Hemoglobin 212

This probably won't be very easy to read. I know writing it won't likely be. I promise to follow up soon with something more light-hearted!

As most of you who know me well are aware I've had a couple health issues over the last few years. Most recently anxiety issues and I was diagnosed with a panic disorder. Before that I got Bell's Palsy, from which I've recovered somewhat. Most people say I look like I did before, but I know I'm still not the same.

Anyway when I was in the hospital they'd done a lot of tests and in the end the neurologist said there wasn't any reason they could find for my condition. Without doing far more extensive (read: expensive) testing, the best she explanation she could give was that this was a result of stress.

Which brings us to the real topic of this blog entry. We all have stress in one way or another. But I would say most of us likely have a particular stressor that when we experience it, something just kind of snaps within us. I believe I've discovered mine.

While you all know I've gotten sick, most of you don't know what happened shortly before the outbreak of my symptoms.

Only a couple days before I felt the first few twitches in my face that precipitated it breaking down completely, I had to physically get between my daughter and my husband. She'd done something that made him mad, and I saw him chase her down and knew instantly if I didn't intervene it'd be bad. I'm not going to go more into what happened, because, well, I don't want to. The rational part of my brain also feels compelled to point out that the timing of events does not necessarily prove that this incident is directly responsible for the problems I would have later, but c'mon, I'm sure it didn't exactly help things.

Fast forward a couple years later and I'm coming home from the beach with friends. We're getting into our car and overhear a father screaming aggressively at his child in the back seat. The Mom sits there seemingly coolly while I'm eyeing the situation. My heart is pounding and adrenaline is going through my system. I've never felt like the fight or flight expression is more accurate. I either needed to get out of the situation immediately, or I need to go protect the kid. Protecting the kid won't really help anything however since in reality I'm powerless. So driving away is my only option. I hate that I can still hear that kid's voice begging his daddy not to hit him.

The most recent incident is kind of what cements the idea in my mind that this is a pattern for me.

Last Saturday I went out to eat with friends. We were sitting outside the restaurant, it was just us and some other family.* All of a sudden the mom pulls her little boy, around my son's age, away from the table and shoves him  face first into the wall of the restaurant. She beings aggressively telling him something, at this point my ears are ringing and I'm just getting snippets of what she's saying. She leaves him there and goes back to the table. He starts sobbing and she tells him he can rejoin them when he decides to act "like a human." Right because crying over your face getting shoved into a wall by your own mother, is totally in-human. Again fight of flight. This time I couldn't get away. Nor could I fight no matter how much I wanted to smack this woman in the face.

I don't know if it's what's happening that's so deeply disturbing, or is it the powerlessness I feel?

I also want to provide the disclaimer that I know I'm not the parent of the year. Part of why I think these situations get to me the way they do is that I understand what it's like to reach those levels of frustration with your child. So while I now trust myself not to go too far, I know how easy it is to snap and push that line.

I need to stop now because getting this far was pretty unsettling, but if you've made it to the end with me, again you deserve cookies.

But I leave you with these questions: How do you handle situations that make your blood boil? Are there ever ways you can choose to fight and have it end constructively? What if you're in a situation where neither option is available to you? How do you cope without it reducing you to a totally panicked state?



*With the exception of my husband I don't know personally any of the people mentioned in his entry. They were all strangers to me.

What I've Been Up To

So lately every time I've tried to sit and write, I'm unhappy with the result or become too distracted to make much progress. I regret not updating my blog further, or the kids blog, or working on what writing assignments I have. A thousand apologies to anyone who has been waiting on me.

Some of it has been the season and general business. Some of it has been certain personal issues weighing on my mind and preventing me from relaxing enough to be able to write. And some of it has been a new way I've discovered to distract myself from the aforementioned personal issues.

