Are you nuts?

Falling from that pokey holly tree

The fourth graders made snowflakes and they were lovely.

I’ve been rather fed up with how much the 8th graders have forgotten. They act like they’ve never used some of the graphic tools we use every year and they’re in charge of the yearbook. They need to get hopping.

I’ve been concerned I’ll have to do a lot of page cleanup when it comes time to turn the yearbook in.

So a refresher was in order. Their challenge was nutcrackers. I don’t just like snowflakes. I also like nutcrackers. Back when I worked at Highflying Banners we would make lots of nutcracker designs. They fit really well on light pole banners. You know, those big tall banners in shopping mall parking lots. Tall skinny nutcrackers are great for that. Maybe 2.5’ wide and 6’ or 8’ tall. Plus, they are colorful.

Nutcrackers are also mostly symmetrical with a lot of even-ness about them. A perfect challenge that will get the students used to lining things up on the left, center and right and for getting them in the habit of evenly distributing shapes. Alignment and centering is very important in a yearbook, you know.

As an example, let’s say you have six squares and you want to line them up and space them evenly. You could try to do it with measurements, by eye, or some other laborious method… but most drawing programs will do it for you if you know where the tools are.

So, If I take the two right shapes and align them right… and take the left ones and align them left I can end up with this.

Then if I do the three shapes on top and the three on bottom I can get this and I’m nearly done.

Now. If you have good eyesight you’ll notice that they are not evenly spaced horizontally. That’s where distribute comes in. Yup, use it on the top and bottom rows and “POW!” done.

So they had to use those tools in the process of building nutcrackers. What they made was quite fun. I made an army out of my example here. In a light-bulb. So you get the idea. ☺️

Ahh. Nuts.

Today an eighth grade mom stopped me during the Christmas party. I had an ‘uh oh’ feeling, but that’s not what it was. It was a thank you.

Her son was applying to a local private high school and one of the questions was something like, “Tell us about a class you’ve taken that has pushed you beyond the expected curriculum”... of course I’m paraphrasing from what she told me and she didn’t even see the real question.

Anyway!

He chose my technology class because of how I put them in positions where it feels like they are never going to succeed.. a seemingly impossible task at first…frustrating… but then as they work they gradually work together and figure it out. Even if I help, they usually don’t notice. He chose it because he had learned some confidence in his ability to persevere despite an initial feeling of failing, or not knowing what to do for, the task.

A nice thing to hear.

Especially since that’s exactly what I’m trying to do in my classes. I am hoping to help them prepare for the frustrations that can happen in life and successes that can follow if you just stick with it. If you learn to work with others. If you use the tools that are available in creative ways. My class may technically be called “Technology” but it could just as easily be called “Perseverance”.

Especially nice since I know a few years earlier the boy had been having some anxiety problems centered around the times when he did not know what was going on. He felt like he always had to know. To hear he is growing comfortable with those times when he is frustrated and a task seems impossible, or at least, really difficult, is great to hear. Student growth is amazing. Human growth is amazing. The building confidence that can be seen when consciously worked on is amazing.

Phew.

Crazy, nuts, insane, off my rocker, weird, different…

I am all these things.

I had a couple high school helpers during the Christmas program. We chatted a little. I told them I run alone at night. They told me I’m nuts.

I also run alone on steep trails in the middle of nowhere. Yeah. Katie would get grumpy with me. Some of my friends get grumpy with me. They think I’m crazy.

In my first year of college in the dorms there was a girl that was known for being promiscuous. Someone was giving her a hard time about it (not me!). Her response was to turn on me. First yelling at me for being so damned happy all the time. Then asking if I had ever done “it” and when I didn’t reply she said, “What are you, a weirgin?”. Yup. Being called a “weirgin” will boost a fella’s confidence for sure.

And then … well … this is rather odd, but a lot of times I can really relate to folks that are being called crazy.

Homeless folks that have been on the streets for years with randomly spew sentences and fragments. I can talk to them ~ usually. I can find an out of the blue sentence that will stop them. Get them to pause, notice me and then we can converse. And most of the time I can empathize with them and understand and give them a kind word or two.

Over the years there have been a few local homeless that I frequently talk to. I would say they are more than just casual acquaintances.

Katie talked to a lot more of them.

Katie knew she was on the edge. She told me several times that she found it easy to imagine herself alone on the streets, homeless. She had been abandoned and orphaned. She had been put in a psych ward in high school by her adopted parents. A brother had his own issues and his words of murder and death would echo in her brain. Her adopted parents kicked her out eventually… blaming her for his actions… How do you stay sane through that? Can you, really? I don’t know.

The horrible things. They can echo in a person’s head. And Katie’s memory was nearly photographic.

I know they echoed for Katie in a very ferocious way.

E v e r y l i t t l e t h i n g e c h o e d.

Sometimes I would get home and dinner would start all happy. And she would seem to be happy and we’d talk and banter and then I would say that one thing wrong. That one comment that was “exactly what my mom would say” and hellfire would burn through my bones in a vicious attack unleashed at all the horrible things in the past and me… I was merely there. Unaware of what I had done.

My flesh felt like it was being melted away. It was exhausting. Tiring… and somedays I did not have the patience to just absorb the flames and I would fire back with my own venom. And I have a voice when I want to use it.

And she would be surprised.

I learned to be afraid of evenings that seemed too good. I learned to be wary.

There was one major time when I did do something that deserved her being mad at me. Once I realized what I had done, I apologized profusely. I tried to make up for it. I apologized again. I knew I had been horrible. Not intentionally, mind you, but I was inconsiderate and had tunnel vision and put her in an impossible situation and it was not fair and I tried to own it.

But when someone’s brain replays all those negatives in their brain at the slightest instigation and have been treated unfairly for years… it can be difficult to heal. To move on. To trust again. It takes more than patience.

A few times she would be on her computer in the other bedroom late at night and something would rile her up. I would be asleep in bed. Soundly. Door closed. zzz.

She would pound the door open and lay into me. Waking me from deep sleep with anger and fierce mean words. Just brutal. Flames. And this time it was me she was mad at. Truly. I knew it and understood and knew that it was true… but I also knew what I was receiving was beyond anything I deserved.

I would close my eyes and absorb the flames as best I could. Until I couldn’t.

That’s the only time I had to go and stay at a friend’s house. I think I was out of the apartment for a week. It seemed like it may be the end of our relationship but we survived somehow.

But from then on… on those nights when she was up late and I was sleeping and the door was closed… sometimes I would wake up and just stare at the door in fear of what might come through.

And all the while. I understood. I knew where it was coming from. I could see the wires in her head and understood the damage done. The fear. The lack of trust that had been learned from being abandoned and betrayed over and over by those she should have been able to depend on.

But that didn’t stop me from learning to be fearful. And now, nearly two years after her death and probably three years since she had last unleashed on me… when things do seem to be going smoothly I get a nagging feeling that it will all come crashing down. That someone will come through the door and raze me to the ground. That someone I care for will turn and crash into me with fierce fiery fists. And they don’t. They haven’t.

I sigh. I try to learn … re-learn. I wasn’t always so fearful. Logically, I know what has happened in my brain and why.

Holly

When my dad had his nursery there were a few winters when I would be called into action to help make wreaths. There would be stacks of different evergreens and we would be outside in the dark at the nursery putting them all together to form lovely wreaths.

It was cold and juniper gave me rashes and holly. Well, holly is lovely but you’re bound to get poked. And poked a lot. I got poked a lot.

But I still think fondly of Holly. Just as I still love Katie. When I imagine her she is a white light.