So, I am mad with jealousy: someone is knitting a sweater for their tenure-tracked professor sweetie.
Okay, I know this is beyond rude for me to even say something like that, given the circumstances.
But, do you know how often I fantasize about reading the latest draft of my fabulously degreed and tenured Other Half's stunning tour-de-force academic work, sure to become the next ground-breaking classic reference text of its kind? And then, having some dorky discussion about the etymology of some obscure word, and then waking up in the morning to "literary quote of the day"?
On the other hand, I did have my share of knitting for my own sweetie, who wore them proudly, in only a way a True Knitter can grow properly teary eyed and swoon. The winter Ibrahim came back from Egypt, I knit him a charcoal grey, V neck sweater out of a wool/alpaca blend. I also knit him a hat and scarf. He wore the sweater all the time, as well as the scarf. He wore the hat, sometimes, but he really wasn't much of a hat wearer.
Now, unfortunately, being summer in Baghdad, he doesn't need these kinds of things much any more. I am going to have to find a penpal from Iceland who needs woolen things, I think.
I should probably dig out my woolens for Seattle, though. I'll probably spend the summer experiencing some kind of climate-related low-grade pneumonia from the dampness.
Sunday, April 29, 2007
i need a new drug
Last night I had a series of bizarre dreams, even by my standards.
In one sequence, I was being told by one of the charge nurses on my current floor that I had no choice but to go back to high school and finish out grades 11-12.
I was protesting that I couldn't possibly need to finish high school, because I had a bachelor and master degree, and as such, it was presupposed that I had graduated highschool.
But, I ended up in high school, feeling betrayed and very angry about the humiliation of having to be dragged through one of my most unfavorite schooling experiences, ever.
I can't imagine why, given how incredibly satisfied I am with my employment experiences lately, why I would be having such strange dreams.
In one sequence, I was being told by one of the charge nurses on my current floor that I had no choice but to go back to high school and finish out grades 11-12.
I was protesting that I couldn't possibly need to finish high school, because I had a bachelor and master degree, and as such, it was presupposed that I had graduated highschool.
But, I ended up in high school, feeling betrayed and very angry about the humiliation of having to be dragged through one of my most unfavorite schooling experiences, ever.
I can't imagine why, given how incredibly satisfied I am with my employment experiences lately, why I would be having such strange dreams.
Saturday, April 28, 2007
with love, from Iraq.
IBRAHIM:
[in a phone message from Baghdad, Iraq]
Hey, how are you? This is Ibrahim, Jamie. I am.. calling you... trying to call you... but you're not picking up. Please pick up. If you don't pick up, just wanted to call and say Happy Anniversary; it's our second anniversary. I'll try to call you later. Just wanted to say Happy Anniversary. Try to answer if I call you. Bye!
[in a phone message from Baghdad, Iraq]
Hey, how are you? This is Ibrahim, Jamie. I am.. calling you... trying to call you... but you're not picking up. Please pick up. If you don't pick up, just wanted to call and say Happy Anniversary; it's our second anniversary. I'll try to call you later. Just wanted to say Happy Anniversary. Try to answer if I call you. Bye!
rock me, amadeus.
One of my all time favorite pieces of music:
Mozart's Piano Concerto No. 5 in D major, K. 175.
Mozart was seventeen when he wrote this concerto, and it remained one of his favorite concertos, played by himself until his the year of his death.
I can see why: the piece is pure musical joy.
When I was fifteen and sixteen, I played the first movement of his Piano Concert No. 23 in A Major, K. 488, in competition and recitals.
Even though I haven't played piano since highschool, Mozart remains one of my all time favorite composers to listen to, and play (the others being, rather predictably: Bach on the Baroque end of things, and Beethovan on the other side of Classical Romanticism).
While many people think Mozart is facile to play and not as technically demanding as perhaps a Romantic composer; I disagree. There is a certain control and clarity of technique one must possess in order to play his works with any grace or lyricism. There is hardly any pedal work--and if there is, it must be used judiciously--to muddy and blur potential mistakes.
