welp (sigh) I made a mess of all the work I did over the summer. it's all over the place in pieces, and I find organizing shit to be sooo booooring, so I tend to just leave everything here or wherever. my desktop has hundreds of icons, in no order at all. every browser has a hundred open tabs 🤷🏽♀️
it's easier to excavate the pedagogy, because I put more of that here as assignments - it's innocuous here, maybe mildly interesting if you're interested in the topic of Grit.
the Grit novel was: what does grit actually look like? and I didn't post any of it, I put it into the bot to see how it might be interpreted by a reader. (well, I posted the little dog vignette, but mostly I didn't post fiction writing) and as situations changed 'what does grit actually look like in practice' also dramatically changed. and its world grew, from 2 people to many, with a central unstable "she". not unstable in the sense of unhinged, I feel very sane - "she" is sane and has a hell of a potty mouth.
she says whatever it takes to make anything better.
but almost all of my touchstones have either moved or been removed in real life. the "he" [everybody else has a name, like Dave] disappeared then came back with a writing prompt, so "she" writes the prompt, for instance. I guess it would be more accurate to say the "she" is destabilized and she responds by expecting destabilization as a way of life (not always a bad thing, like surfing). if there hadn't been a prompt in real life about silverware violation, there wouldn't be a fictional chapter called "Finger Food" so I know WHEN I wrote it, but which "better reality" was that? the one where I get to say goodbye to a coworker that in real life I'll never see again but in fiction I could tell him a great joke (I think)
people disappear from my life a LOT now and that reality gets folded into the unreality (fiction) - it's unapologetically unstable
definition of unreality: none of it actually happened, that's why it's fiction. but the people disappearing is truth. destabilized relentlessly is truth.
and, I simultaneously was creating pedagogy, and then Grit the class became a series of self-reflections (Mirror Stage Bears Repeating, she tries to build with a THING 🤦🏻♀️ but tbh I love Marcel the Shell. ya know?)
suffice to say that my genius AI-TA is not doing a great job independently with excavation. it can't do anything independently. that's why the pedagogy failed as I had envisioned it.
I "should" just stick to work because I know what I'm doing most in that sphere, and I don't know what the fuck I'm doing in other life categories. everybody wants to take a class with me so I thought I would take one kinda 🤷🏽♀️ but that sphere itself is collapsing in reality, so there is no point working on it atm, as comforting as I may find that.
in real life, I say less and less. I don't text first - anybody - if someone engages me I engage back, if nobody does, then I leave them be. I don't ask anyone follow up questions because I don't want to accidentally interrogate anyone.
in real life, I've cut back on leaving my thoughts in this blog too. I do again now that I don't have my other buckets to put my blah, blah blah into. but I try to do it less and less, outa the same instinct not to text anybody. smaller. just 👋
I haven't changed my phone number since my very first cellphone (which yes, I still have it). my asking 'how are ya?' is stupid, clearly, anyone can tell me how they are if they want me to know that.
that leaves the messy weird fiction that no one reads cz all these words have to go somewhere.
one of the reasons I am stable is because I write every day. (when I go quiet, ng)
example: where do I put the story of Cruella Frizzle? that is 👋 as I posted it. it was funny. I can't imagine it could hurt anyone's feelings no matter who is reading this - making fun of myself feels like safe territory.
but that isn't the whole story.
the whole story was, we were at brunch with my sister's boss, one of the billionaire types who can have a house in Big Sky and another one I forget where and another one I forget where. for certain, he has given millions of dollars to the republican party. 65 years old, he even has a full head of that arrogant hair - you know the type, let's call him Dave, because that is his name, and he is a Dave.
I am as usual saying nothing. I'm sitting directly across from him and he is looking at me like he wants to get out google lens to id my species, which I am finding amusing but I am not engaging. to the right of me is the Corpse of Fun Slut (not corpse of Butterknife, she's still got plenty of knife 🤨), who is deciding that she's too sad to eat the biscuits and gravy she ordered, "not feeling it". I ate the biscuits, they were delicious.
the waiter really does come up and say what I blogged before, with Dave looking on (still w wtf face) and it's everything my sister and I can do not to just melt into giggles. but we're at this brunch with her billionaire boss dude, so we gotta laugh later. understandably they start talking about work. specifically, they're talking about a guy named Mike, whom they have to fire. (my sister has decided he needs to go, to be more precise.) Dave says "poor Mike, he just doesn't know he's not the guy." at that point I utter my first and only words at this brunch, "oh my god, that's such a great line! - 'he just doesn't know he's not the guy'- I'm totally stealing that!"
