Where I've Come

So... I was out and back. I am in Mass. again on Monday, and I can't admit to looking forward to it. Not really saying that I'm not ready and the like, but I'm just not enthused about it, personally speaking. A lot going on in Reno, and my life seems to be a little consistently better at home in some qualitative ways (such as: can I eat decently without having to walk a half mile? Can I stretch in my own living space? The little things in life).

But at least I got to go out with a bang. I spent most of last week in Las Vegas, which was fun. Very fun. I went to several events with Mom, which were both difficult and interesting. I mentioned here briefly that my Mom is now one of two candidates in the state-wide race for the Supreme Court, and that is an interesting journey, to be sure. So I got introduced to those people, and that's always fascinating, because you kind of get introduced out of hand to people with a lot of influence, in a way that had traditionally been quite foreign to me. Puts things in a very weird perspective.

Anyway, Vegas. So... my Mom spent most of the time working, as is her mandate. Back to back meetings, spare for later hours. In retrospect, I kind of feel bad about that, because I mostly had casual fun. Went to the pool, walked around on the Strip (weather, of course, is in the 100's!), and played at various arcades, among other things.

What I think really interested me most about that all, though, is simply how many more skills I've gained over the years.

It has to be clear that I have quite some history with arcades and casinos. I live in Reno, and while the casinos are not nearly as interesting as in Vegas, they still are very present, and that was the entertainment hub. So, throughout my life, I've found myself in those places quite a bit. Lights, noises, everything aside.

I kind of have a love/hate relationship with the whole lot, really. They were always places where I would get challenged a lot sensorally, in a major way, but I had fun there, and the scattered friends I had enjoyed them as well, so I'd end up there a lot. They became places to practice a good level of sensory control and social situations, with obvious rewards(I have historically been a big game player, though not a gambler (and I never will be, if I have a say in that)). Not a Zen Garden exactly, but have what you will.

So I was surprised at how easy it was for me. There were exceptions (one machine was particularly loud, my hearing was "drowned" by various voices at the AFL-CIO dinner and I lost the conversations I was trying to hear, among other things I don't remember currently), but they really were minor by comparison. Really minor. And so it mostly was just having fun.

I have to admit to that being pretty bittersweet, as I don't see it getting any better in terms of management. But it was nice to have such a definitive marker for me. Granted, a lot of that change probably happened naturally, but I also know that much of it didn't.

So I took much of the flight back to think of all of the things I've worked on, personally. No, I don't mean in the sense of "I was non-verbal, and look where I am now", because I find that to be abhorrently elitist and frankly on the whole ridiculous. I certainly don't consider myself better for being verbal. But the other things, such as stress management, figuring out motives, and learning flexibility, where I spent some personal effort and active thought improving such things, the more concrete details.

So that was nice. I might write more specifically about those thoughts later, but it's almost sufficient to say that I was able to identify them and think about them. It's important not to lose sight of the little things, as opposed to the big picture, which always is quite daunting in its scope.