music, therapy, and me

I have found that I am great at writing personal and professional goals for myself. They are spectacular, perfect in their composition, and very clear to all who read them.  ...and, that's as far as they go.  Once I have written them, I lose interest, never flip back to that page, and then feel like a failure when I have not done what I wanted to do earlier. So, I have decided that I am not making goals for this upcoming year. I am setting quests for myself! My word of the year is "Explore," and I have come up with five areas of exploration for this year - places, health, ideas, identity, and connection. As you can see in this bullet journal spread, I have a small piece of paper for each area with some ideas of how to complete these quests. I am not setting endings for any of these because I don't know where I will be at any time. These are just the things that I want to think about during the year of 2022. Rather than shaming myself when I do not get to my end goals,...

I am in a period of change. This is partially due to my age, I am sure, and partially due to the fact that I have moved into a new home, and partially due to the fact that there are so many things happening in the world that there isn't much that remains static. Things are changing all around us, and it is sometimes difficult to keep up.  So, I am feeling a sense of accomplishment this morning. I woke up at 3:30 (my usual waking time these days) and finished a book. I have been reading Good Omens by Neil Gaiman and Terry Pratchett since Monday. It was nice to get to the ending. If you haven't read it, just know that I loved the Amazon series (there is a second season coming!!), and then I read the book. The series was very close to the book - something that I value in a remake and that doesn't happen often enough for me. After I finished the book, I took the pieces of furniture down to the office/studio to set up. Before I started that project, though, I looked at my utili...

So, I won't. The worst thing about being away from my full-time job and being at my home rather than in California with my family is that I have lots of time for thinking. At times, that thinking is overwhelming, and I am experiencing that feeling right now. I am surrounded by books, by crafting supplies (all the ones EXCEPT the ones I need to finish my latest book), by boxes, by chores, and by things that are not quite in the right place...yet. I spent some time looking at the posts that I wrote at this time last year. I was not in a really good space at that time. My Dad was dying. My cat had died. I was here, alone again, and engaging in my thinking process. This year, I want to focus on other things. Thinking leads me to grief which leads me to feeling like there are things that I am failing at - on a regular basis. I'm not sure that avoiding this type of post - a year in review post - is going to stop me from thinking, but I know that it will help me focus on what I want t...

It is time. I have neglected my therapeutic music experience (TME) database for the last three interns, and it needs to be updated! So, today is the day that I start to get that process started. If you are a new reader, then, keep reading the next paragraph. If you are familiar with what I do and how I organize my ideas, then you can skip the next paragraph and not miss much of anything at all! I have been collecting ideas for my therapeutic music experience (TME - what I call the things I do with my client during sessions) since the second semester of my freshman year. I had an assignment to come up with 25 ideas of things I could possibly do in sessions with clients. I remember that assignment as being extremely difficult, but I did it, and my TME file was born! I put in all sorts of ideas and situations into my file, and I add the TMEs that my interns share with me during their time at the facility. It has been a long time since I have linked TMEs into my file, so I will be spending...

I am in the midst of a dilemma. I have two words that are really resonating with me at the moment, and I have already decided on one, but the other is calling to me. I think I will have two words of the year, but the first one is the most important to me. This "word of the year" practice is one that I started two years ago, and it has really made me focus. I took this from the bullet journaling community that I stay on the fringe of at all times, and, at first, I thought it was kinda silly, but now it is part of my annual planning. Last year's word came after weeks of brainstorming and thought and all that. This year's words have just come to me with less of a thought process - they just showed up. I'm taking this as a sign that the words that I have are good for me. Last year's word became "deepen." I loved this word as it directed my focus towards learning more about things that interested me. I used this word to inspire me to take different contin...

It is 5:39 am, and I am eating breakfast after taking my mother and my sister to the airport to head home after a week here with me. I decided not to try to go back to sleep - there is still a bit of doubt about whether they will actually get out of here due to COVID-related cancellations. I am way too awake to sleep now. With their departure and the end of my apartment life, I now have time to get back into my routine. When I moved in a month and a couple of days ago, I established a chore routine that has been working pretty well for me. I keep it tucked into my bullet journal, behind the picture of my Dad, and try my best to keep up with the chores for each day. Today, being Sunday, is my bullet journaling day and my catch-up day for all other chores. I really haven't done my jobs this week, so I will start this week off right. Tomorrow is laundry and bathroom day, so I will spend a bit of time doing those chores in between setting up the office space and the craft room.  (I hav...