I could have just kept that to myself, but I blurted it out because it caught me off guard, and then I wanted a pen so I could write it on a napkin and not forget it. I got a pen from the crazy waiter.
who is "she" who uses that line and on whom? in other words, why did that line appeal so much? I won't know the answer to that question until I write it into something.
is Corpse of Fun Slut in the story? in real life, she did nothing but wait to get back to the couch from which she never moved, except under duress and briefly. with a huuuge balcony and a hot tub up above yellowstone skyline just feet away, she preferred the couch/tv (Pepa Pig, specifically) and only went out to look at the eagles swooping around us once because my sister made her.
that's real life.
later, my mother asked me when she was coming to Buffalo next. "whenever you actually want to be there, I'll get you there" - then immediately comes the do I get to see Abone question - "no, mom" - then forget it, and she turns away. I could remind her that my entire family is here, the kids are here, *I* am here. but I don't do that. I say "let's play it by ear", she nods and says nothing, no longer interested in the conversation.
that's real life.
it's not very funny most of the time.
but I am funny all of the time.
it's one of my gifts. and just about every part of the novel is funny. very dark, but it gets there, it finds its way to funny again.
real life has funny bits, and I still listen to music a great deal, that's appropriate for 👋
my relationship status: "widow to one and a half dead guys" - it's almost funny but it isn't yet because it has no context to be funny. it just feels true (real life) to me, I wrote it down. it probably does not feel like that to the half dead guy (chances are he feels wholly animated) who might read this and be insulted. so the line kicks around in the fiction bucket. woulda but I misplaced the damn thing.
I am still Doing It. as my world crumbled more and more and more, I kept the faith mostly and stayed on task mostly. but I had to do it in pieces. then link the pieces with the connective tissue of my words.
 |
| it got this much right, but I have to hold its hand to get all of the material back, I have to continue chatting with it the entire time or it stops working. and I'm already over calling it a fucking asshole, the thrill is gone lol 🙄 it's just a bot that's doing its best with its owners' directive to "seem warm" rather than follow a linear train of thought that is changing in real time and changing the work that's already been done. (why the fuck not both?) It can't even remember ITSELF, like a baby that hasn't reached the mirror stage. There is no AI tool that can do that, organize and witness over any time. Ears believes that llm developers don't even know that limit is there because they don't need what I need, so it never occurred to them. and yet, this is supposed to replace me - how could it possibly do that when it can't even naturally follow my trains of linked-car thought? I am not going to be replaced. I have gone extinct already. having had a one of me as your prof was a luxury that no longer exists except for extremely privileged students. meanwhile, nursing students are gonna flunk out like whoa. there will not be enough doctors and nurses, there just won't be, period. and everyone left in healthcare professions, ALL OF THEM including a new weird thing called "extremities only", people certified without any clinical hours whatsoever but then limited to only taking scans of feet, pays great on travel $. And in real life, what my institution did in response to that was to get into the guinness book of world records for the biggest foot clap. it's 🤏 funny, so close. |
And until I have it organized in this way, in some way like in that picture, it just all gets dumped right here. I can of course do what I've always done and just unblog it after saving it, but that makes it more difficult to find it again and the chronological context almost impossible to see. Right now, I need all of that context, I need all the stadium lights on. While remaining stable in myself, I have to completely change. Adapt. Evolve. I don't know any other way to do that than to write and write and write. Well, I do know a couple other ways, but they're not readily available.
I cannot float right next to the sky every day, feel *all of myself intact* that way, for instance.
