Dancing in the rain…moving through crowds
I’m trying to get caught up on posts! In my defense, it’s been busy.
Side Quest (March 13)
Most of today has been dealing with Pain in the Ass stuff. Just a relentless amount of it. Brain feels melted. I am cranking the tunes and dancing off and on as I write this, to try to recover. I did get to chat with a couple of friends, but most of the day was nose to the grinding ass crack of bureaucracy.
I’m almost ready to start Book 4 of the WIP. I’m hoping I can start it up tomorrow.
But, so I don’t forget it: this morning I went out for my walk. It was a gray day, heavy, ready to rain.–It’s been raining on and off the last few days, the kind of rain that makes the petrichor receptors in one’s nose open up.
On the way back from the park by the river (the one with the community garden and the passionflowers, which are putting on buds!), it started to rain again.
I made it back from the park by the river and stopped at the back end of a second park, the one by the playground with the big spiderwebby thing. The rain was getting heavier, and I’d tucked the phone into my waistband so it wouldn’t get too wet.
Then an old electronica song came on, the long version. The cars were too far away to notice me at the back of the park and all the joggers were elsewhere, waiting for the rain to stop.
So I danced.
Out in the rain.
I didn’t go too hard; I had a phone in my waistband and it kept trying to slip out. It probably looked like someone doing tai chi too quickly.
Ten minutes later, the rain stopped, the joggers returned, and I put my company face back on. Ten minutes of MWAH. I couldn’t have planned it.
I got back to the apartment and maintenance had (finally!) come to fix the tub leaking. Result: wall sawed open, water heater parts replaced, open pipes in the commons plumbed with one dude’s arm, lower bathtub hardware removed, replaced, removed again, replaced again, covered with black plastic.
Using Ray’s shower, I think. They said they’ll be back tomorrow, but they said that last time.
Good song just came on. I’m off.
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Side Quest (March 15)
Trying to figure out how to teach Ray how to move through crowds with less stress.
A while back I learned (although I can’t find it now) that wasps mostly just find something big and fly around it. Like a tree. So if I want to ditch a wasp, I’ll walk next to a tree. Generally the wasp will stay with the tree, as long as I’m not close to their nest.
Since then, I’ve been thinking: people don’t have nests, they have families and groups. If I’m in a hurry to get somewhere, I stop watching people and start watching groups. Who moves together? Who’s staring at someone else?
If it’s not too crowded, I’ll dodge between groups.–Ray seems to be okay on that side. I’ve seen her weave through people tons of times. She’s good at that kind of fast.
When it gets more crowded, though, she’ll push herself to the edge of the room or otherwise wait for EVERYONE else to do their thing first. Mostly that’s okay, too.
But sometimes you just have to GO, and she doesn’t get that part. Does not compute. She tries but so hesitantly that people just walk right into her.
People have stopped walking into me in crowds, probably because I carry myself more confidently. In the constant dance of “us versus them,” I have taken on visible signs of being more trouble than I’m worth, but not so scary that I can’t be smiled at (or talked to). It’s nice.
In a crowd where I need to GO, I’ll slow down and walk steadily and slowly. People generally move around me, because I’m too much trouble to walk into. I’m a rock in their river.
I can’t teach Ray that overnight, though. Too many small things to change at once, and she doesn’t think the way I do anyhow.
She does do pretty good with getting her own way in games with tons of people in them (Roblox, Minecraft). She does her own thing and if others can’t follow server rules or are deliberately screwing with what she’s doing, she’ll grief them. It makes her more trouble than she’s worth. Maybe I can phrase it in those terms.
We did talk yesterday about thinking like a brat whenever there were setbacks. She was trying to navigate to a new bus stop, got turned around, got flustered and shut down. But when she was little, setbacks were Not Possible. She would find the most freaking clever ways to get around obstacles. She was SUCH a little shit, often identifying quickly when I was distracted and she could execute her plans. Other kids have Terrible Twos. Mine acquired the theme song to Mission Impossible.
I’d have to find ways to get her what she wanted or at least to understand why what she was doing was dangerous or hurtful, because “no” just meant “when an adult wasn’t watching, which can be arranged.” Child-proof locks were just enrichment activities at the zoo for her. But of course the public school system tried to crush all that out of her, and now she can’t access that mindset nearly as well.
AHHHHHH parenting remains weird. We’ll see.
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The park. Taken just before I said, “Screw it, dancing now.”
Ray, after we recovered from the bus stuff.