DDR_and_needing_a_miracle
October 07, 2005 at 7:40 a.m.
It's wonderful how compatable Jared and I are.
We both Hate AudioSlave. And I think he hates NickelBack, too. He doesn't make me listen to it in any case, so our compatability is in the bag.
It's a nice thing to know.
Quite the week, lemme tell ya. There's ups and then there are not-so-much's.
Lesse, first I'll go for the up. A few days ago one of my students brought me a present. I'd mentioned before how I dug the DDR game and so the next week, he and his mom came trotting in with a DDR foot pad game for me!!!
Okay, for yous who don't know what this is, it's a video game where you listen to music and then follow arrows on the screen that well you where to step - like it's telling you where to dance. I tried finding pictures of it on the intraweb but the best I could come up with were:
That's the pad. You step on the arrows when the screen tells you to. Here are some happy DDR dancers:
Yeah, that was the best selection of pictures I could find. Because I will NOT be posting of myself dancing, oohh no.
Anywho, they gave me this game and I got all excited and showed Jared - and discovered that since he, as the best husband ever, had already bought me the same game for my birthday (which is in fact less than 10 days away - let us commence the freaking out now).
So I feel terrible that I ruined his birthday surprises - I even ruined his other gift idea - this wave curling iron I've been craving - I picked it up the other day because I found a deal on it. Arg, I am a wretch of a wife.
But I have a DDR pad and it is sooo much fun!! I had a student who plays it and he is a lean, mean dancing machine. his mom told me he used to be overweight, but playing DDR got him much more fit and he's even on the cross country team. And it also forces you to listen to the music and feel the rhythm. You can't rush or drag behind, it's honestly a fantastic teaching game.
But I ruined my birthday surprise. le sigh.
Growing up, I had my mom teach me violin. Getting older, I had an aunt that was my main teacher. She wasn't warm and fuzzy, and honestly the months I spent living with her each summer, practicing up to 10 hours a day, were some of the worst of my life.
But as I teach now, I realize that most of my knowledge of my violin comes from those summers. I am a good teacher - because I also know how to be kind and give kids the room they need to learn to have fun, but I don't know - no, I know I wouldn't be the musician I am today if I wasn't pushed so hard as a kid.
I also wouldn't be so insecure, and would have made it though my teens a lot healthier than I did, but I made peace with that a long time ago, and I'm really glad for who I am and the skills I ended up with. We patched up our realtionship a few years ago, and I appreciate it so much. But now, there's a wall up that I can't scale.
Her doctors have just discovered that her mysterious illnesses over the last few years are the reslut of cancer. I don't know how well she's doing, because for some reason in our family, the adults still prefer to keep the adult things to the adults (even though the rest of us are getting too old for our liking). So for now, I'm hit with too many waves of emotion. I don't know what my mom will do if she loses her only female friend. I owe this woman so much, but I can't call her because of some invisible barrier becuase I am a "child." That and she doesn't suffer fools gladly, especially when she's sick (she just had massive surgery to boot) and I would fall into that category, I think.
I'm so sad. I really do owe her so much, but there's absolutely nothing I can do but pray. I hate being helpless. I dislike it. I'm almost 26. Yet I'm still a baby. (oh, and I REALLY dislike the idea of that number. Bring on the birthday freakings.)
So, that's my brain today. Off to do a little "therapy" with the DDR.
SUPERCRACK.