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Text of the page (random words):
the crow october 2010 the crow random observations from an old crow saturday october 30 2010 the consequences of heroic acts three weeks ago i wrote about my grandson donovan let s face it i was boasting about him in the way that grandparents are wont to do my mother used to say that if you boast today you will cry tomorrow but three weeks had passed and i hadn t yet another old wife s tale three weeks ago another grandmother s beloved grandson was released from prison after serving time reportedly for assault he is in his late twenties stands a couple of inches taller than donovan and evidently spent most of his time while incarcerated working out in the prison gym where donovan has lingering baby fat this other grandson has muscles upon muscles he has more than six pack abs he sports a full case of them his arms start at his neck just below his earlobes with upper arms as big around as my thighs yes that big three days ago my grandson and the other grandmother s beautiful boy crossed paths this chance meeting didn t turn out well for either grandson my grandson was knocked to the ground and injured by the other grandson who was arrested for his assault on donovan donovan saw one of his neighbors pull into the apartment building parking lot from out of nowhere it seemed to him another woman and two men ran up to his neighbor s car whereupon the unknown woman reached into the neighbor s car and began beating her donovan ran over to the car and placed himself between his neighbor and the attacker he held his hands up palms open and facing the attacker to block her blows giving his neighbor time to exit her car from the passenger side donovan pleaded with the attacker to just walk away that what she was doing wasn t going to solve anything and would only bring trouble to her if she continued the other grandson began shoving donovan in his chest trying to push him out of the way donovan turned toward the attacker and said she needed to leave that because she didn t live in the building she was trespassing and could be arrested for it that s when the other grandson sucker punched donovan who has never hit anyone in his entire life blind sided him knocking him unconscious this man a street fighter wise in the ways of bullying and beating others hit donovan so hard that the inside of his upper lip along the jaw teeth was split almost to the outer skin he bloodied donovan s nose and mouth so severely that donovan lost enough blood to become anemic either the man s fingernail or perhaps a ring he was wearing gouged a piece of d s lip away and he needed stitches to close the gash my grandson had to visit the hospital twice for his injuries but he is going to be okay his bruises and wounds will heal before long the other grandson is back in county prison for violating his parole agreement no fighting while he awaits trial on charges stemming from his assault on donovan the prognosis for him is not as good as it is for donovan i ve written about this for a couple of reasons first to say how proud i am of donovan for doing a brave selfless thing in coming to the aid of friend and neighbor when she was unable to defend herself i also am proud of him because he was putting into action the lessons his mother and i and others have tried to teach him about not giving in to his anger in confrontations to walk away which he was trying to pass on to the attacker his actions his obvious grasp of the non violent solution to conflict tells me he is maturing and growing toward independence he is adapting to the world and learning how to live among to navigate around to cope with the rest of us complicated not always well behaved human beings mostly as always and no matter what this says about me i ve written for myself to help me understand the incomprehensible i write to release the extreme anger and murderous rage i feel toward that other grandmother s beloved grandson for hurting my gentle spirited kinder than god grandson greatest gift i will ever receive our beloved donovan this is me walking away posted by the crow at 9 50 pm 17 comments labels donovan forgiveness joy and love letting go pride sunday october 10 2010 passages the picture of the little boy above is of my grandson donovan i took the photo when he was four years old this was seven years before we learned he was autistic donovan had been misdiagnosed as having attention deficit disorder at age seven and prescribed medications which made some of his symptoms worse including causing him to have suicidal thoughts at age eight he is an aspie as some folks now refer to people with asperger s syndrome donovan is on the high functioning end of the autism spectrum which means he has a greater chance of being mainstreamed than youngsters on the more profoundly autistic end of the scale like most aspies he has a high iq and absorbs information like a sponge also like most children within the autism spectrum his social skills and emotional maturity lag behind his intelligence and physical development consequently he is now a 6 4 tall highly intelligent high school junior turning eighteen today sunday 10 10 10 who sometimes sounds like a boy of twelve or fourteen on really bad days he s more like a child of nine or ten but those days are fewer and farther between than they were last year and the year before that he is maturing physically more rapidly than his mother would like to see he used to be too small for his age and was started on growth hormones two years ago at that time he was a little shorter than i am i m 5 6 and shrinking height wise he now towers above me and his mother his father both biological grandfathers most of the kids at his high school and the teachers as well what s alarming is that the growth plates on his bones have not hardened yet which means he s still growing he d be great at basketball i think but his coordination hasn t caught up with his height yet he had a girlfriend this spring but the romance faltered neither one of them is ready yet for such a relationship donovan is a kind hearted young man generous