EGAD! The last time I tried to write on this blog was a week ago. I didn't finish the post, so there has been silence from this keyboard for this entire week, so let me catch you up with all the stuff that has happened here in just seven short days. My mother and my sister arrived exactly on time (we are a bit concerned about getting them home, but they are here). I got them back to my house at 1am on Sunday morning, shuffled them off to the new mattress sets, and then went upstairs for three hours of sleep before heading off to church to do the children's part of worship. It went off without a hitch - even the littles sang their hearts out! I returned to my house to find that my sister and mother had started right in with the boxes in various areas of the house - the kitchen, bathroom, and office/craft studio. We went to get them a rental car for the week and then went out for lunch and some "necessity" shopping. After that excursion, I was exhausted, so I said goodn...

I am going to head out to work today to spend the day mashing potatoes and washing dishes for our annual Holiday Dinner. There will be no music therapy today since the dinner is a big deal and the special support staff are the only ones that do not have kids throughout the day. So, we get to help out. I was kinda hoping to be on a jury at this point, but that didn't happen, so off I go! This is the last Friday of the Calendar year, and it is a non-therapy day. That makes it pretty much a wasted day in my schedule, but that is fine. If this was a regular Friday for us, then I would have three groups, three individual/dyad sessions, and documentation to get done. Today though, all I have to do is the documentation, then the mashing of potatoes... I saw something on Pinterest yesterday that made me smile. It was a Myers-Briggs commentary about one of my two types (you know how I said yesterday that I was in between two Zodiac signs, well I am in between all sorts of personality tests ...

Last night was just strange in all senses of the word. As many of us in the central part of the country experienced, there was a long line of thunderstorms that blew through almost every state in the center of the country. This may have been the storm that pounded my family in California the day before. It was an interesting evening. I drove home a bit slower than usual due to the gusty winds. We had gusts up to 80 miles per hour out here. My little car is lighter than some and just dances all over the road, so I slow down, keep off the cruise control, and then take my sweet time. On the way home, hearing about tornado warnings getting closer and closer to my church job and my town, I decided to err on the side of caution and cancel choir for the night. When I got to my house, I went to the bathroom and found that my shower curtain had fallen from the wall. I think the force of the wind hitting my outside wall shook it loose. I took that as a sign to replace the shower curtain and fix ...

I called the jury line last night to see if I needed to report to the courthouse today and was told that there were no jury trials scheduled for the next week and a half, so I was released from my civic duty. I am not sure how I feel about this. I was hoping that I would finally get a chance to do this jury thing, but I was also not looking forward to the complications that would come from having to be on a jury at this moment. Now it is no longer an option. So, I head out of my home today to go to the assembly (which I don't think we should be doing, but no one asked me, so here we go) and then get ready for washing dishes at the Holiday Dinner on Friday. I am tired already and this is just going on top of everything else.  Yesterday's music therapy groups went better than I expected. I was quite surprised to see that the student who usually disrupts my groups on Tuesdays did all the things that I asked without protest yesterday. It was a great change and something that really...

I have seven more work days before the end of the calendar work year. At this time last year, we were working without client contact. This year, we are getting ready to host a local middle school group for their "Jingle Jam" because people in my work area do not believe that COVID is a big deal anymore. I am still not convinced and am not doing our own holiday event because of COVID. I do not want to be the one who starts another breakout at my facility because someone is singing and spreading virus particles everywhere. I admit that I am still scared of this virus, but I am more scared of the people who are not scared of this virus. COVID feelings notwithstanding, I am looking forward to the end of this calendar year. It has been a doozy for me. Again, I am not the type of person who believes that a man-made time construct will automatically change all the things happening in my life, but there is something nice about knowing that the end of the year is approaching. I am tir...

My move is finished. There is only trash left in the apartment - well, and the vacuum which I need over there until I have finished cleaning - it is ready to clean up and be finished with completely. I only broke down once yesterday, and that was when I found Bella-cat's collar on the doorknob of the craft room. I got out of the apartment and sat in the car for a time. I miss my cat so much, and her absence is especially strong as the anniversary of her death approaches. This is not a post about death, though. This is a post about newness and getting new opportunities going for myself. The house is full of boxes. Those boxes are full of stuff and need to be emptied. I am in lots of joint and tendon pain and am hobbling around from place to place and box to box. I am stuck in more overwhelm. It seems to be my constant state of being these days - overwhelm.  I have to keep reminding myself that it is Sunday and I need to go to church to do my job this morning. I woke up very early (a...