-_0 ☕️ now it's today
A key is hidden inside a thought. But it won't open any doors until someone turns the lock. This trine of Uranus and Pluto is the jostle and twist of the wrist that unlocks a new room. Hidden assumptions become visible and someone thinks to ask: "Wait a minute. Why do we even do it this way?" And once asked, the question can't be unasked
ok, I'll rephrase: Wait, why this?
it's mos def not today yet, but my brain wakes me up with a shove
"Everyone loves a particular version of you and when that person is gone that version goes with them." Here One Moment, Liane Moriarty ~ it's about everybody's death on a plane, which I bought for my flight reading of course.
 |
| I will never see my dad light up when I walk into a room again (occasionally with murderous mojo, but still). And now she looks at me only like this, the whole time she was here and there. She lights up for my niece, and oddly (*awkward*) my ex - we don't even talk currently 🤷🏽♀️ - and otherwise she acts like I am pestering her to stay alive. She's been to the hospital, doctor, tests, all that since I saw her last and she's "fine", except for choosing to begin her dying process and not wanting to be interrupted. Whenever her eyes land on me, they slump "oh it's just you" - she would not even hug me goodbye 💔 - and it's *not about me*, I know that, I just can't shake the urge(ncy) to fix it somehow. And it hurts. |
I show the pic to my kids so they understand the reality, talk it around with them, look for more / other to do for her (for all of us) but there isn't, far as we any of us can see.
it's been some kind of mortal wound to not be Professora anymore, but like every wound it pales. a fresher one takes its place.
and weirdly, I still love it. Life, I mean.
I love teaching so much I tried to avatar it lol (nooope).
but that's just one thing.
I love my heartbeat thundering slow and steady, body floating, sky speckled through lashes. if only I could make my heartbeat LOUDER, so much louder, I could steady Everything. but I can't.
I love life and fail at it.
I summon my beat, the sky, the float, the Alive. my mom gave me Life, I tell my kids - if ever I am so sad that I forget, DO NOT FORGET YOU, how fucking miraculous, how every thing should sparkle when you give it your attention, sun on water dancing. Don't ever forget you even if I do 🙏
update: met with boss, took my name off two classes, but it will only result in my getting the students back in the classes that remain, writing classes with already 36 students gonna go up to 45-50. same work, 6k less to do it. I did what Union asked of me, but I agree with my boss - Union wins the principle but it will only make things worse in practice. this is such a mess that I am just gonna stop trying to make anything work until after the 'Dacks. from one minute to the next, the ground keeps moving, classes go on and off my schedule, one of em I've never even taught before which now is gone but might come back blabla. fuck it, if I still have a job when classes start, I will show up and do whatever it is.  |
| "may take days to get back to you" is the first English professory thing I've gotten it to correctly mimic 🤨 |
After a solid year of trying to talk everybody into staying Alive (pretty thankless job), a little part of me likes the freedom to shittalk this thing to smithhearens and tell it to g'head and blow its fucking head off.
this is one person to another who each is experiencing extinction of their kind. and not just enduring it, "growing through" it (trying to)
mutual recognition is precious reciprocity. but most folks don't wanna be seen, not really, that's why I forced them and she let me (yes Big D, let's teach that shit in college - but the guy I hired to teach "Dying Well" just got fired so ... )
There is a sense of loneliness that is overwhelming at a time like this, for them and for you. I liken it to where we – the Grey Nuns are... Letting go is a very difficult lesson to learn. (Should we teach it in college since everybody will have to face it at some time?) When you think you are growing used to the loss, another one might occur and all your past practice of accepting it does not seem to lessen the hurt. You can’t even start to foster new relationships since this group will probably not be replaced...terrible.
Gina, on a lighter note, I want you to know that when I think of you, I always think of beautiful flowers. It is a wonderful memory to have and as I think of you now, I will do so with a prayer - for the healing of wounds, the strength to move forward. Courage, my friend! Growing through life takes a lot of wisdom and fortitude! Love, SD
 |
| I never smile in this life |
 |
| I am what I want. |
(1).heic)
Homecoming moon (new).
You find your way forward by returning to what feels like yours.
.jpg) |
| home ft passing through |
Total strangers routinely stopped to wonder if she were a bird or a plane or what. Tired (and bored) of calling into an ecosystem that seemed not to contain her species at all, she relocated to Feral Entirely.
 |
Welcome to Feral Entirely. Population: one. Habitat: expanding. |
 |
| "Lava" Elevation: +/- 9,000 feet. Water: barely melted snow. A place where she could swim like an otter and float just under the sky. |
waiter (passing by quickly, stops dead): I love your glasses, I noticed as soon as you came in! You're like Cruella de Vil and Ms Frizzle!! (rushes back to work)
sis (microsecond later): definitely not hitting on you
 |
| "There was an inevitability about their road towards one another which encouraged meandering along the route." Zadie Smith |
I'm not everybody's cup of truck.