Like I said: Piano Concerto #5 is sheer joy. Listen to it, and see what I mean.
Mozart's Piano Concerto No. 5 in D major, K. 175.
Mozart was seventeen when he wrote this concerto, and it remained one of his favorite concertos, played by himself until his the year of his death.
I can see why: the piece is pure musical joy.
When I was fifteen and sixteen, I played the first movement of his Piano Concert No. 23 in A Major, K. 488, in competition and recitals.
Even though I haven't played piano since highschool, Mozart remains one of my all time favorite composers to listen to, and play (the others being, rather predictably: Bach on the Baroque end of things, and Beethovan on the other side of Classical Romanticism).
While many people think Mozart is facile to play and not as technically demanding as perhaps a Romantic composer; I disagree. There is a certain control and clarity of technique one must possess in order to play his works with any grace or lyricism. There is hardly any pedal work--and if there is, it must be used judiciously--to muddy and blur potential mistakes.
Like I said: Piano Concerto #5 is sheer joy. Listen to it, and see what I mean.
Thursday, April 26, 2007
space and time
You know you're a big huge geek when you're riding on Space Mountain and you're thinking the entire time about Kant's Critique of Pure Reason wondering if Kant had it right, that time and space are indeed the a priori intuitions that make human experience possible.
And then, while still on the ride, you find yourself wishing Kant had picked something else, like sedation and somnolence as his a priori intutions for experience, and start wondering what translation of Heidegger's Being and Time would be the best to read, or what the ancient Romans would have thought of the Magic Kingdom, what with their fondness of spectacle and gratuitous excess, themselves.
And, while you're having a Fesitval of German Thought during a theme park ride, you also start thinking seriously about writing several essays on the machination of what passes for modern amusement and publishing them in the next issue of The Journal of The Disgruntled Snotty Pseudo Intellectual.
I don't recommend becoming a brooding Prussian on your next family vacation to Sea World, or the Icecapades, or what not, but even if you've never read a drop of philosophy in your life, I would assume at least your pocketbook is disturbed by ruthlessly efficient and brilliant marketing scam engineered and thriving in such "places of amusement."
Personally, I kind of don't get it. The one and only ride I actually liked was only because it was so absurd, it made me feel like I'd dropped acid and reminded me of that Simpson's episode where Lisa and Bart visit Duff World and she hallucinates through the It's a Duff World attraction. (And no, it wasn't It's a Small World, either.)
Otherwise, the whole thing seemed kind of creepy to me, with the leering monolithic plastic figures everywhere, and the sanitized fake forced happiness of the employees clad in what look like heat-stroke inducing polyester uniforms.
As I was shuttled along in and out of endlessly roped lines and gates into small coffin or cell like compartments, respectively, I started wondering if Disney executives and park planners didn't rely heavily on Mssrs. Goebbel and Himmler's notes on the efficient transportation and genocide of Jews in an effort to control crowds and ensure their timely and expedient movement towards a horrific death full of agonizing suffering. I'm not offering up this comparison lightly, and it is not meant in any disrespectful way to those who suffered the Holocaust; I mean I felt a real sense of dread and fear of becoming a dehumanized, marginalized object of commercialized explotaition ("a body of consumption"--it felt like a Foucaultian moment!) as well as psychological discomfort akin to mild forms of torture due to the constant exposure to physical restraint and deliberate manipulation of sensorum.
Or, in a perhaps a less dramatic and more genteel comparison, I felt I was cast deus ex machina into a bizarrely Orwellian world, where the State controlled all means of access in and out of shelter, to food and water, music, entertainment, and audio broadcasted thoughts of happiness and discipline everywhere and always to its inhabitants. ("For your safety, keep your valuables in a secure place under the seat, and do not stand up or place hands or other object outside your projectile vehicle during your 50 feet plunge to your death in a small grey cubicle much like that of your work station! Thank you for your cooperation, comrade brothers and sisters!")