A few months ago I was invited to a knitting party. I hadn't tried knitting since I was a kid, but I like arts and crafts so I thought I'd give it a try. I didn't expect to be quite as addicted to it as I've become. I enjoy it because within a reasonable period of time there is usually a final product so I achieve a sense of accomplishment. And it's particularly relaxing I think because, depending on the complexity of the pattern, I can usually relax my brain from whatever jumbled mess is tumbling about inside of it and just focus on the repetitive task my hands are carrying out. I am able to simply disengage from whatever is going on, and still feel like I'm doing something!

Ian wearing the first scarf I made

Since I started I've made scarfs which are probably the most basic thing since it's basically one large rectangle. But I've also learned to make arm warmers, hats, and even these cute baby booties which I made for my cousin's new baby.

             
So anyway, that's just one of the things I've been up to lately. Hopefully though I'll get to do some writing this weekend since I finally have some time to myself to just sit still and do nothing. ^_^

What Feeds Our Dreams

Every night we all hopefully enter into rem sleep at which point we dream. Most of these dreams we will never remember unfortunately, but once in a while one will stick with us. Most of the time the dreams I remember are random. Occasionally they'll be nightmarish, usually they are just odd, and even rarer are the dreams in which I become aware I am dreaming and actively begin to take control. As of this morning however, my last three dreams have all come directly from things which had been on my mind recently. So I thought for the fun of it I'd share. I'll start with this morning's and work my way back.

My friend Amber is very good at playing with Photoshop and making it appear as if you've had your picture taken with various celebrities. A few days ago on her blog she posted that she was taking requests from her readers and asked that we post the names of people that we'd like our picture with. I'm sure it's no surprise to my readers that I suggested one of my favorite Korean actors, Lee Min Ho. Well last night I had a dream where I met him in some sort of coffee shop. My memory has faded quite a bit but I know I was with a friend who spoke fluent Korean, and I was trying to talk to him. Even though nothing really happened any dream where I get to cozy up with him is bound to be a pleasant one.

More dreams with you please?

The time before that, a friend of mine with a new month old baby had been posting pictures of herself and the baby after the meeting, and been talking about how they're packing for a move. I'd been feeling a little sad that I'm not really in that congregation anymore so it's more challenging to make it over to see them at the meetings, and it's more difficult for me to offer to help with things. So sometime last week I dreamed that I'd gone to the airport to pick up friends and on our way back out to the car, I passed this family with their new baby waiting in a line for boarding. I got to hold her, and talk with my friend and it was really nice. 

This last one is not quite so warm and fuzzy, I see it as being directly associated with my anxiety. A couple of weeks ago I was at a wedding. It was beautiful and I had a lovely time, but my anxiety flared up quite badly when it came time to go through the receiving line. I'm not really sure why, all I know is by the end when I reached the bride and groom instead of offering hugs and congratulations like I'd wanted to, my mind just kind of choked and I wanted to run away. >_< Part of it may be social anxiety coupled with the fact that I hadn't really eaten for most of the day. But anyway, while the rational part of me thinks it's entirely likely no one really cared or noticed that I acted strangely, the other part that suffers from the anxiety kept worrying about it. And so I had a dream that I had approached the bride sometime later, planning to apologize for my awkwardness and before I could say anything she started getting really mad at me about something that in the dream I knew I'd done, but in real life had never happened. Again I highly doubt anyone is mad at me about anything, but it's become a function of my thinking over the years, whenever I do something like that it gets blown out of proportion in my mind. This time it leaked over into my dreams as well.

So what do you guys think? What feeds our dreams? Any thoughts or dreams you'd like to share? 

Intro to Gaming - Kindergarten Style

Most of you that know me well know I'm a huge fan of gaming, particularly role-playing games. This is one of my many interests that in time I'd like to involve my children in, however at their ages it's a bit of a challenge to get them involved. Recently however they were given a fairly large collection of Star Wars Galactic Heroes toys (thanks again Nathan!) and I decided this was a great opportunity to introduce them to some of the basics of game-play.

