I’m looking across the circle at family book club. Moms and dads and their kids are sitting together, and we are sharing out to the whole group.
The kids are quiet, shy in the way kids get when it’s evening and they are with their parents and teachers and principal, all in the school library.
A third-grader seems to want to say something, but she puts her head down, shoulders up, not sure if she wants to speak. Her mom smiles at her, encouraging.
There’s something about the exchange that takes me briefly back in time.
My daughter and I went to a book club together – a Mothers and daughters book club. We met at the library every so often. We talked about a book we had read, did a craft.
We didn’t always finish the book we were supposed to read, but we went, we did the craft, we talked.
I don’t remember the books, I have a sliver of memory of one or two of the crafts.
But, I can picture the photograph of us laughing during one of those book clubs – it hangs in my parent’s house. And, I remember the feeling: sitting next to my young daughter, encouraging her to speak.
Reminders aren’t working. Last March I set a reminder on WordPress – and I never turned it off. So every day at 10:00 in the morning, my phone notifies me that is time to blog.
Yet, I do not blog every day, or even every Tuesday.
My latest phone software update added a journaling app. I explored it a bit, and now it sends me reminders every day at 10:00 at night. “New Journaling Suggestion” it says. Every night.
Yet, I haven’t written in that journal. Not even once.
It’s a little creepy how the journaling app uses phone data to suggest things from my day that I might want to write about. Today it wonders if I might want to write about my “Afternoon visit near the dentist.”
I mean, sure. I can do that. If you insist.
I was near the dentist. Very near. Okay, I was at the dentist.
I always hope for a reason to cancel my dentist appointments, but today I just had to make myself go. Adulting, right? Later the dentist even thanked me for taking time out of my afternoon to spend with them. So I feel this appointment was like a gift I could give their whole office.
I was even early enough to do some work in the van before heading in, because why wouldn’t you use your sick time to catch up on a few things for school?
I’m not sure why I try to avoid the dentist when it’s actually fine. It’s good to get your teeth cleaned and checked! My dentist is nice, the hygienists are nice too. The one I had today hadn’t seen me since the divorce, I guess. She wondered about my name change, told me she hasn’t seen my ex husband for awhile either.
In completely unrelated news, I didn’t even ask her to jab anyone extra hard with the dental pick next time she sees them. Points for me!
The hygienist looked at a place on one of my teeth they have been keeping an eye on. She told me that all would depend on which dentist came to check on me. My usual dentist is a conservative watch and wait kind of guy. The new, fresh out of school dentist is more likely to want to do more.
My mouth was too busy to engage in a conversation about consistency of care. But I did wonder. Like if the new dentist came to check on me, and told me I needed to get a filling, could I just yell for my regular dentist? Would he hear me? Would he understand what I was saying while the new dentist’s fingers were in my mouth? Would he help me?
I worried for nothing. The new dentist was nice, definitely fresh out of school. And he isn’t worried about any of my teeth. His check up was so different from what my regular dentist usually does though. Do I just not remember having to turn my head from side to side, having my throat pressed on, the under the tongue check?
No signs of mouth cancer though. That’s what he told me anyway.
There’s something I didn’t even know to be anxious about at my dental check-ups. Cool.
Come to think of it, maybe this iPhone journaling prompt thing will come in handy in March. I would never have thought to write about going to the dentist.
Don’t worry though, I don’t plan on going back to the dentist for another 6 months.
Loud Music. I blast it in the car. I’ve always loved loud music, wanted the sound to fill the space.
Of course, this tracked at 16. Picking up friends on the way to school, I must have slipped a cassette in. Tori Amos filled the ol’ Hyundai, but also The Doors, Nirvana, Bob Dylan, Joan Baez. I had the best mixed tapes. I’m wondering if I turned the music up or down when I pulled into the school parking lot.
Once, freshman year, I blasted Jewel in my dorm room. I don’t know why this memory pops in my head so often. Was I getting ready for something? Was my roommate there? Did the entire building hear Who Will SaveYour Soul?
On my way to work these days, I choose a playlist to turn all the way up. My team started a “Hype” playlist, so that’s a good way to start a day with positivity.
Playlist poetry should be as popular as book spine poetry, don’t you think? What’s your current Playlist Poetry?
Hype!
Make Way Good Morning Rise Up Rise Be Cool High Hopes Glitter & Gold
Not that I am always strong enough to choose the “Hype” playlist. It takes a certain strength to set intentions like that every morning.
Sometimes my morning playlist is just a shuffle. I skip through songs until I land on the one I need. But, I don’t know the one I need until it starts. I say, “No.” to my van as I skip through, sometimes listening to a few seconds, sometimes going backwards giving a song another chance, always annoyed that the shuffle doesn’t know me better.
Morning Shuffle
I am - no What I am - no Therefore I am - no Unstoppable - no
Truckin’- no Invincible - no I Will Survive - no
Run the World (Girls) - no Don’t Give Up - no
I’m the Best - no Mad Woman - no Mad Woman - no
Exactly How I Feel - no Players - no Touch the Sky - no Kings & Queens- no
Rap God
I turn the music down when I pull into the school parking lot.
I mean, not all the way down.
My son just got his license, and right before his test, the driving teacher went through an amazing list of things to know about having and using a car. She reminded him that cell phones and friends are the leading causes of accidents. She went over what emergency supplies to keep in the trunk, when to check the oil (every fourth or fifth time you get gas) and how he needs to watch a YouTube of how to change a tire and jump start a car before he’s stuck on a country road with no signal needing to do those things.
It was a great list, and I wondered how many other things have I forgotten to teach him? He’s 17. I am running out of time! Later I told him that even though I love listening to loud music in the car, as a new driver, he should not be blasting music. He needs to concentrate.
“Oh, no. I will be very focused.” He said this very seriously. He does blast music in his room some, but he also turns my car music down a lot. He might be embarrassed by my music. He is a teenager.
I’m not a teenager or in college still so I don’t know how to feel about my propensity for loud music. Is it embarrassing? I’m not sure how I’m judged for it, but I know I’ve been judged.
“Turn it down!” ”Can you turn it down?”
A few years ago I found out I had a 30% hearing loss.
Check yourself reader – did you have a moment of assumption?
“Duh. You shouldn’t have been playing all that loud music!”
But actually the hearing loss was something I was born with, they say.
So maybe my loud music is how I hear.
Maybe my loud music is HOW I hear
People might judge my loud music, tell me to turn it down. They may sigh with exasperation when I need them to repeat themselves.
I try to remember this feeling, remind myself that you can’t always notice other people’s struggles. I try to remember it when I sigh with exasperation at others.
I try. But I’m a work in progress. So sometimes I just turn up my music.
On a Thought 