I felt, however, that I should kindly spare these wildly unpleasant thoughts from my unwitting companion, who seemed to be very happy and not in the least bit perturbed in any way by Foucaultian deconstructions of Mickey Mouse or Kantian a priori intuitions of the Small World singing international Chuckie dolls at any time during our excursion. Meanwhile, the least biting of my complaints is that I had essentially exchanged hard earned money to partake in a spectacle that felt much like a day at work except perhaps worse in one respect: not only was it loud, chaotic, and tiring, I was without fucking air conditioning for most of the time on a hot summer day.
(Other interested parties may like to return to my blog at a later date when I return to my critique of the theme parks in installments such as: Orientalism and The Representation of the Exotic in America's Collective Imagination; The Fantastic Mythology of the American Cinema Portrayed as Historical Reality and The American Dream Defiled: Simulacra ,Spectacle and Society.)
And then, while still on the ride, you find yourself wishing Kant had picked something else, like sedation and somnolence as his a priori intutions for experience, and start wondering what translation of Heidegger's Being and Time would be the best to read, or what the ancient Romans would have thought of the Magic Kingdom, what with their fondness of spectacle and gratuitous excess, themselves.
And, while you're having a Fesitval of German Thought during a theme park ride, you also start thinking seriously about writing several essays on the machination of what passes for modern amusement and publishing them in the next issue of The Journal of The Disgruntled Snotty Pseudo Intellectual.
I don't recommend becoming a brooding Prussian on your next family vacation to Sea World, or the Icecapades, or what not, but even if you've never read a drop of philosophy in your life, I would assume at least your pocketbook is disturbed by ruthlessly efficient and brilliant marketing scam engineered and thriving in such "places of amusement."
Personally, I kind of don't get it. The one and only ride I actually liked was only because it was so absurd, it made me feel like I'd dropped acid and reminded me of that Simpson's episode where Lisa and Bart visit Duff World and she hallucinates through the It's a Duff World attraction. (And no, it wasn't It's a Small World, either.)
Otherwise, the whole thing seemed kind of creepy to me, with the leering monolithic plastic figures everywhere, and the sanitized fake forced happiness of the employees clad in what look like heat-stroke inducing polyester uniforms.
As I was shuttled along in and out of endlessly roped lines and gates into small coffin or cell like compartments, respectively, I started wondering if Disney executives and park planners didn't rely heavily on Mssrs. Goebbel and Himmler's notes on the efficient transportation and genocide of Jews in an effort to control crowds and ensure their timely and expedient movement towards a horrific death full of agonizing suffering. I'm not offering up this comparison lightly, and it is not meant in any disrespectful way to those who suffered the Holocaust; I mean I felt a real sense of dread and fear of becoming a dehumanized, marginalized object of commercialized explotaition ("a body of consumption"--it felt like a Foucaultian moment!) as well as psychological discomfort akin to mild forms of torture due to the constant exposure to physical restraint and deliberate manipulation of sensorum.
Or, in a perhaps a less dramatic and more genteel comparison, I felt I was cast deus ex machina into a bizarrely Orwellian world, where the State controlled all means of access in and out of shelter, to food and water, music, entertainment, and audio broadcasted thoughts of happiness and discipline everywhere and always to its inhabitants. ("For your safety, keep your valuables in a secure place under the seat, and do not stand up or place hands or other object outside your projectile vehicle during your 50 feet plunge to your death in a small grey cubicle much like that of your work station! Thank you for your cooperation, comrade brothers and sisters!")
I felt, however, that I should kindly spare these wildly unpleasant thoughts from my unwitting companion, who seemed to be very happy and not in the least bit perturbed in any way by Foucaultian deconstructions of Mickey Mouse or Kantian a priori intuitions of the Small World singing international Chuckie dolls at any time during our excursion. Meanwhile, the least biting of my complaints is that I had essentially exchanged hard earned money to partake in a spectacle that felt much like a day at work except perhaps worse in one respect: not only was it loud, chaotic, and tiring, I was without fucking air conditioning for most of the time on a hot summer day.