First all the pieces are placed in a large plastic container and we take turns selecting pieces randomly. We play on the floor which is tiled. Each character is able to move at a speed of one tile per turn, except when mounted on a speederbike, then their speed is doubled. Melee characters can attack any enemy characters within the same square as them, characters with blasters can attack up to three squares away. 

 The large black section where the tile has been torn away serves as a 'pit' into which deceased characters are cast. It also serves as 'rough terrain' and can not be crossed.

This guy is one of my favorites of the set!

Once the figures are distributed among the players we take our starting positions and each roll the die once to determine who goes first. Each player gets a move action, and standard or attack action. To resolve an attack the instigator and defender both roll. If the attacker's roll is higher, then it's a hit and the character is placed into the pit. If the defender's roll is higher they succeeded in dodging the attack. 

Initially we began playing with your standard d6's but eventually they were misplaced and Ian came across a set of story-telling dice that a friend had given me. We began to use that, only instead of rolling to see who could roll the higher number, each picture meant a different event would occur when rolled. The eye for instance meant that the attacker missed or had become temporarily blinded. The castle meant that for one turn, one character could not be attacked. The tree and rainbow were tough ones to use. The both ended up meaning that the character attacking missed their target, but the reason was usually because they'd wound up going up a tree or rainbow instead of attacking. This doesn't make a lot of sense, unless maybe there was a tree nearby with a trap that they'd sprung. Hmm maybe I'll use that idea...Anyway it did occur to me by the end of the game it might be cool to use the rainbow to bring back dead characters that had been placed in the pit. The rectangle symbol was used simply to mean that a ranged or melee attack had been successful and the pyramid was used to signify that a force power had been used. Ian imagined in particular a Jedi (or Sith) using the force to raise the earth under their opponent.

While I don't enjoy getting down on the floor to play (it sets off my allergies >_<) I do love the creativity Ian's brought to this and even though these are baby steps, I look forward to continually introducing him to more advanced forms of gaming.

I Know It's Been a While

I was without internet all summer and so I was a little challenged at writing entries and I'm still working on somethings, but I wanted to make a post with just some funny little odds and ends I've found online lately. ^_^ Enjoy!

Tony Stark welcomes Bruce Banner to his lab and then they turn into a pair of teenage girl manga characters. 

*facepalm*

And then I don't normally come across many Anne of Green Gables videos but I did find this one on Tumblr and I thought it was a nice use of the song and employed nice simple editing to tell their story, and this is one of my favorite songs right now. What can I say? I'm a girl. 

I actually love math but I realize I'm a minority and this still amused me. lol

Darn you Mother...if only you'd given me cola as a baby I wouldn't have been NEARLY 

so awkward as a teenager.

Thrilling Interplanetary Heroics

I didn't want the month to go by without updating my blog! About a month or so ago I finally rented the movie John Carter. I'd been initially unimpressed with the trailers and I immediately dismissed it as a poor attempt to copy Avatar. I mean come on, a human winds up on another planet, is taken in by the natives and ends up championing their cause? But then I learned the movie was actually based on the book - A Princess of Mars by Edgar Rice Burroughs who brought us the Tarzan series. After a couple of my friends went and saw it and couldn't stop gushing about how wonderful it was my curiosity was further piqued. I waited until it was available at the local Red-box location and picked up a copy. I would've preferred to also read the book for further points of discussion, but it's on back order at the library and I'm pretty much at the bottom of the list. So for the sake of this article I'll be discussing only the movie and occasionally bring in my opinions of how it compares to similar movies such as Avatar.

The movie opens with a young man discovering that his uncle has unexpectedly died. A lawyer explains to the him that his uncle has left him everything and that all of the funeral arrangements have been carried out and that his uncle's body has been buried in a mysterious vault which can only be opened from the inside. Included in his vast inheritance is his uncle's journal, which contains the entire story of the movie. It is also revealed that the young man is Edgar Rice Burroughs himself. Initially I was irritated by this, as I find it's become cliche and I tend to think of it as film makers attempting to be cute. However when I did get a chance to read an excerpt from the beginning of the book, it is told from the first person perspective of the author. It seems he was trying to give an otherwise completely implausible story an air of authenticity by claiming to have heard it himself directly from the source. 

