Thursday, October 22, 2009

what can I say? life happens

My life is still random. randomly random. So here goes,

I am . . . still trying to find a word that sufficiently describes the way I feel about school. I have six classes. I have the homework done through this week in three of them. But I do have a three day weekend coming up so maybe I'll get caught up. Maybe.

I continue to work more than I like, but when bills come due it seems like less than I should. Alas is there ever a happy medium in life outside of Madeleine L'engle books? I see strange things daily (everywhere but mostly at work) I try to think about them in context with my studies, Hermeneutics, Philosophy, Christian Beliefs, and I am constantly boggled. Where do people get there ideas from?

I saw a fellow with a tattoo the other day which read, "Oh death where is thy sting, Oh life where is thy victory" How is that for living with constant depression? ink it into your skin. I don't understand why people do the things they do, like stabbing a ninety-plus year old women. Why? but then, no one else I work with understood that either. They think that whoever did that is definitely going to Hell. (not the time I suppose to suggest a little self examination, but if not then, when?)

My pts are alternatively crazy, whinny, and genuinely sick. The only time they'll talk to me is when their crazy. The only time the tell me the truth is when their genuinely sick, and when their whinny, well, they talk at me, and they order me, and the beg me for everything from pillows to pain pills, neither of which am I permitted to give them (tech, I could get them a pillow but I have to check with the nurse. We don't like to make certain pts too comfortable, namely the ones who think our door reads "University Hotel")

I have a long list of things to accomplish tomorrow, and am praying fervently for a certain item on that list which I will not disclose here and thereby jink it. If it happens, I will announce it. Family - keep your mouth shut and your comments off my blog :)

Shout out to John Todd for tinkering on my Jeep. A Jeep which now that I think about it I have never told blog-world about. It is a 91 white Jeep Wrangler, Islander. Ask me no more than this because I know no more than this, except the fact that it is my first car. Yeah! (confetti) Again, I will probably not post pictures of it. But thanks to a little tinkering it seems to be running fine. Though doubtlessly repairs and body work are in the near future.

I find that I run out of things that I can actually post on blogspot. Is it not grand how the ego can think that weeks worth of life has happened, yet the mind can squash it down to a few blips of data, yet the psyche wonders whether all the life lived can really be so condensed into such strict categories, yet the philosopher wonders whether life was lived, or just survived. Well I'll stop now. I really should study more in my classes, maybe then I could tell if what I just wrote made any sense.

Saturday, October 3, 2009

death's angel

Today I watch the man they call the Angel of Death as he walked family back and forth to our tiny viewing room. No doors or windows in this room, it used to be a storage closet I think, so only two or three (if their skinny or close) can fit in at a time.

Today they came to see a young man who,had he lived to the end of this month, would have been Thirty. I thought how coincidental it was that my birthday is this month to.

He had lots of family, all crying. So the Angel walked back and forth for hours. They always go past my little corner, so I watch as they go in -crying, but determined. One mutter quietly to no one as she past, "maybe if we put the oxygen back on he'll come back". Then twenty min. or so later they file past again. Still crying, but now they just look hopeless.
The first stage of grief- denial is shattered here.

I think to myself of Dr. Brown telling the class that we don't deserve to live, that life is a gift of God. We don't deserve to be healthy, have eyesight, walk, speak, be happy. These are gifts from God. It's not something to tell the mourning, but something for the living to think on.
What if. It is a great question. What if this, What if that. It could have been me, you think. It could have been my friend.

"I called him everyday" said one girl as she walked out. What is she thinking? I bet it's not about how many min, she'll save. But rather, what will she do with those min, now.

The Angel of Death walks the floor most nights here, sometime we manage to ward him off, sometimes we transfer the pt before that inevitable event and he walks on another floor. But he has job security that's for sure. A living reminder of dying. What does he think of this nick-name I wonder? Does he go home and ponder the brevity of life? He does not seem the brooding type.

I will end my meandering thoughts now, and walk into the autumn night, the cool breeze fills me with a sense of life all around. I will thank God for his great gifts to me, so undeserving, and ask him, if it is not contradictory to his plan, to bless yet awhile longer.