(Other interested parties may like to return to my blog at a later date when I return to my critique of the theme parks in installments such as: Orientalism and The Representation of the Exotic in America's Collective Imagination; The Fantastic Mythology of the American Cinema Portrayed as Historical Reality and The American Dream Defiled: Simulacra ,Spectacle and Society.)
mr toad's wild ride: the end of an era
I think my dad told me this awhile ago, and I repressed it from my memory, but yesterday, I went to Disney World (more on Deconstruction of The Spectacle, per Foucault, later) and was aggrieved to find out possibily the cheesiest, most cardboard, hokey, lame ride at the theme park, Mr. Toad's Wild Ride, has been summarily replaced by some Pooh ride.
Not that the thousands of screaming, sticky faced bratty kids throwing dramatic and lustily public tantrums to extract from their genetic donors (otherwise known as parents, although any actual parenting of some of the offspring seemed dubious) sugary ten dollar popsicles and plastic toys guaranteed to break in under four hours wasn't sobering enough... But, I lamented at length a piece of my chilhood ripped away and lost forever. My sister and I used to go on that ride together, because it was so lame you just had to go on the ride. I'm sure you Mr. Toad affecianados out there know of what I speak. It was the refreshing tacky corny, low-budgety goodness of it all.
While I was lamenting the literary loss of another one of my childhood favorites, a companion noted, "Uh, kids today probably don't know who Mr. Toad is."
Oh god, the tragedy of generations!
Not that the thousands of screaming, sticky faced bratty kids throwing dramatic and lustily public tantrums to extract from their genetic donors (otherwise known as parents, although any actual parenting of some of the offspring seemed dubious) sugary ten dollar popsicles and plastic toys guaranteed to break in under four hours wasn't sobering enough... But, I lamented at length a piece of my chilhood ripped away and lost forever. My sister and I used to go on that ride together, because it was so lame you just had to go on the ride. I'm sure you Mr. Toad affecianados out there know of what I speak. It was the refreshing tacky corny, low-budgety goodness of it all.
While I was lamenting the literary loss of another one of my childhood favorites, a companion noted, "Uh, kids today probably don't know who Mr. Toad is."
Oh god, the tragedy of generations!
Monday, April 23, 2007
thinking thoughtful thoughts.
I just finished The Hidden Life of Otto Frank this morning.
The book has been haunting my mind since I started reading it. For one, I had always believed through popular history accounts that the Netherlands had been a place of refuge for Jews fleeing Nazi Germany.
However, the Dutch government's post war repatriation policies concerning Jewish survivors of the camps was, in a word, horrid.
Otto Frank, himself a decorated German officer in the First World War--and survivor of Auschwitz--was considered by the Dutch government an "enemy of the state" due to his German descent. Upon liberation from Auschwitz and return to Amsterdam, he and many other German-born Jews were summarily stripped of their citizenship and considered "stateless" persons. An investigation was launched in 1946 as to Otto Frank's status as "enemy of the state" in which his pre-war business firms were scrutinized for any connection to the Wermacht, which indeed there was. (However, it must be noted that most of Holland's businesses--eighty percent by some estimates--were linked to the Wermacht during wartime. Many of these businesses, including Otto Frank's own Opetka pectin company, did so out of financial necessity as opposed to any political affiliations or sympathies with Nazi Germany.)
Surviving Jews in Holland were treated with anything from verbal contempt to downright abuse: the Dutch government claimed they could not afford to house or otherwise support the repatriating Jews (of which there remained 5,500 of the approximately 150,000 Dutch Jews), and many of the survivors were sent to subpar, often filthy holding camps. In some cases Jews were actually sent back to concentration camps and virtually imprisoned along side captured German and Dutch Nazis! The Dutch government refused to give the survivors any financial aid, telling these devastated people to appeal to Jewish organizations "abroad" for money or assistance isnte
German Jews such as Otto Frank, who had expatriated to Holland before the Occupation were treated the worst of all. Those German Jews who were "lucky" enough to stay in Holland were faced with having to produce an affidavit of "means and money" to stay, or risk arrest and imprisonment. For most Jews, this was virtually impossible. Lacking any form of income or money, Jews who had given Christian families certain possessions or even homes for "safe-keeping" during war time returned to find that their "friends" somehow "forgot" their Jewish friends and claimed to no longer recognize them, and outright refused to return their property and dwellings to their rightful owners.