How it's going! So, something that I know for a fact but that is becoming increasingly uncomfortable is that I have too much music therapy stuff. (Is anyone shocked by this?? Anyone?) I keep finding stashes of visual aids and PECS and things that I have made or accumulated over the years. Each time I find some more, I get a bit more frustrated with myself. This is a never-ending situation I find myself in at the moment. I found another box yesterday - full of baggies of visual aids that are not corralled anywhere, so they are not useful. There is nothing more frustrating to me than non-useful things taking up space - AND, that's ALL that I have around me! Non-useful things taking up space. A long career as a music therapist means that I have lots of things to go through and either find uses for or give away to someone who can use them. I need to get in touch with the local music therapy university programs to arrange for some donations. I wonder if they would take communication...

I have a difficult relationship with technology. iThings and I do not speak the same language, so I avoid them like the plague. I have an iPod because Apple took over the mp3 market and it was easier to just give into the Apple thing than it was to try to navigate the world of Zune and other mp3 technology. As long as I don't antagonize it, the iPod does what I need it to do - keeps me entertained. I do not have many smart speakers around me - just the one in my Kindle Fire - and I am fine with not knowing things immediately. I am resisting the world of instant gratification and the need to always get information instantaneously. I have a terrible success rate with Bluetooth things. My Dad got me a BB-8 robot many years ago that has never connected with my Bluetooth stuff. I FINALLY figured out how to work my speakers with my laptop, and I also can get my phone hooked up into my car system. I tell you this because I have a new toy to share with some of my clients next week - a Drop...

I returned home last night after 10 hours at work, 3 hours of commuting, and another 2 hours at my part-time job to find a voicemail from the apartment company informing me that they have a showing this morning. While that is good on one hand, it is also extremely stress-inducing because I have not had a chance to clean the apartment and it is a pit of lint and stuff sitting all over the place. The showing is this morning at 9:30, and I have not been at the apartment since Tuesday because of all the things that I have to do. In addition, I am getting ready for jury duty service - something that lasts for two weeks here in my county - on top of coordinating packing and moving services, carpet cleaning, the delivery of two beds, and an upcoming visit from my Mom and my sister. Add to all that the end of the year/preholiday stress happening at work, and I am at my wit's end. I got nothing. You know, I am spending inordinate amounts of time in a stress response these days, and I do not...

One of my former clients often attempted to turn me off like I was a mechanical person rather than a human. He would poke my arm and then model what he wanted me to do - with a neeeee-rm sound. I told him that he had to figure out the secret passcode in order to stop my mechanism, and I was forbidden to divulge that passcode to anyone.  I want a shut-down button. I think I am in the down part of my hormonal cycle which is getting more and more variable as I get older. It would be nice to have a button that would allow me to hibernate and let the world go on around me, but I cannot. The best thing that I can do during these times is to try to maintain my hold on my emotions the best I can. I use my self-care strategies and try new ones, and I fail. Lots. This is going to be a difficult day for me - all of the stuff that is happening is going to be emotional for me. I am already steeped in dread about everything that is going to happen tonight, and I am good at self-fulfilling prophe...

This week is sound awareness week in my music therapy groups. We are using a couple of devices and a website to start our journey into sound and how sounds affect us as humans. I have a couple of movement-activated devices called Musini - this is a device from Neurosmith that is no longer made. I buy them when I find them because my clients enjoy the cause and effect of this particular toy.  I have two that are fun to play with. In addition, we are using the website, https://bouncyballs.org/, as an auditory reaction to sounds. With this website, you can set several different things to respond to ambient sounds. You have to have a microphone, but I have found that I can hook things up to my Promethean board through my clinic laptop with a slight delay in the response. This seems to work pretty well with my clients who also experience some delays in responses. Well, we are using these two things to explore the relationships between sound and response and movement and sound. I love i...

'Tis the season for self-examination and thoughts of new resolutions. The new year is coming, so it is time to sit down and think about what has happened this year. I did not do well on my reading goal. I started the year with the intention of reading the 13 books that I ordered from Barcelona publishers last year. I read through three books. That means that there are 10 more books on my To Be Read list. Reading has been less important to me than surviving the continual changes of a COVID world. Oh, dear. I just used the archive function to look back at my posts from last year around this time and fell into all of my grief. Now I am back into my own grief situations and am finding things difficult to go through. At this point last year, my cat was fine, my Dad was not, Mom was beside herself trying to get help with Dad's health needs - he went from being perfectly fine to being completely unable to walk, use the bathroom, and be nice to her - we still think it was a stroke, but...