One thing I have been doing more of is actually playing within this regressed life of mine that I talk about on my blog and on Tumblr.
This weekend I spent time with my Lego which usually I tend to use to make things from my imagination but as I think I may of mentioned a few weeks back here it does come with some instructions to get you making things.
I have difficulty in seeing and selecting items I want connected from everything else with my dyslexia and picking them up so I thought I try working on my abilities through practising.
I found a item that was fairly simple to make but had a number of small bits to find.
It was frustrating searching through all the bags each colour group of bricks and that came in but I did manage to find them and follow the pictogram instructions assembling bits before putting it all together.
There it is complete my digger with wheels fitted and bits for it to pick up.
This was good going for me and so I felt this was a good exercise for me to do.
After that talk about lego back to other aspects of my evolving life with a connection starting with the further distancing from anything feminine I ditched a cute pencil case for this.
This is really more suited for a boy and what is more featuring a wolf links directly to Wolf Cubs or in post 1967 British scouting association terms, Cub Scouts being in that pack learning and having fun as a boy.
That leads on to cub scout in spirit activities such as going down to nearby woods observing nature, identifying species and noting changes.
It also includes exploring such as the local waterways , challenging myself to overcome fears and difficulties, reaching beyond ordinary limits like walking in muddy conditions which I did mid week.
This was a picture I took yesterday where I thought the winter sun lighting was good.
I have the strength to stand alone being my own boy in the pack standing up for his innate masculine self.
After talking a bit last week about New Years, this dedicating it to a thing and the previous week looking at the last year in my life I feel like talking about something else today.
l did have for Christmas a 'classic' lego box by which they mean instead of the small dedicated kits that make one or possibly items admittedly well, this is more like the kind of lego we had.
The last time I had any was up to my mid teens which I did play with intensely before being taken away as I was 'too old' to play which was a joke and some to be honest as I was regressing even then.
What you have instead is a variety of different bricks, wheels and other parts from which you can make anything from provided you have sufficient parts and for good measure mine did include a suggestions booklet with ideas showing what parts to use.
The above picture was one idea I had taken on Boxing Day while playing with it the company of one sibling and my parents where I came up with this idea for a Bungalow using the small supplied green board rather than the bigger one that was bought separately.
I didn't need to use the pink bricks that were added to tick the gender neutral box some insist on which is fine for somethings but few building use pink and even in female circles some feel the 'pink tyranny' is getting out of hand.
Being sat making this easily was one of the best things that could of happened over Christmas not just from the point of using imagination and helping my co-ordination but also from just being that eternal ten year old regressing in play.
Last week I wrote a bit about last year personally, life on Tumblr and yes this blog but when out I decided to write something about the New Year.
There's a bit of a tradition in calling an New Year in honour of some cause or other like for instance 2019 is actually been designated the International Year of Indigenous Language which is supposed to help the awareness of languages native to the original people that are said to be at risk of being lost and the associated often oral history and culture that goes with them
I can recall two International Years that directly were relevant to me one, being the International Year of the Child in 1979 and 1981's International Year of the Disabled and to be honest I'm a bit skeptical over them.
When I think of that year as a physically and developmentally disabled teen at the time in high school the overwhelming though of myself and my peers was "more of the great and good saying we're sorry for your condition and here's some services we think you ought to be grateful for".
I mean the more inspirational thing around disability I read and saw was actually on Blue Peter about a man called Joey Deacon who like me had cerebal palsy and like I did for a period was unable to communicate through regular speech who lived originally with his mother.
When she died early, he went to a institution and was labelled as 'simple minded' ignoring that he was intelligent and even though she could 'read' his output when it came to blinking or emitting sounds.
In time he met four friends also there who found they could understand him and this lead to a projected where between them they could transcribe them into the form of a book about his life.
This had come to prominence as it was the start of a period of closing such 'hospitals' down and resettling people into grouped bungalows and this turned in one of the tv programs appeals to raise funds for more bungalows, power outdoor electric wheelchairs and so on to promote greater independence.
It also helped to bridge a huge gap between the understanding of non-disabled children and those of us who were.
To me that program as written in more detail in Blue Peter book eighteen did more good at the everyday level than any high faluting designated years and processions of big wigs.
It also showed often the biggest barriers are attitudes and that having an output problem - not being able to communicate to others what you think - can lead to widespread prejudice even among the medical community.
It's why when I think about new years I tend to feel it's better for all of us to try to challenge other peoples ideas by showing them more of our lives as well as our being prepared to help others for how we can make lives better for one another.