in spirit protective of kids smaller and younger than he probably because he was bullied so when he was younger and small he wants to get his driver s license but he has what seems like the human version of fainting goat disorder sometimes when he s under a high level of stress he passes out not what you d want in a driver sharing the road with you until the cause of the fainting can be determined and either cured or medicated he won t be issued a license donovan faces multiple challenges on his road to adulthood many of which will be with him for the rest of his life he s a good kid with a good brain and loads of potential he will adapt to life among the rest of us which may or may not be such a good thing and will make his mark in this world he is dearly loved and has the support of more than just his family so i believe he will do well the body of the boy in the first image has grown and is now that of a young man but the eyes that look at me when we re talking haven t changed a bit they belong to the same four year old who thought the universe was a place of wonderment magic and boundless joy who thought his nanny was his best friend i will be for as long as i live and maybe beyond that happy birthday my beloved boo boo posted by the crow at 1 27 am 15 comments saturday october 9 2010 remembering i didn t watch the late night news the night john lennon died and was told the next day at work by a friend who came in to the post office to get her mail i was a beatles fan from the first time i heard i want to hold your hand in the late fall early winter of 1963 the beatles music and the hysteria that followed their explosive popularity helped take my mind off the assassination of kennedy one of my heroes all through my remaining teen years and into my early twenties john paul ringo and george their music i mean was a part of my life i didn t know how much of an influence they were until john was murdered oh sure i thought for about 10 minutes the world would end when the beatles broke up in 1970 but it didn t of course while i didn t think lennon s murder would bring about an end to life as we know it i did grieve his death which surprised the heck out of me at the time a few weeks later in talking with some friends about the murder i realized i was mourning the loss of an icon of my youth perhaps my youth itself google s logo today was a remembrance of lennon and it made me feel nostalgic for his voice and a time when my life was less complicated though not easier there are so many songs from lennon s beatles years and his post beatles career that i hold dear woman for instance but i chose these two songs because stand by me is one of my all time favorite r b songs from my teens by ben e king covered by many others including lennon and oh my love is a rocking love song with a gentle rhythm that i really like posted by the crow at 11 01 pm 2 comments friday october 1 2010 abashment deserved well i found out who made the mistake that cost me my pheaa grant the fidgit uh that would be me i entered the wrong information on my application back in may which i discovered when i went over my application worksheet last night to see if there was room evidence for me to file for an appeal boy do i feel stupid the answer to that would be a resounding yes thank goodness i was on my best behavior when i went in to the financial aid office yesterday morning or my face would be even redder than it is right now posted by the crow at 8 23 am 12 comments newer posts older posts home subscribe to posts atom about the crow photo behind the blog title brian stormont took this picture of the crow in february of 2006 with his new camera i m following his blog eye dull moments stargazer about me the crow home is in a small town in south central pennsylvania 45 miles as the crow flies north of baltimore i am a displaced southerner aging less gracefully than i d like a helluva lot faster than i d like but i m trying to slow things down a bit to make this ride last as long as possible view my complete profile blog plaid the crow s wings followers blog archive 2022 1 november 1 2021 3 august 1 july 1 june 1 2020 6 december 1 june 1 may 2 april 2 2019 5 august 3 july 1 may 1 2018 5 december 1 october 1 august 1 june 1 january 1 2017 1 january 1 2016 11 december 1 november 3 september 2 march 3 january 2 2015 19 december 2 november 3 july 3 june 2 may 1 march 2 february 2 january 4 2014 8 november 3 october 1 september 1 july 1 march 2 2013 17 december 1 november 1 october 1 august 1 july 2 june 4 april 2 march 1 january 4 2012 30 december 2 october 4 september 1 august 4 july 8 june 3 april 1 march 4 february 2 january 1 2011 61 december 5 november 6 october 1 september 5 august 6 july 9 may 8 april 4 march 6 february 6 january 5 2010 62 november 2 october 4 the consequences of heroic acts passages remembering abashment deserved september 1 august 7 july 12 june 2 may 3 april 1 march 3 february 16 january 11 2009 123 december 16 november 9 october 11 september 15 august 7 july 11 june 14 may 9 april 12 march 6 february 8 january 5 2008 30 december 2 november 12 october 16 meaningful quotes we are displaced by time marian marshall suplee griest late first mother in law spoken to me in january 1994 in a dream after her death we ve got to live no matter how many skies have fallen d h lawrence via whiskey river 8 22 2014 there is something scary about letting ourselves go it means that we will screw up that we will relinquish the possibility of perfection it means that we will say things we didn t mean to say and express feelings we can t explain it means that we will be onstage and not have complete control that we won t know what we re going to play until we begin until the bow is drawn across the strings while this spontaneous method might be frightening it s also an extremely valuable source of creativity the lesson about letting go is that we contain our own creativity we are so worried about playing the wrong note or saying the wrong thing that we end up with nothing at all jonah lehrer via whiskey river 10 22 2014 shrinking simple theme theme images by sololos powered by blogger