Teachers

May 5, 2020, this was posted on facebook. I was tagged. I'll share my responses.

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There's only a couple of teachers that I can say influenced me in a good way. My 7th grade English teacher Sandra Dodd was an amazing teacher. Mr. Albert Fernandez wasn't my teacher but he was a teacher at my school and he was also amazing. Thank you both for giving me confidence 😊😊

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That was written by she-who-was Tracey Perraglio. That's for identification without outing her by her current name. Hometown friends will know; that's fine.

I wrote:

Thank you. 🙂
It was so long ago, and it's nice to hear there are good memories and that confidence was part of the effect! GOOD!

I was Sandra Gill then, probably, or Adams (part of my first year). I have lots of fond memories of those days, too.

I learned a lot, teaching.

I learned a lot teaching where I went to school, and having former teachers as co-workers! 🙂

She responded:

You went by Gill back then. You were a great teacher and always had a smile and encouraged us 🙂 You did good 🙂

Mine:

I'll name some of my own favorites.

Sally Gonzales (4th, and I helped in her classroom a time or two a week, one year when I was in high school, as a "future teachers" project. I kept up with her after I left school, up until my own daughter was 9 years old, and Holly and I visited her for a few hours at a restaurant and then her house.)

R.A. Martinez (8th and 9th grade English; actually 9th grade twice—long story, but most of what I know about punctuation and word choices came from him and from Sally Gonzales, and that's some of what I passed on, with their voices in my head, when I taught English.)

Robert Felix (band grades 5-9, choir 7-8)

Sam Jamison (choir in high school; I made all-state once)

Jacquie Littlejohn (English in high school)

That is the order I met them, AND the order of their value to my life. They treated me like a person, more than "just a kid." When they knew that I really wanted to learn, they shared what they had, and what they loved. They all gave me information and ideas above and beyond what they "had to" do.

Others I remember warmly for one reason or another:

Mr. Cipriano Trujillo (6th grade)
Mrs. Bency (I don't even know her given name 🙂, 2nd)
Miss Tomlinson (1st)
Mr. Lujan (French, two years, and sponsored a class they let me design, on current events, one six-week session)

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That's the end of what was written in 2020. Now I'm off on my own, 5/5/21:

The class Mr. Lujan sponsored but didn't teach was "History '69." Each student gave a presentation on something from current events, and led a discussion. That year, the electives were switched every six weeks, and I LOVED that year for that! I wish they had kept it, but the scheduling must've been difficult.

From Sam Jamison (my choir teacher), during that experiment in lots-of-little-electives, I took a humanities class. He was the first to help me see that everything is connected—science, art, technology, communications... That has been the way my mind has worked since then, and I'm grateful for having had that opening at the age of fifteen.

I don't remember the other four I took.

Miss Bency provided the ivy, and I still have some, thanks to a string of relatives passing it on, and eventually back. Now my daughter, Holly, is the main caretaker. I'm down to one plant here, and for many years I had none.

Miss Bency is here, and most of my 2nd grade class. Click it to enlarge.

I'm the first on the bottom row. My mom always managed to do something bizarre with my hair for photo day.

The Return of Sandra (perhaps)

I used to LOVE this blog, when people used to read it, before everyday news moved to facebook.

I think I'll start using it again. I keep wanting to write something, or keep something, and can't decide where. All around me, over the years, online platforms change or are abandoned. Someday this will go, too. I don't like that. 🙂

Nearly every day, now, I think of something I was to write and can't decide where best to put it, so perhaps I will restore this old truck.

Some of the photos seem missing. They've been moved, and I'll need to change the URLs, one at a time, but that's okay.

Some slide-shows that were easily made with photobucket lived on that site, and the code was abbreviated, so... gone is gone, on those.

Memory, not new, but the topic came up a few times recently.


We had SCA visitors once (date to be added, maybe, someday) and drove them touristing. One of them (Patrick/Padreigh (?)) posted this photo on Facebook in 2020, and I snagged it. There's me in the driver's seat, and if you can zoom in, there's Holly in a car seat and Kirby standing up. The visitors from Tennessee were out to take pictures of something, and our van was part of the something. Cool!!

February 1999, big van (15 passenger '83 Ford) went into the shop for the last time; didn't survive a $1200 repair, too much engine damage

Odd, to pay a bunch of money and have the van pretty much die on the operating table. We had it towed back and Holly used it as a playhouse for a few years. She decorated it hippie-bus style and used to listen to Alice's Restaurant out there.

Keith, me, arguments, peace

I wrote this on facebook in 2018, and I would like for my kids to be able to find it someday. Others might benefit, too.

February 14, 2018

Valentine's Day report
Young love was fun. Longterm love is different—different things are fun. Familiarity. Having a good woodpile. Memories. Projects. Grandchildren.

Our friend André Begnaud commented, "Hair color may change, but those smiles are still the same!" I responded:

We're not always smiling. Some disclosure: Sometimes we start to recite one of our repeat arguments, but we remember it's a re-run, and jump to the end, or trail off. They're about feeding cats (how to), or putting tools up (one of us is too short sometimes, and figures "on the bench" is close enough), how to do laundry (mostly we do our own now, and it pisses me off that his isn't totally ruined for his not following my instructions).

