On the Edge (of 200 and otherwise)

First off, I mis-led you in my previous post. As I was looking through past posts in search of the top ten, I discovered a duplicate draft post that was being counted in my total. Once I deleted it, I was down to 198. This post is 199. Next one will be 200. So, we're still on the edge of 200. Ooops. The good news is, there's still time to nominate a favorite post for inclusion in the top ten!

Also on the edge (and I am obviously brazenly stealing this edge-concept) is what's up with me for this next year. I have the potential opportunity to take a fantastic one-year university program, as a parent of a child with special needs, that focuses on special-needs systems and family services, and entails intensive mentoring and leadership training and much additional coolness. It's designed to be about a 10-hour commitment per week. But first I have to get accepted, then I have to scrounge an extra day of childcare for Joy, then I have to re-arrange my life to accommodate this huge additional spinning plate (which right now looks like a huge serving-platter complete with Thanksgiving turkey). I'm thrilled, apprehensive, excited, busting at the seams with ideas -- wish me luck, y'all!

If that all weren't edgy enough, I've been thinking about Joy and physical edges lately. She has long been one to climb and teeter, generally scaring the wits out of whomever witnesses it. An early teetering favorite was the low windowsill in our living room (just barely visible in her somersaulting photo). One of her first occupational therapists suggested that the urge to get off-balance may be, for Joy, a way of feeling where she is in her skin, establishing where she is in space. Yikes!

These edges were much scarier when Joy was having daily seizures. You'd think we'd have been familiar faces at the local emergency room. That's not how it has worked out, though Joy's legs often have more bumps and bruises than we'd like to see. Amazingly enough, Joy seems to have developed rather a remarkable sense for how high is too high, how teetery is too teetery. Even though she scares us, her sense of the edge is actually pretty sound.

I've been seeing more and more evidence of this lately at parks this summer. She flings herself happily off of playground equipment ledges up to about 4 feet high, but avoids the edge when it's any higher. She has also been gaining confidence in climbing, not only going up standard ladders and ladder-grids, but also going up the kinds of climbers that look like string-art, with cables at odd angles, and climbing structures that are made of curves instead of straight edges. It's some pretty complex motor-planning that this girl has got going on.

Well, here we are at the edge of the school year, the edge of grade 2 for Rose, the edge of a new schedule for Joy, the edge of a new opportunity for me, the edge of 200 for the posts.

Geronimo-o-o-o-o-o!