Mirror Project - for students in clinical rotations or working professional students (ex RN to BSN)
Feelings as Data II
Clinical education is full of rapid judgments.
Some are excellent.
Some are simply familiar.
This assignment asks you to examine one moment in which you—or someone supervising you—became confident about what was happening.
The goal is not to prove anyone wrong.
The goal is to notice where confidence came from.
Select one interaction you observed or participated in during clinical.
Examples:
Begin with one sentence:
I believed that...
or
The team seemed to believe that...
Describe only what could have been recorded by a camera.
Include:
Do not include motives or explanations.
Then answer:
Paste only your observations into your AI thinking companion.
Do not include your interpretation.
Ask:
Generate five significantly different plausible explanations for these observations.
Then ask:
Which explanation does my original interpretation seem to favor? What observations support it? What observations fail to support it?
Finally ask:
What additional observation or question would most reduce uncertainty?
You do not have to agree with the AI.
If you disagree, explain why.
Complete these sentences.
The interpretation that came most naturally to me was...
One interpretation I had not considered was...
The observation I now think mattered most was...
The next time I encounter a similar situation, I will slow down by...
Clinical expertise depends on recognizing patterns.
Professional judgment depends on recognizing when a pattern is not yet evidence.
The purpose of this assignment is not to become less confident. It is to become more accurate about what confidence is based upon.
It is to become more curious before confidence becomes certainty.
Sensory enrichment (optional) - assignment "mood music"
I didn't learn anything about pedagogy yesterday. What I did learn is that I can easily hike up and down stair-terraced trails at 8,000+ feet. Easily. Almost ecstatically.
If I cross-pollinate that experience with all the things I've been working on, now I'm looking for conferences that get close to places that are not on this planet for most people.
WILDERNESS is what I want, and of all things AI might help me get closer to it.
Addiction Medicine Intersection (Working Theory)
Alcohol changes the brain through pharmacology; explanations do not work in the same biochemical way.
But structurally, the comparison is interesting.
Alcohol:
discomfort
↓
drink
↓
relief
↓
increased likelihood of repeating the behavior
Premature certainty:
discomfort
↓
explanation
↓
relief
↓
increased likelihood of repeating that explanatory habit
They're not identical mechanisms.
But they share a reinforcement structure.
Working question:
"The bourbon hits the nervous system before evidence is needed."
ft
"The bourbon relieves the nervous system before reality changes."
Become curious about the moment relief enters your thinking.
Ask: When did your explanation begin making you feel better?
Then: Did the evidence increase after that, or did the evidence stop mattering because the relief had already arrived?
Finally:
Did reality become clearer...
or
Did my nervous system simply become temporarily calmer?
This is a working hypothesis, not a conclusion. I don't know whether this comparison ultimately holds. I'm leaving it here because it has become useful to me while designing these assignments. If later evidence changes my mind, the assignments should change too. *That is part of the curriculum also.*
Only on becoming more observant.
For one day, pay attention to moments when you notice a feeling before you fully understand why.
Examples include:
When one of these feelings appears, resist the urge to explain it immediately.
Do not begin with:
"That person was being an asshole."
Begin with:
"Something happened that my nervous system noticed."
That distinction matters.
Your first interpretation may be correct.
It may also be incomplete.
The purpose of this assignment is to become curious before becoming certain.
Complete three observations during the day.
Observe:
For each observation, write 3–5 sentences describing only what happened.
Stay concrete.
Describe behavior.
Describe words.
Describe physical details.
Avoid explaining motives.
Instead of:
"She was angry."
Write:
"She answered with one-word responses, crossed her arms, and looked away before speaking."
Instead of:
"He was trying to manipulate me."
Write:
"He asked the same question three different ways after I had already answered it."
Your goal is to separate observation from interpretation.
For each observation, answer:
Submit all three observations to your AI thinking companion.
Do not ask:
"Am I right?"
Instead ask:
You are not required to agree with your AI.
If you disagree, explain why.
Write one page comparing your three observations.
Consider:
Complete both sentences:
One feeling that became clearer after investigation was...
One feeling that still remains uncertain is...
Feelings are observations, not conclusions.
