Heavy Feelings

 

Dumbo being comforted by his mom

To Aysha, Thursday, November 16, 2023

Which do you want first - the light ponderings or the heavy? 😁😔

I'll start with the heavy and end with the light.

As I mentioned on Monday, Jessalyn miscarried her baby. It's been a long and difficult week for all of us. Most of it would be better shared verbally than written down. If you have time and want to hear more, you can call tomorrow. If you don't want to hear sad and traumatic stories, it might be better to find some housecleaning to do instead. 🤷‍♀️

On a lighter note, I brought Pom to my class with Dr. Kim for the first time last night. Dr. Kim is a single woman, very much enjoys the educational research environment, and finds our Idaho subculture interesting, but as foreign of an environment to her as she could possibly get. She is from Korea, which has a negative growth rate, because people just don't have families. It's not done any more in their culture.

I was sitting right in front of the teacher, because I came late and the seats by the door were already taken.  (As a side note, I have been early or on time to my classes almost every night! I was about 20 minutes late last night, though, because I was washing Jessalyn's dishes so they could all go to bed and rest.) So at break time, she indicated Pom and said, "What is this?" in her heavy Korean accent. I grinned (thinking, "I'm glad you asked!" 😄), and I said proudly, "This is my emotional support animal! His name is Pom!"  She asked something like, why do you have it - for what purpose?  So I explained it to her. She was interested at first, when I explained why it is difficult for me to sit through Mr. Burnham's classes. And she asked, is this class similar? And I explained, no, because it's more intellectual- less personal - not about me and whether or not I'll fail or succeed as a social worker. Then she asked, "Why an elephant?" When I got to the part about Dumbo, and his mom cradling him in her trunk and singing a lullaby, Dr. Kim turned away and tried to start class. "Wait!" I said, "One more thing!" I brought out my Babar book and showed her the resemblance.  I started explaining about reading books being our safe place as a family, but she was super done. She interrupted me to start class.

I find that whole exchange incredibly fascinating!! Dr. Kim almost never interrupts us! And she always does it very hesitantly and politely -- "Okay.... Can we start class now?" That is the strongest reaction I have ever seen from her. She must really have a hard time with the idea of nurturing.  

I am just so fascinated by this whole experience of going back to college and studying social work. I am fascinated by the experiences and lives of my classmates and fascinated by every interaction.  What an intriguing study of people!!!

I hope you are doing well! And I hope you have a really restful P-day tomorrow!!

Love,

Mom