April is the coolest month!

April is National Poetry Month, Baseball and it's Autism Awareness Month! Don't worry, I won't write a lot about baseball.

Apr 01, 2023

4 daffodils in bloom, 1 falling. They are bright although in the shadow of a tree. — Daffodils in the yard!

Here are the poll results:

What would you most like to read about in Z Words?

Baseball 5%
Autism 5%
ADD & business 30%
Political philosophy 0%
A little of everything… a whopping 60%!

I thought it was funny that NOBODY wanted to read about (my) political philosophy. That’s okay, because I might rant. And really, this newsletter is not for ranting.

Some people wanted a little baseball and autism. Not necessarily together, although that might be an interesting article.

And 30% want to read about ADD & Business, with 60% saying: A little of everything!

Thank you for your guidance, friends!

Share and Enjoy!

A Poem-A-Day

I love the month of April for many reasons. It’s really spring. The ice cream trucks start to chime or broadcast their jingles. Good Humor trucks with the Chocolate Eclair…mmmm. Mr. Softee… and Bungalow Bar.

Forsythia bushes are beginning to leaf and shine. We’ve got daffodils in our yard, despite how chilly the mornings have been.

And usually by April 15th, every tree has leafed out in tender spring green.

Adulthood puts stress on me during April, but it’s National Poetry Month and I’m going to try to write a poem a day. And send a Poetry Wrap-Up each week.

Writing a poem every day means they won’t all be polished or beautiful or even meaningful. Some of them may, in fact be rewrites. Most won’t rhyme.

Autism Awareness Month - Autism Across The Life Span

picture of part of a keyboard and a multicolored bubble fidget keychain — A fidget device. You can press the “bubbles” down and pop them up, but mostly I played with the chain. Speakers handed out items like this to normalize fidgeting!

In March I went to Autism Across the Life Span, a conference presented by the University of Kansas.

I learned a lot. Although it was a very research-heavy conference, the presentations were pretty accessible.

Eye-opening panel discussions led by autistic people highlighted that there was a long, long way to go. Some of the biggest challenges are that the researchers tend follow an old paradigm.

This paradigm studies autism as something to cure, or to find out how it is caused. The autistic people who spoke don’t want to be cured. They communicate fine with each other. They say that neurotypical people can and should learn to interact with their autistic family members by listening and watching them.

One panelist said, “I’m not a weird horse. I’m a perfectly normal zebra.”

Yes!

I know for parents with a newly diagnosed child, it is heartbreaking to learn your child is autistic.

That they might never be able to tell you they love you.

But trust me. Don’t give up. They will tell you — just not in words.

Thank you for reading Z Words. This post is public so feel free to share it.

But, Eri, how’s that business of yours doing, you know with your ADD brain and all?

When I decided to write a newsletter, I knew it wasn’t going to be a huge money generator. That took some pressure off me from “trying to succeed at business.”

And I’m less than a year in. But it’s helped me in a lot of ways.

For one thing, I define myself as a writer. Every day, I sit down and write something. Whether I use it or not for the newsletter is not important.

But I have tools to help me write and keep track of what I’m writing.

Tool #1: 750 Words.com

It’s a website. It’s private - no one ever has to see what you write there. And I join in the challenge each month: To write every day!

I seem to thrive on challenges - especially ones where the stakes are not too high. I love the adrenalin (I guess that’s what it is) involved in challenges and deadlines. That's part of my brain chemistry and ADD.

750 words is about 3 pages worth of words.

I’m not motivated to win money or a prize, but to say I did it.

The important thing is that I start something and finish it. Because, that’s always been an issue for me.

Tool #2: Evernote.

Evernote is a place where I keep track of a bunch of stuff. I’ve been using it for years now.

So, when I finish writing my 750 words or more, I copy and paste it into Evernote and then I create tags based on things that came out while writing. I can search Evernote by tags, by words, by titles.

I looked into Notion, but it’s got a long learning curve and I don’t want to spend the time at this point. I’ve been using Evernote, oh since 2014 and it’s changed a lot since then. But I’ve been teaching myself how to use it along with those changes.

And their logo is a nice green elephant. Green is my favorite color. Elephants are some of the best animals in the world. I feel happy when I see the color green. And elephants.