I guess the trick is to know it's about cats, tools, and laundry, and not about the soul of the other person.

Keith and I have been married since 1984, and were a couple for six years before that. It averages out to 40 years, these days. This year, our youngest child turns 30; the oldest will be 35.

Most mornings, we play three games of Dr. Mario. We're evenly matched, and if one of us wins all three, the other is probably unwell somehow. We've joked that it's our Alzheimer's test, but it can be an indicator of smaller problems, too.
"Are you okay?"
"I didn't sleep well," or "I was thinking about..." and then we can help each other.

Most evenings, we play two games of Five Crowns. I do all the shuffling and dealing. That started when Keith was recovering from 13 broken ribs and a broken sternum, after his life was saved in early 2019, and he was revived from cardiac arrest, by SCA friends, and then firemen, and then ICU doctors, all three in one day. So I shuffled and dealt when it was uncomfortable for him, and now I just do it because I do. Keith keeps score. It's a time we can talk, if we need to, and joke if we don't need to talk.

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The photo above was taken by Rachael Rodgers, in November 2016. She took this one and several others that day:

That photo predates the births of Ivan, Kirby Athena, Tommy and Wynona. I looked better in the other takes, of that arrangement, but others looked beautiful and happy in this one.

Moments pass. Try to keep the peace.

2020 in Review, Christmas-letter style

I have links to the Christmas letter. I sent out lots, thinking partly that it might be my last chance. 2020 was like that.

This is being written afterwards, but I'm backdating it so 2020 has more than one post.

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2020 Christmas (if you'd rather go to the website version right away)

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2020 Christmas
Sandra Dodd

(You could skip to the good part about how this whole Christmas card is a picture of the basket.)

BUSINESS:

Please don’t feel bad if you didn’t send me a card. Don’t. It’s stressful. Let it go. Maybe send me a text or e-mail, or you could click “like” on some facebook thing. That’s plenty.

PERSONAL:

I made this letter from me, because Keith didn’t want to tell people he had another “cardiac episode,” but because it’s my story, I will tell you that we learned this much, on August 9: an implanted defibrillator can wake a guy up and put him back on schedule, heartbeatwise. Keith is well, swimming, splitting wood, playing music (more info at the link below).

Grandchildren review/news (all are well, as are their parents):

Devyn (2009)
Ivan (2017)
Kirby Athena (2018)
Tommy Kore Lynn (2019)
Wynona/Wynnie (2020)

I am informed that this is to be the full set, forever, including by Holly, who has recently moved into her own home, much nearer to the artsy vegetable farm where she works. I’m happy that all of our kids and kid-in-laws are employed, all from home except for Holly.

THE GOOD PART:

The card is a picture of a basket. Gerard David apparently owned a basket, five hundred years ago, and worked it into at least three paintings. In this one it is clearly a diaper bag—rolls of swaddling cloths are showing.

TIME OUT: I've put this letter online with links and images, if you'd rather.
sandradodd.com/2020

A few years ago I read a book called Vermeer's Hat, by Timothy Brook. It’s about connections among people and places, and how the Dutch East India company traded with China, which led to the blue-and-white ceramic magnet of a windmill that I (and many others) own. But in between those things were stories of ships and Spanish silver mined in South America, and how the travel and exchanges of goods were working. History and connections, technology and art.

Many of Vermeer’s paintings were made in the same room, with the same window, sometimes the same props, art, or map. Vermeer’s Hat is about his stuff. I enjoyed the whole story, and all the images.

So time passed, and I had one Gerard David image on my website. A few years later, I found a second one, out in the wild. Same basket. I got excited and did web searches for discussions of that, but I didn’t find anything. Cool!

This year I happened to see an SCA-related discussion of baskets somewhere, and there, right there, was the same basket. Another Gerard David! There was some artistic license in the color, but still…

As if that weren’t exciting enough, when I went to look for Christmas cards this year, what pops up but Gerard David and his basket.

Thanks to Julie and Adam, I got to see a Gerard David painting in London. No basket there. I was a little disappointed that he wasn’t Spanish, as I had first guessed. When I was a kid, the two male neighbors closest to my age were Gerard Vigil, to the southeast, and David Sanchez to the north, so the name was easy for me to remember. Gerard David was not Spanish, but Dutch, as was Vermeer. He lived in Italy a while, and ended up in Brugge until his death, all before Vermeer was born.

These connections are a reminder that even from home, we can explore the world, thanks to other people’s clues and unintentional gifts, and the wonders of the internet these days, with so many detailed photos.

I could be sad at home, or I can be happy. I have years of practice at conjuring and sharing happiness. Keith knows that sometimes I fail. I get scared, or have a bad dream, or feel sorry for myself, but I revive and recover and put out one more Just Add Light and Stir, where people can peek into moments in other families, viewpoints of other people, and sightings of birds or lizards on other continents, in other seasons. There are words and ideas people can take in for a moment, or an hour, or to keep. Then I feel better.