The Dutch people, having been through their own privations such as the Hunger Winter, were often largely indifferent to the plight of the returning Jews. While some, such as Otto Frank's close friends and protectors-in-hiding, continued to support their friends and were sympathetic to repatriating Jews; many others regarded the Jewish survivors as sapping what scarce postwar goods and resources were left to be had.
I found all of this information to be in stark contrast to what I had alway believed was a very liberal, tolerant country and government, and a sad addendum to my--admittedly pithy--knowledge of the Holocaust.
The book has been haunting my mind since I started reading it. For one, I had always believed through popular history accounts that the Netherlands had been a place of refuge for Jews fleeing Nazi Germany.
However, the Dutch government's post war repatriation policies concerning Jewish survivors of the camps was, in a word, horrid.
Otto Frank, himself a decorated German officer in the First World War--and survivor of Auschwitz--was considered by the Dutch government an "enemy of the state" due to his German descent. Upon liberation from Auschwitz and return to Amsterdam, he and many other German-born Jews were summarily stripped of their citizenship and considered "stateless" persons. An investigation was launched in 1946 as to Otto Frank's status as "enemy of the state" in which his pre-war business firms were scrutinized for any connection to the Wermacht, which indeed there was. (However, it must be noted that most of Holland's businesses--eighty percent by some estimates--were linked to the Wermacht during wartime. Many of these businesses, including Otto Frank's own Opetka pectin company, did so out of financial necessity as opposed to any political affiliations or sympathies with Nazi Germany.)
Surviving Jews in Holland were treated with anything from verbal contempt to downright abuse: the Dutch government claimed they could not afford to house or otherwise support the repatriating Jews (of which there remained 5,500 of the approximately 150,000 Dutch Jews), and many of the survivors were sent to subpar, often filthy holding camps. In some cases Jews were actually sent back to concentration camps and virtually imprisoned along side captured German and Dutch Nazis! The Dutch government refused to give the survivors any financial aid, telling these devastated people to appeal to Jewish organizations "abroad" for money or assistance isnte
German Jews such as Otto Frank, who had expatriated to Holland before the Occupation were treated the worst of all. Those German Jews who were "lucky" enough to stay in Holland were faced with having to produce an affidavit of "means and money" to stay, or risk arrest and imprisonment. For most Jews, this was virtually impossible. Lacking any form of income or money, Jews who had given Christian families certain possessions or even homes for "safe-keeping" during war time returned to find that their "friends" somehow "forgot" their Jewish friends and claimed to no longer recognize them, and outright refused to return their property and dwellings to their rightful owners.
The Dutch people, having been through their own privations such as the Hunger Winter, were often largely indifferent to the plight of the returning Jews. While some, such as Otto Frank's close friends and protectors-in-hiding, continued to support their friends and were sympathetic to repatriating Jews; many others regarded the Jewish survivors as sapping what scarce postwar goods and resources were left to be had.
I found all of this information to be in stark contrast to what I had alway believed was a very liberal, tolerant country and government, and a sad addendum to my--admittedly pithy--knowledge of the Holocaust.
zonked.
I feel like a drugged out old person, or possibly, a depressed young person.
I'm basically sleeping in four hour blocks, waking up, answering an e-mail or two, and then going back to sleep. Every once in awhile I remember I have to walk the dog, or scrounge something to eat (yesterday, I ate a diet comprised exclusively of cheetos and m&m's, because artificial coloring and variety of colors, even unnatural ones, fool me into thinking I'm eating a balanced diet. And, I was too tired to deal with cooking, or even ordering out, which would have entailed talking to people, and opening the door and dealing with a stranger for twenty seconds. Plus, I'm not sure in my near-catatonic state if I remember how to eat with utensils, or communicate verbally.)
