In a dream, I was walking with the one I loved. I was chatting. He was holding my hand. His hand became moist. I thought it was the heat. His grip loosened. I thought it was the sweat.

He dropped to his knees. I turned to gaze upon his face and saw that he was choking. He had been choking... I tried to help. I was not able. My efforts were not successful.

I called for help.

I asked him to tell me how to help him. He could not answer.

I asked him what was wrong, though I  knew he was choking. He could not answer. I asked him what he was choking on. He could not answer. I called again for help. Help was already on the way.

I panicked. He choked. Help traveled.

I asked him how he felt. He could not answer. I tried again to fix him. Nothing.

I knelt and comforted him and held his head in my lap as he choked. I cried. He choked. Help traveled.

I asked him why he was choking. He did not answer. I asked him if he'd ever choked before. He could not answer.

I begged him to tell me how to help him. He could not answer. He wrapped his arms around me for comfort. Still, I asked away.

Maybe I fell and hit my head. It hurt. But it also was screaming at me, finally, even when he could not speak.

Step back. Look at this situation from outside yourself. This man is asking you to help him. He is clawing at your arms, trying to climb inside your body and receive comfort. Shut up. You are not able to stop this man from choking. Proper help takes time. Help comes in stages. Help sometimes needs to practice. To reposition, to mold to the situation. That help is coming, slowly.

Look into his eyes. Tell him help is coming. Disregard his panicked gasps and hold him. If you are scared, look up into the crowd of people who have assembled to help you and ask them to step forward. Ask them to remind you to breathe. Breathe for both of you.

Tell the man you love him. Tell him you're scared too, but that everything will be ok.

Stop spinning off his panic. That is not what he needs. Do not be offended by his inability to tell you how to fix things. He's choking. Love him in the only way you can.

In my dream, there was fog, and I was awake.

What is dangerous?

What is dangerous? What is good?

Writing is good. Thinking, talking, questioning, realizing, challenging, growing, understanding. Loving. That is good.

What is dangerous? Spiral notebooks and plastic wrap? Sometimes. Silly putty? So they say. Becoming complacent? Yes.

Cherish what you have.

Homework

All for one and one for all. That's a saying from some movie. The Three Muskateers? I don't know.

I'm doing this for homework. I'm supposed to examine interactions; communications. I like to write and it helps me to work through things when I write, so I write. I set up an iPhone app for Blogger, but I hate the keyboard on my phone and it gives me a headache anyway. Not so bad that I can't play Tap Store or Whirly Word, but maybe you get the picture. Now my house is empty of children, so I have no excuse. No little girl sauntering up and signing her invented sign for The Wiggles, etc., in which case I would be forced to turn over the computer. No matter where I go in the house it's 100 degrees, and so I might as well sit here and do my assignment. I have to share about it tomorrow, too, so now's the time.

Why am I stalling? I love to write. This is a good assignment. I even ASKED for assignments. I should just get to it.

So, back to the Three Muskateers, if that's where the saying came from. And to communication. Interchanges. Exchanges. While we're at it, bring in noise. Baggage. Anxiety. Yeah, I'm starting to understand why I was stalling. And AM stalling.

The prompt deals with my communication patterns with one specific person; recall one successful one and one not successful, or one you were pleased with and one not, etc. I forget the exact wording and it probably doesn't matter. Being global, though, I have to start with the big picture. I'll get down to specifics in a few minutes.

I'm a teacher, but also an introvert. That means that I have little problem with speaking in front of a group. Yes, I can get a little anxious depending on the topic and the audience, but it's not difficult and it doesn't overly stress me out. It also means that all of these dog and pony shows wear me out. Speaking to a large or small group, or even just multiple individuals throughout my day leave me wanting to be somewhere quiet. Maybe that's why I like to write, especially when I'm stressed. Writing and speaking are almost totally mutually exclusive.

Ok. So, we have the generalization. I don't mind speaking, even in front of a group of peers, students, or strangers, but I have to balance that with quiet.

More specifically, how do my communications with individuals go... Well, I think they're fine. One thing I wish I was better at is my entrances. I tend to walk into a co-worker's office, for example, and just start talking about what's on my mind even if it's first thing Monday morning and we haven't really even greeted each other. It's like I just walked out and came right back in to say something I'd forgotten. It's not that I'm trying to be rude. I think it's partly my ADD. I'm usually trying not to forget what I want to say, so the chit chat is skipped.

Sorry about that, everyone.

I also think I don't reach out as much as I'd like. Sometimes I don't ding my family just to chat, and I should do that more. I think that when I think about them, I'm counting that as communication and of course, it's not.

