another dollar. Well, OK, hopefully I’m paid in pounds…
Woke up with a great headache this morning, appears to have been a theme around the ring today. Something in the air? Anyway, helped Tim get kids ready without really raising my head from the pillow – Big pulled herself together pretty well from a shaky start and they made it to school for breakfast time (which apparently was the problem yesterday). Of course at that point she decided she didn’t need breakfast, she needed to go outside with Ailsa!
I slept a couple more hours and then sat very still on the couch for a few more, while starting to crochet a cardigan for Small. This will be the first garment (barring crochet chain mail) that I’ve made for him, I’m hoping that it won’t be too strenuous. Have discovered that expensive yarn, even when bought extremely cheap, is a whole lot nicer to work with than cheap yarn. Guess some things are worth what they’d like you to pay for them. I’m working with wool cotton just now, and it is gorgeous, so easy to use. So different from the 99p a ball acrylic I used for the mail.
After several hours of holding my head very still I decided I was up to going to get the kids – Tim has been running them backwards and forwards most days, and it’s taking it out of him too. Set out nice and early so that I could have a rest when I got there, and arriving at tea time made it obvious that I’d get offered a cup of tea. Apparently Big has been inseparable from her new friend E today, which is quite handy as her old friend (also E) has departed for another school, and without the new version I think she’d have been somewhat bereft. She still managed to have a meltdown over several nothings as we were gearing up to leaving, and then a massive hysterical meltdown over the fact that she’s too short to lie down in the bath without floating.
After she finally calmed herself down enough to hear a speaking voice, I went to talk to her about ways she could manage this kind of upset, and taught her the serenity prayer. Now, we aren’t Christians here – the best that we can come up with is agnosticism, though I work on a high level of tolerance as being very important. In the past Big has been extremely intolerant of religious belief, although our long close friendship with the off the path family has exposed her plenty of aspects of Christianity, and she’s become more accepting recently. Still, you could have knocked me down with a feather when she told me that she wanted to pray to God and do like C and M do.
Think I’m going to have to think about this one some more. Big needs something to help her with her feelings and I’ve successfully used a number of different mantras in the past. I’ve used the serenity prayer myself in the past, and I’ve also used the Bene Gesserit litany against fear. I’ll take whatever makes sense to me from wherever it comes, and I don’t think that devalues where it comes from one little bit, but like I say, going to have to think carefully about how to put it together for her.
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