It's too bad being a recluse isn't a paying gig. I'm really good at it!
I'm basically sleeping in four hour blocks, waking up, answering an e-mail or two, and then going back to sleep. Every once in awhile I remember I have to walk the dog, or scrounge something to eat (yesterday, I ate a diet comprised exclusively of cheetos and m&m's, because artificial coloring and variety of colors, even unnatural ones, fool me into thinking I'm eating a balanced diet. And, I was too tired to deal with cooking, or even ordering out, which would have entailed talking to people, and opening the door and dealing with a stranger for twenty seconds. Plus, I'm not sure in my near-catatonic state if I remember how to eat with utensils, or communicate verbally.)
It's too bad being a recluse isn't a paying gig. I'm really good at it!
Sunday, April 22, 2007
quicksand
I have come to a place yet again where it is impossible for me to act as if everything was normal, and I am okay.
I am not okay.
I am far from okay.
My coping mechanisms, honed by a few years of a job which entails Faking Like Everything Is Okay (so as not to Freak Out Your Patients, Too) have been sapped.
On a near daily basis at work, I'm close to tears by the end of the shift. I cry all the time at home. I long only for sleep, so I don't have to think any more, and when I'm awake, I'm wracked with anxiety and a sense of panicked dread.
I'm physically and emotionally exhausted, all used up. Going back to work feels like facing a firing squad, or at least some modern version of Prometheus wherein my liver gets picked out daily, only to regrow itself and have the cycle repeat the next day.
There is no reward for endurance, there is no comfort in hope.
I feel like I have had my soul amputated, and all I feel for life now is the strange sensation like that of a phantom limb, or a thought or dream one is trying to have in the twilight before sleep.
One realizes, at some point in adulthood, I think, that the loss of childhood innocence is this: that it is silly and irrational to go on living, and yet, it is unthinkable not to.
I am not okay.
I am far from okay.
My coping mechanisms, honed by a few years of a job which entails Faking Like Everything Is Okay (so as not to Freak Out Your Patients, Too) have been sapped.
On a near daily basis at work, I'm close to tears by the end of the shift. I cry all the time at home. I long only for sleep, so I don't have to think any more, and when I'm awake, I'm wracked with anxiety and a sense of panicked dread.
I'm physically and emotionally exhausted, all used up. Going back to work feels like facing a firing squad, or at least some modern version of Prometheus wherein my liver gets picked out daily, only to regrow itself and have the cycle repeat the next day.
There is no reward for endurance, there is no comfort in hope.
I feel like I have had my soul amputated, and all I feel for life now is the strange sensation like that of a phantom limb, or a thought or dream one is trying to have in the twilight before sleep.
One realizes, at some point in adulthood, I think, that the loss of childhood innocence is this: that it is silly and irrational to go on living, and yet, it is unthinkable not to.
bellum omnium in omnes
Yesterday, Ibrahim, who was deployed to Iraq about a month ago, said that the building where he was e-mailing me from was attacked by a rocket. He said he wasn't sure what happened to the rocket, but it didn't end up hitting the building, and no one was hurt.
He said this is the way it is over there. He said he's resigned to his fate, and that he knows there's a round of gunfire or an IED that's going to get him, and there's no longer any point to worrying, or being scared, or fearing death.
A week ago, he was part of a convoy in which he watched one of his buddies lose both of legs and an eye, and another one lose a hand. He was charged with the task of packing up Legless, Eyeless Guy's possessions and send them back to the states.
I treat every conversation, every e-mail, as if it were our last, because it's hitting home: it very may well be.
He said this is the way it is over there. He said he's resigned to his fate, and that he knows there's a round of gunfire or an IED that's going to get him, and there's no longer any point to worrying, or being scared, or fearing death.
A week ago, he was part of a convoy in which he watched one of his buddies lose both of legs and an eye, and another one lose a hand. He was charged with the task of packing up Legless, Eyeless Guy's possessions and send them back to the states.
