From bits of conversations overheard in a cafe....

I spend two to six hours a day sitting in a café that has free wifi….  thus I overhear a lot of bits of conversations.  People meet here to talk,  there is an interesting  variety of topics….everything from business to vacations to health….  Students do their homework here, high school debate teams, local college students….businesspeople stop in briefly to take care of business on phone and internet, older folks come in for a cuppa and to read the newspaper (a local newspaper and WSJ are provided for our perusal –free of charge).

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This week I overheard a conversation between people I can only assume are some kind of social workers….  They talked about a young person with some kind of handicap, and he takes behavioral cues from his mother.  The mom uses hand signals and key words to guide the young man’s behavior.  What he will do if she predeceases him is the real question.  ….. But this overheard bit of conversation reminded me of my own mother, who had Alzheimer’s disease.  She was regularly given an MMSE (mini-mental state examination), during which she was asked 30 questions, then her answers were evaluated to determine the degree of impairment. 

The questions or exercises involved memory, math, recognition, and drawing (copying a drawing).  It was my observation that, if I stood in the room with her during the MMSE she answered nearly every question correctly.  –However, if I stood outside the room and did not listen closely, but rather, thought of anything other than the correct answers to the questions, she did not do as well.  After some 12 years of living in the same house, we had developed a kind of telepathy.  (My mother was not the only person I was able to “transmit” to, but that is another story.)  We did not have hand signals or key words…. I tell you this because I found it intriguing, and I am still fascinated with the memory of these occurences. 

(an MMSE can be found at http://www.dementiatoday.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/06/MiniMentalStateExamination.pdf ) 

[incidentally there was one portion that I was unable to telepathically “transmit” answers to her:  The examiner names three unrelated objects clearly and slowly, then the instructor asks the patient to name all three of them. The patient’s response is used for scoring. The examiner repeats them until patient learns all of them, if possible.  They would tell her 3 words, for example:  “pencil, rock, quarter”,…. followed by completely unrelated subjects,… a few minutes later they would ask “what were the 3 words I asked you to remember?  Now, it happened that Mom, without fail, could tell them the 3 words.  I was always amazed by that ability in her, because I almost never remembered any of the 3 words when I listened.]

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Another time I heard an older woman telling someone about driving on the toll road.  The toll road between Rockford and Chicago in Illinois has a minimum of three lanes.  A lot of ignorant people drive slow in the left lane, this is what she was talking about.  This foolish woman rationalizes that she is safe driving in the left lane because she is “out of the way” and there is room to pull to the left side of the highway should she experience engine trouble or a flat tire.

For the record: THE LEFT LANE IS FOR PASSING ONLY.  Law enforcement has devoted hours to enforcing this in order to attempt to educate people on this. 

Unfortunately there are a lot of people who think that they can putter along in the left lane.  So, here I ask of you: PLEASE TELL EVERYONE YOU KNOW THAT THE LEFT LANE IS FOR PASSING ONLY.  That is one of the reason that trucks are to drive only in the right lanes.  Truck drivers are taught to pass on the left….. passing on the right is foolhardy and dangerous, what with entrance/exit ramps, and people who read signs that say things like “SLOWER TRAFFIC KEEP RIGHT”. 

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I overheard someone I know talk about  the Camino de Santiago https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Camino_de_Santiago aka The Way of St. James, which was wonderfully depicted by director Emilio Estevez in the movie The Way.  This is a spiritual journey or pilgrimage, which one may take, which is weeks long if on foot (as depicted in the movie The Way)….. it is a journey of discovery of one’s self…

“The Spanish consider the Pyrenees a starting point. Along the French border, common starting points are Saint-Jean-Pied-de-Port or Somport, on the French side of the Pyrenees, and Roncesvalles or Jaca, on the Spanish side. (The distance from Roncesvalles to Santiago de Compostella through León is about 800 km.- 497 miles). An alternative is the Northern Route nearer the Spanish coast along the Bay of Biscay, which was first used by pilgrims to avoid travelling through the territories occupied by the Muslims in the Middle Ages."

there are different routes one may choose

(The movie The Way follows the Camino de Santiago trail from Saint Jean Pied de Port in the Basque Country across the Pyrenees along the Napoleon Pass to Roncesvalles, then to Pamplona, the Rioja region and its vineyards, on to Castilla y León, the vast Meseta, the breath taking Mountains of León, El Bierzo and finally the green hills of Galicia before reaching Santiago.)

The person who was talking about the pilgrimage was not able to properly articulate what the Camino de Santiago is all about for believers who make the pilgrimage….  precisely the reason I do not spontaneously discuss the topic….. I am not able to retain in memory an explanation that does the pilgrimage justice. 

(Perhaps I should make the pilgrimage myself.)  http://www.caminoadventures.com/

My point, here, being that one should know more about a topic when presenting it to anyone who has not heard of the topic before.

Finally their discussion turned to the European habit of taking a long vacation every year (what a marvelous thought!).

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Otherwise my time in the café is partially spent observing behaviors and eavesdropping snatches of conversation…..  There is a person who has Tourette’s or some related disorder, a  foursome of senior citizens who bring their chess sets and play, trading partners after the first set is done.  A Christian men’s group- early in the morning.  Women who play Scrabble, a Mah Jong group, and a group of ladies who play various games from cards to some kind of tile game I have never seen before.  Other groups of as many as 10 people gather for various kinds of meetings.  And a great number of people who come here for the free wifi, or simply to visit with friends.  

In short, this is often a lively place, full of conversation, and the occasional writing prompt as you can see.