Sorry about that too.

So two things I'd like to work on. What else... as I said, I think my verbal communication is ok. I try not to be confrontational, but I try to say what's on my mind if it's important. I think people understand what I'm saying when I'm speaking, etc. I try to remember to ask questions and not just blab on about whatever the person reminded me of when they had their turn to speak.

At some point I will have to get to the actual prompt and I think I'll go for it now. When I'm done, I'll try to figure out what it was so hard.

It's easier for me to talk about what I'm not good at, and I have two ideas for this part of the homework, so I'll start there. One, I don't like when I just stop communicating when I'm pissed or frustrated in some way. It doesn't get anything accomplished, except maybe it allows me to cool off and reflect on what's going on. I'm afraid that, later, I'll wish I hadn't said something or other so I say nothing. But I always end up wishing that I hadn't clammed up - it just makes the not-that-big something seem bigger and take longer to put to bed - so doing so isn't really helping.

My father used to clam up and it was most unbecoming. When I was married I would clam up, sometimes for days. Then I'd get tired of that, or more truthfully, arrange things in my mind so that whatever I was mad at went into the "whatever" pile, ie, not important enough to stress about, and slowly reinitiate conversations again, though never about the original problem. That DEFINATELY does not work, especially when your pile of really small things gets really big. I also never got to practice talking about frustrations so that it was easier when they were not really small. (That was the baggage part.)

Clamming up is also cheating. If I'm texting and get upset about something and stop texting, the person I'm ignoring is just left hanging. I did it today, about something... well, I was going to say "really dumb", but it wasn't dumb. It was very important to me and because I didn't word something right (I didn't take into consideration the noise happening on the other end), I didn't get the response I was expecting and my happiness was dashed. So what did I do? I shit-canned the whole thing. Maybe next time I will be able to set emotions aside and just rephrase my opening so that my message is received as intended. Duh. Sounds easy now.

For my second unsuccessful example, I think I'll skip to my third-on-the-list item because it involves something I have significantly less control over. When someone (yes, the object of this writing prompt) is hurting, I want to help. Somehow. I want to do what will help. Sometimes, though right now I can't think of a specific time this has happened in the last few weeks, I ask what I can do to help and the response is just a shrug. Should I say something or be quiet? Should I leave the room or stay? Should I distract, reassure, what? What, already?! (This is the anxiety part.)

Ok. So the message here is, he doesn't know. Maybe. Or is it that he won't say? (I'll repeat "anxiety" just for emphasis here.) Does he think saying he wants some space for a few minutes will hurt my feelings? Because it won't. Do I trust him to advocate for himself? Am I making things even worse by pummeling him with questions?!

As I said, this has been happening less often now. Or has it happened at all since... Maybe not. But I'm afraid it will happen again. And I'll feel helpless again. And useless. In those situations I had to rely on my own instincts to guide me. With no direction from him, I have to decide on my own. So I should be asking, what do I need? For me? But here is where I'm stuck.

I need to feel like I'm helping, and without knowing what will help, I can't get what I need. So I need to get unstuck. "Self," I should say, "you can not help him right now because he is unable to ask for what he needs. What do YOU need?" Logic tells me that if I can't help him, and if the question is whether to stay in his face trying to find out which question he CAN answer or to give him a few minutes, I should take a few minutes for myself and leave the room. Yes, yes, don't get stuck in the quicksand - get out even for a few minutes. But what if I had done that that fateful night... I could have lost him. But that night I also did not wonder what I should be doing. I did not panic and beg him to tell me what he needed. I never pondered the option of leaving the room or staying. Maybe my instincts are ok afterall.


Why does this bother me? Why do both these examples have to do with me trying to help him feel better and not being successful? What am I suppsed to do? I have no idea. I know I can't fix him. I can't help him if he doesn't provide some kind of direction or clues as to what's happening. Anxiety. Anxiety. Anxiety.

Example two was going to be the smattering of short conversations that provoked illogical responses from him, which resulted in complete confusion on my part. Now I know that those are linked to the awful things that happened long ago. There may be more of them in the future and I will certainly be startled again if it happens but I know I will quickly remember their origins and recover my equilibrium.

Part two of the prompt: which conversations went well? Well, the rest of them. But maybe that's too broad. Most of our conversations go well. We are very-well suited for each other. We can talk about cereal, hay, or the library and have a good time. I think the prompt is asking me to consider conversations that could have good poorly and examine why they did not.

Right now, though, reflection is in order. My mind is scattered. I will continue later.