, feeling too relaxed to move, and seeing humans as energy.
June 17, 2015
Rough life
Life is rough. Tough. Too much to do, too many people expecting too much, too much homework, scary tests, sick people who might die. This is what I hear from my students. They're stressed out, overwhelmed, freaking out, getting sick.
So I tell them:
Put your feet up. Get comfy. Close your eyes.
Breathe.
Rest.
Relax.
Imagine you're floating up out of your body. Look down at that stressed self. Float higher.
Float over to the beach. Think about how many drops of water there are in the ocean.
Float back to your body.
Eyes closed, wonder what you're supposed to learn from this situation.
What's the lesson here?
Life is rough? Good! Time to learn something.
Look for a pattern. Make a change.
Get healthier.
So I tell them:
Put your feet up. Get comfy. Close your eyes.
Breathe.
Rest.
Relax.
Imagine you're floating up out of your body. Look down at that stressed self. Float higher.
Float over to the beach. Think about how many drops of water there are in the ocean.
Float back to your body.
Eyes closed, wonder what you're supposed to learn from this situation.
What's the lesson here?
Life is rough? Good! Time to learn something.
Look for a pattern. Make a change.
Get healthier.