I hope next year is easier and sweeter for all of us. If it is, your memories of an expansive world should allow you to jump on and ride it.

Best wishes for peace and health!

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If you got this far without going to the letter with images and links, here are previews (which are links, too).

January-June 2020

This will be a place for me to fill in what happened in early 2020, but the most important thing was the birth of Wynona Dodd, to Marty and Ashlee, on March 16, 2020.


Before that, it so happens, there were several outings that were about to become undoable:

February 6, Marty got a new car. He tried to come to the house to show us, but Keith and I were at Rex Burger on Montgomery, so they went there. Ivan got to work a claw machine (and direct Marty to use it).


We all went to Chuck E Cheese, before Devyn's birthday, on February 23. It was an excuse for a gathering, and we called her the birthday girl even though it was two weeks early.


February 25, I went with Holly and Rylan to the zoo to see the new penguin exhibit.



Kelly Halldorson, Devyn and I went up the tram to Sandia Peak, one day (Feb 27), and to Meow Wolf in Santa Fe (March 2).





Keith and I took Devyn to The Electric Playhouse, March 12.
Three days later, the governor told people to stay home.

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On July 5, I still haven't held Wynnie.  Indoor places at the zoo, Meow Wolf, Electric Playhouse... nothing is open, so I'm grateful for all of those visits, coming just before the governor said to stay home.  We're still mostly home. Kelly has been the first and only visitor to use the new guestbed. Irene and Gerry had been needing an ABQ spot fairly often, last year and before, and so... there's a better bed, for someday.

Keith was able to go back to swim, in early June (?).  He's doing instrumental music with Beau and Laurie B, one afternoon a week, outside, sitting far apart.

I'm scheduled to have surgery July 20, and that has other office visits and a Covid 19 test associated with it.  Doesn't seem safe or good, but...  there's really no solid knowledge of what is right yet.

Recently, Wynnie passed three months, Ivan's 2 and a half, and Kirby Athena turned two this week, July 3. We're all healthy, so I try to think of the good things, and find gratitude for what we did get to do this year, so far.

Urgent care for my Uvula

These were taken where I spent much of Christmas Eve morning. I love that place, on Montgomery east of Juan Tabo, in Albuquerque. I took the photos for the facebook group Zias and Pickups.

I'm better now, because they have great people. I'm very glad my (seemingly) life-threatening problem was NOT tomorrow/Christmas, but on Christmas Eve, when they were open (shortened hours, but I got in) and the pharmacy near me was open, and I was better in just an hour.

Uvulitis. I felt like something was stuck in my throat that was going to keep from breathing soon, because it was already keeping me from talking right and full voice, and I was afraid to swallow. I had tried hoiking it up, but that really hurt my chest and my head. I tried swallowing it. That was really not helping. Poor uvula.

I was very afraid, but as soon as the doctor figured out what it was, and showed her assistant, who was a medical school student, because the combination of my high tongue and uvulitis were a rarity, I was 50% cured, because I was able to be calm, and she said the fix was easy.

Three days of steroids (20mg Prednisone twice a day)
Motrin
"Magic Mouthwash" (seems to be lidocaine in a pepto-bismol base, and I can gargle with it four times a day, and swish and spit and forget)
and
Allegra, because it seems I have an allergy, and that might've contributed to it all.

But the combination of those four things (five, with the knowledge that it was not a growth planning to reach out and kill me) had me calm and cheery very soon.

Other negative factors could have been dehydration (I meant to, and failed to, refill the humidifier last night that is there to counteract the...), fireplace (ashes, dust from splitting kindling), way-hot red chile on tamales yesterday afternoon (very hot), a margarita, and not drinking enough water or tea for a few days

So if you ever feel like there's something in your throat and you know it's not a foreign object, and you can't hoik it up, stop trying to. Gargle with salt water, drink tea (maybe with honey or lemon), try a cough drop, drink lots of water, relax if you can, or go to urgent care if you can't.

Amidar makes more sense there!

In a couple of Korean dramas, roommates sharing a house have made decisions or set up chore charts with the use of a sort of game on paper like this:


On a site called "DataGenetics," there's an article about this, and it's the way Amidar (the video game) worked. We had an Amidar game! There are screenshots, and some description,and it talks about the game the motions are based on.

In Japan, it's called "Ghost Ladder."
In China, "Ghost Leg."
In Korea, "Ladder Climbing."

The Japanese word is "Amidakuji" so... Amidar. Tadaa!

And then they have diagrams and explanations for how the randomizing game works, on that page, and I hope you'll look.

The blog "Ask a Korean" has an article with samples and stories: How do You Climb "the Ladder"?

I found all that (except the image, which I lifted from some drama or another) by searching for ladder randomizer Korea

Sorry he didn't have clothes on. He was getting dry after a bath. There was a "fig leaf" version of this photo, long ago, on some '90s computer. Found it (2024).