As Burroughs reads the journal he discovers that while his uncle, John Carter, was prospecting in Arizona after the Civil War, he sought refuge from Apaches in a cave. He is suddenly ambushed by a strange looking man and after a brief struggle his attacker is killed and he looses consciousness himself only to wake up in a completely different land, clutching the man's medallion. It takes him a little while to realize he's on Mars, or Barsoom as it's natives call it. It takes him a while to compensate for Mars slightly lower gravity but with practice he's able to get his bearings and finds he's much stronger and is capable of leaping incredibly high. 

He's soon discovered and captured by the Green Martians known as Tharks. After reading their description in the book I was pleased by how faithfully the movie portrayed them in both appearance and demeanor. Before long Carter also meets the humanoid Red Martians, particularly Dejah Thoris, Princess of Helium. The people of Helium have long been at war with the city of Zodanga. The Zodangans are backed by the Therns, powerful beings who resemble men but possess knowledge and power far beyond that of the men of Earth or Mars. With the help of the Thern, Zodanga has brought Helium to its knees and is offering a peace treaty that hinges on Dejah marrying him. Naturally she does not intend to go through with any such thing and is running away when she meets John Carter. 

When she meets him she observes his supernatural strength and ability and wants him to help save her city from the Zodangans. However he continues to refuse her pleas, claiming that he has no desire to fight for the causes of others. His seemingly calloused attitude we find springs from the loss of his wife and child while he was away fighting in the War. I'm honestly not sure why he changes his mind and eventually agrees. My hypothesis is that his southern gentility eventually kicked in and he couldn't leave a lady in distress, or maybe it's just because she was pretty and persistent. 

This in my opinion tends to be the weak point of many of these type of sci-fi/fantasy adventure movies. The romantic element often feels like it's thrown in just cause, or maybe they do it thinking it will draw in female viewers. Regardless of the reason, John Carter and movies like it have given me the likely erroneous expectation that any handsome stranger I happen go on an adventure with will likely fall in love with me. This situation works for me in instances where there is some plausible development and some sort of under current of attraction that goes beyond "Well we're both pretty and in a precarious situation, so let's go for it!" Avatar for instance in my opinion handled the love story aspect well. Jake and Neytiri started out having a rocky relationship, but he learned a great deal from her and they ended up developing a mutual respect and love. One of my favorite scenes in fact is at the end when she rescues him and they both are together for the first time without him using his avatar body. It's subtle but so well acted. John Carter's romance is unfortunately more contrived feeling and slightly harder to accept especially in light of how haunted he still appears to be by the loss of his family. 

What I do have to give John Carter high marks for however is giving me twists and turns that I did not see coming. Avatar while absolutely amazing at immersing us into the world of Pandora and being completely epic; plot-wise it was very predictable. Many have compared it to Pocahontas in space, I prefer Dances With Wolves in space myself, but either way the point remains that it's not the most original of story lines. However I do give them credit for having a strong moral to their story of the importance of respecting the rights of others, as well as respecting the natural world around us and not taking it for granted. If John Carter had any message behind it, it was totally lost on me. 

I won't go into how it ends for any of you that may wish to see it, but I will say I didn't regret watching it. I'm not sure I'd pay full price for the DVD but if I see it pop up in the bargain bin I'd likely pick it up. I do regret it was such a box-office flop as that makes it less likely they'll make any more in the series. I'd kind of like to see what happens next, but at least I can read the books. 

My Dad

Sorry I haven't been posting as much lately. Since I'm no longer as connected as I usually would be, I will likely write up entries ahead of time, then post them whenever I have access to do so. Today however is a special day and therefore I've made a more concerted effort to get this out in a timely manner. 


June is an important month for me personally, it marks two of the most significant days of my life.  June 13, 1998 was the day I symbolized my dedication in baptism. Fourteen years feels so tiny in comparison with many of the brothers and sisters out there, but it's a decision I'm glad I made, even if it's not been an easy road.