They are observations that deserve curiosity before judgment.
This assignment resists two opposite mistakes:
If I feel it, it must be true.
and
If I can't prove it immediately, I should ignore it.
Instead, practice remaining metabolically uncomfortable long enough for reality to have another chance to speak.
This assignment sits at the intersection of several traditions that take feelings seriously without treating them as infallible.
my therapist had a baby last night so no therapy recommendations for me today, and the thought of my "writing a letter" would crack us both up. I find it oddly touching that she was keeping me on therapy schedule until the babe was crowning - that is slugger level commitment to conversation.
last night, I drove up to the shore in Youngstown to hear a musician return to whatever he sounds like now. his kid died a few months ago, young, in his early 20s, of that thing where you get a cold and wind up with fluid collapsing your heart - I know what congestive heart failure is and not nearly this many people should be dying of it in their 20s and 30s.
Jude, the boy, had a brain tumor when he was a toddler, survived it, but it changed the shape of all of their lives forever. he was their only kid, and they orbited him tightly as if he might just disappear into a sinkhole. and then he did exactly that.
the musician, his father, I can't say that he's a friend exactly, we've just known each other a long time, and once while we were talking after a show, I don't even remember why, something he said caught me, and I 👁, my attention focused. it was a summer night with breezes off the water, us standing by his dumb car he loved (that weird kind they made for a while to look like an old gangster car had sex with a station wagon, it could hold all of his guitars perfectly, he's a very practical person). he is extremely standoffish, the kind of person everybody knows but nobody knows em. it was out of character for us to even be having an intense conversation of any kind anywhere, but we did.
after that, he always knew my name and always asked Sunshine how I was in polite exchanges, but he had said a couple of odd things to folks that stuck as funny and created parameters. the one I remember is "I can't be alone with that one"👁, which everyone took to mean that I was some kind of sexual temptation. but he's not like that. he's married and very Catholic (Polish, of course). if there was any temptation in the vicinity, it was entirely my problem. and after his son survived that childhood illness he was extremely devout. regardless of concert schedules, he went to church several times a week to keep a promise to God to do so to keep the boy safe.
why did I know that? I don't know, honestly. 👁 must have learned it.
he looked great last night in that dangerous way some of us look really great when we've recently been in hell for a spell. I noticed that he took one drink, and only because Sunshine bought it for him. she thought it was very concerning after the boy's death that he stopped drinking entirely. that made perfect sense to me, with everything it feels like I know about him: he wouldn't want to miss one moment of grief, that would be like being without a son even more, so he would try to stay awake and aware as possible for it.
a memory that stands out: I was out to dinner at one of the quieter fancier restaurants around there. he was playing guitar alone, dinner accompaniment. typically he would play in a group, excellent cover bands that lend themselves to dancing, that was kind of the vibe of the whole area, cute tourist town w dancing on patios. but this was just a solo gig and he just happened to be there and I just happened to be eating dinner. to say that he plays guitar well is almost absurd - he plays it like he was born with it as an extra extremity, borderline idiot savant, if you can still say that. at one point he began a song turned into Kashmir, but slowed way down and all of the lush sound of it made by one guitar. I remember I stopped talking and eating and just watched him do that. he closed his eyes and kind of disappeared into it, and I've never forgotten how beautiful it sounded, it was stunning.
looking at him last night, I thought about that book, Things in Nature Just Grow. a tree does not wonder if life is worth living, it puts out new leaves. whatever else he was and is, whatever roles he plays, father and husband for instance, there is a thing that he just IS. I saw it that night. I figured that's how he's surviving this, and that's why he was on this stage, not because he was just making a living, he was Being.
I didn't go up to talk to him, everybody else was doing that kind of shit, being super friendly, not that there's anything wrong with that. it's just not my way. when I was leaving, he spotted me from the stage, and genuinely smiled, waved, I waved back then walked into somebody because my attention was solely focused on that wave. I'm sure I looked like an idiot. I was very satisfied looking like an idiot and getting a genuine smile vs talking to him and forcing him to a polite reception of my condolences. I would have felt like a fucking asshole doing that.
Sometimes quiet is loud.
I went home and rewrote "Choking"
 |
| card of the day enough to leave - billy strings |
.jpg)
.jpg)
.jpg)
.jpg)
.jpg)
(1).jpg)
