Dirty Laundry Blog by Jennifer Hynes

Let dirty laundry pile high, while I watch bees make stops on tops of tall daisies under the blue sky

May 29th, 2019
It’s a beautiful day. It feels good to be back in Marin. It’s sunny and warm. The daisies are tall, they cover the ground. Bee’s and moths make stops on tops. The kids are watching T.V. with French bread and butter inside. I take a short break outside. I leave piles of dirty laundry and mess inside. I have to let it go, the mess bothers me, it’s physically too much for me to keep up with. My meatless fridge worries me, meat makes carnivores happy. My kitchen gets complaints. Mama’s kitchen, sometimes I win, sometimes I lose. I’m making lentils and brown rice. This will not be a winner. For me, it’s a winner. I need to let go of the three different meal situation in my family. Let it go. Is it fair? I don’t know.

Next week I start my new art project, I got into the 50/50 show at the Sanchez Art Gallery. It’s 50 paintings in 50 days. It will be my main focus. I need to clean and organize my studio tomorrow. Practice my imagery and work out my palette. We start the official project on June 12^th. I’m excited. But in order to do a good job I need to let the dirty laundry and the three different dinners a night, a vegan meal for me, a meat meal for my husband and a kids meal for the kids. I can’t do it anymore.

I’m also done for now with my research for Fiona’s education. That’s not entirely true, but I need to focus on my art and my language development, ASL and I am starting a Spanish class next week too. How am I going to do all this? I need to become regimented. I need a schedule. But reduce my duties.

The kids need me a lot now. They always have, but now there is a quickness in their development. Identity is becoming very important, and with that comes angst. In a way, boy/girl twins have a unique insight into the mind of the opposite sex. Jack and Fiona study each other, every thought, every move they watch each other and listen to each other. Fiona is losing a tooth, and Jack is jealous, but also it seems to have changed his attitude toward her. I think he looks up to her more. Fiona is maturing faster than Jack. Jack still reminds me of a toddler sometimes, but sometimes like a boy.

How to give all I can to those who need from me, but still take care of myself and do the work I need to do outside of home and family?

And the worry? Just now I was reminded I still have at least two more hearing doctor appointments with Fiona in June. And she’s totally not into going anymore. I even wonder if it’s worth taking another hearing test right now? I wonder if all of the testing as Fiona’s hearing changes is stressing her out? Today she still said she couldn’t hear out of her left ear. I asked her, is it infected or just the way your ear is? She got mad, it’s just the way my ear is, she said. I felt bad, but realized she really does need to continue studying sign and will probably need to use an interpreter sometime in her life.

I still have many questions, but one thing I know is I don’t want to follow a strict oralist approach. I feel like Fiona will end up being in a difficult situation. She tries so hard to hear. My question is, does the oralist only route put too much pressure on the Deaf/HOH person to “hear”, and when they don’t or fail the hearing test what does that do to their self-esteem? That’s what I loved about the ASL bilingual approach, it seems like it creates a confidence, that if a persons hearing aids don’t work or can’t be worn in certain situations there is something to fall back on, sign language. It makes so much sense. But I have to let the worry about this go too. What will be will be.

Time to get back to domestic duties now. The house is such a mess.
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Catch Air

May 26th, 2019
A dark, cold cloud hovers in the sky.

As children swim in an empty pool.

Waves crash,

With a looming shadow on ocean surface,

Fiona is building her confidence in the water.

Today they both catch air.

Over and over.

I told my kids I wasn’t going to swim today. No way. As I type this my finger feels like ice. But the kids just keep swimming and swimming. They must be freezing.

Today I went for a massage. It was so needed and appreciated.

“That’s loud, I need to turn that down, it’s like somebodies deaf who works here.” Says the massage therapist as she’s getting started.

“My daughters deaf, I know what you mean about things needed to be turned up loud” I said.

I didn’t know how I felt. It’s like when someone says something offensive, but you know they just made a thoughtless comment.

The massage was wonderful and I had so many moments of quiet relaxation. I decided I’m just gonna chill the rest of the vacation. Until traffic time.

I have no idea what I will do about much still. I need to wait and see. This morning Fiona said,

“Shannons class, Shannons class, Jacks class, Shannons Class, Shannons class, Jacks class. ”

We have loved our experience there. I wish there was someway to make our neighborhood school more like Shannons class for Fiona. If she knew sign well she could get an interpreter. I’m not going to spin out on that right now. I need to get my own independent education team to get second opinions. And let Fiona try different things, to see what she likes. I just know she doesn’t like Jacks class. And I know I don’t want Listen spoken language only. Because it leaves her out of so much communication time each day.

Vacation with kids isn’t bad. Today they are playing well together. If it was up to me this is what everyday would be like. No stress, just let the kids play and eat junk! I’m making them smores tonight. I’ll put on a movie and chill.

Jack and Fiona are so freezing and they can’t stop swimming! I have to make them stop.
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Where do i go from here?

May 26th, 2019
The ocean waves crash, I don’t feel well this morning. The food situation has been difficult. I love vacations but with little kids vacations don’t feel like vacations. There are moments, like yesterday morning during our walk on the beach. It starts out all four of us, but Fiona immediately sits down on the sand. She wants to make a nest. We find rocks for birds. I draw little birds on each rock with a piece of burnt wood I use as charcoal. Fiona tells me to gather sticks for the nest as she makes a mound of sand. I gather the sticks. I set the nest up, but Fiona says, no that’s not how. She rearranges the nest in her own vision. Jack and Alan are no where to be seen. They don’t have very much patience for constant stops along the shore.

I don’t know how to move on from here, but I know I just will.

Yesterday afternoon Jack, Fiona, and I went in the pool that belongs to the condos we are staying in.

Goosebumps covered Fionas legs. Her lips purple. But she stayed in and swam. At first without the floaty. Later I made her put it on because she’s still very scared in the water.

I told Jack he could probably pass the swim test at the big pool. He does cannon balls over and over again. He’s a strong swimmer. He practices going under water and holding his breath as long as possible. He understands how to float.

When we first arrived at the pool I told both kids we needed to practice our sign language. Once I take off Fionas HA’s she has trouble understanding anything and yells super loud. At first she tries to be quiet, I use sign, she still talks, and gets louder and louder. Fiona wants me close to her the whole time we are in the pool. I try to explain I need to keep swimming, back and fourth to stay warm. I try to sign it many ways but she doesn’t quite understand.

Jack keeps doing cannon balls. As he climbs out of the pool his legs look more like a boys legs, not a toddler, not even a five year old, like he is. He rushes to the deep end ready to do a cannonball. Not a bit of hesitation in his face. I stop him and tell him to go to the middle part, the 4 and 1/2 feet part. Even though he probably would have been able to do it. I still get nervous with two kids at the pool while I’m alone.

I think the pool situation wore me out. The impatience of people in general, even people close to me, in contrast to the patience I’ve cultivated in myself.

To know that there are many situations where my daughter will need patience from others to communicate with her, to stop and make nests in the sand, to wait for her and make sure she knows whats going on when plans shift.

I think the difficult part for me to understand is that it took me so many years to cultivate this patience in myself. It took me years to learn to slow down and to take the time that needed to be taken with Fiona.

How can I expect teachers, students, and adults to have the same patience? People who have no training. When even the people closest to me do not have this.

I don’t know where to go from here.
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