Today's date however marks a much less happy occasion. June 29, 1996 was the day I lost my father. I don't want to make this entry one in which I dwell on that aspect of the past. It was a terrible day, I felt sad and to an extent guilty for a long time. But I've more or less come to peace with what happened and I consider myself blessed first and foremost for the hope of one day seeing him again, and secondly, I feel fortunate that for the most part we were not a family that left things unsaid. My whole life and especially when he became sick he was openly communicative about how much he cared for his family.

I didn't go in to see him once he was gone, I got the to the hospital barely in time to see him in the minutes before he died and while that wasn't the most peaceful memory to end on, one of the brothers suggested that perhaps it was best to remember him alive rather than carry the memory of him deceased. And that's ultimately what I'd like to do in this post.

                                                                                      Mom and Dad on their wedding day

(November 1981)

I did a Google search on him today at the library and found a few interesting hits. One of them was his obituary in the Orlando Sentinel. It simply read:

DAVID J. TINIS, 46...died Saturday, June 29. Mr. Tinis was an electrical engineer for B-E Aerospace. Born in Miami, he moved to Central Florida in 1978. He was a member of Kingdom Hall of Jehovah's Witnesses Plymouth Congregation. Survivors:wife, Marjorie; sons, Phillip, Houston, Anthony, Lake Mary; daughter, Amber, Sorrento; brother Milton, Mount Dora; one grandchild...

While factually accurate, and a perfectly adequate obituary I couldn't help but feel like it was just barely a starting place to describing his life and what kind of person he was.

Dad was born in Miami to parents of Filipino and Russian-Jewish descent. They'd met, married and become Jehovah's Witnesses shortly before having my father. His father spent much of the year away working, as a professional chef. Dad always sounded like he was a bit of a nightmare child to have to cope with. With her husband away so much I'm given to understand that my Grandmother frequently called the elders over to deal with my dad's antics.

I've no doubt you could probably fill a book with the things my dad used to get up to. Unfortunately I only heard a fraction of the stories and it's been so long since I've heard them I can only remember a bit of those. But to give you an idea they range from something as innocent as being a young boy disrupting an entire meeting (during the Circuit Overseer's talk) by loudly banging the ceiling tiles in the men's room in an effort to see what was up behind them to building his own cannon as a teenager and taking it out to the water to fire it off and scaring boaters into jumping ship.

Dad giving me early computer lessons

(circa 1983)

He also engaged in perfectly 'normal' pursuits such as going to football games to watch the Miami teams play. (Go Dolphins/'Canes!) He was a good artist, an excellent and adventurous cook, he built his own telescope, was actively engaged in his high school activities, as well as playing football himself in games with other young brothers. Those however came to be discouraged when some of the pioneers had to go off the list from injuries sustained during these games.

Dad was also an active preacher of the good news. Those who knew him as a teenager were generally dubious of his future, given his trouble-making streak however by the time of his death he had served as an elder for many years and he died faithfully even under pressure to accept blood transfusions. I am enormously proud of the name he ended up making for himself.

He was a loving and attentive parent, a strict disciplinarian, and someone who deserved and usually managed to gain your respect. He had the ability to know when to be serious and when to be silly, which sounds like it should be fairly straight forward, but it's surprisingly difficult sometimes to find people who know how to balance the two.

Giggle Times with Dad

He took me to my first football game, basketball game, and hockey game. He never excluded me from typically male oriented activities on the basis of me being a girl. As I think of it, there tends to be this idea that if you're a geek you must like a certain niche of interests and not really expand beyond that. If you're a sports fan you're probably not brainy enough or interested enough to bother with anything a bit more on the intellectual side. And whether he intended to or not, I think my Dad taught me none of those types of boundaries should matter. As long as it doesn't go against Jehovah's principles love anything you want in any combination you want.

I really feel like I owe the best parts of myself to him. And I look forward to the day when I can see him again.