I treat every conversation, every e-mail, as if it were our last, because it's hitting home: it very may well be.
Saturday, April 21, 2007
book slut
I'm a book snob, and a book slut.
But, unlike most of my friends, I don't like buying used books, no matter how much the allure of cheap reading gets me all hot and bothered--and how sexy I find libraries (with the free books!), especially large university libraries with the expensive and extensive collection of new academic works.
Discouraged by the pit of lameness and inane coworker drivel I have endure at hospital, I went over to the local chain bookstores today and indulged in about 4.5 hours of work wages toward the Gratuitous Purchase of My Own Books, which I've held off of as a traveler, because of the associated bulk involved in transporting books around the country every three months.
Once again, half of my bed is littered in books: I started in on Carol Ann Lee's The Hidden Life of Otto Frank today, which I'm 2/3 of the way through, and absolutely and thoroughly chilled by the new-to-me revelations of the horrific ironies of the Frank family situation; for example, that Otto Frank's pectin company apparently had a contract with the Wehrmacht during the Occupation of Holland. I've honored the writing of Anne Frank since was thirteen, consider her one of my heroes, and have read just about every book and article I could regarding her biography or writing. I also bought Melissa Muller's biography of Anne Frank, but think I'll need a break in between depressing war time stories.
But, that's okay! Because I also bought Kierkegaard's The Concept of Anxiety, which I've been meaning to read, and Michel Foucault's The Birth of the Clinic: An Archaeology of Medical Perception. I realize that the latter book is probably going to be two hundred pages about "the gaze" or regard and how everything on Planet Foucault revolves around the French Revolution, but I think will be germane to and supportive of an academic discussion of nursing-related work trauma. In any case, I will at least have some sort of intellectual inoculation or reprieve from the weirdly boring, bourgeois, constant prattle and general insanity of work, which has been anything but intellectually nourishing as of late.
I also broke down and bought the 6th edition, revised of Wheelock's Latin, and Stone's Latin for the Illiterati for when I'm tired and just want to read pithy translations along side of the original, such as: damnant quod non intelligunt. They damn that which they do not understand.
Babae, et vale!
But, unlike most of my friends, I don't like buying used books, no matter how much the allure of cheap reading gets me all hot and bothered--and how sexy I find libraries (with the free books!), especially large university libraries with the expensive and extensive collection of new academic works.
Discouraged by the pit of lameness and inane coworker drivel I have endure at hospital, I went over to the local chain bookstores today and indulged in about 4.5 hours of work wages toward the Gratuitous Purchase of My Own Books, which I've held off of as a traveler, because of the associated bulk involved in transporting books around the country every three months.
Once again, half of my bed is littered in books: I started in on Carol Ann Lee's The Hidden Life of Otto Frank today, which I'm 2/3 of the way through, and absolutely and thoroughly chilled by the new-to-me revelations of the horrific ironies of the Frank family situation; for example, that Otto Frank's pectin company apparently had a contract with the Wehrmacht during the Occupation of Holland. I've honored the writing of Anne Frank since was thirteen, consider her one of my heroes, and have read just about every book and article I could regarding her biography or writing. I also bought Melissa Muller's biography of Anne Frank, but think I'll need a break in between depressing war time stories.
But, that's okay! Because I also bought Kierkegaard's The Concept of Anxiety, which I've been meaning to read, and Michel Foucault's The Birth of the Clinic: An Archaeology of Medical Perception. I realize that the latter book is probably going to be two hundred pages about "the gaze" or regard and how everything on Planet Foucault revolves around the French Revolution, but I think will be germane to and supportive of an academic discussion of nursing-related work trauma. In any case, I will at least have some sort of intellectual inoculation or reprieve from the weirdly boring, bourgeois, constant prattle and general insanity of work, which has been anything but intellectually nourishing as of late.
I also broke down and bought the 6th edition, revised of Wheelock's Latin, and Stone's Latin for the Illiterati for when I'm tired and just want to read pithy translations along side of the original, such as: damnant quod non intelligunt. They damn that which they do not understand.
Babae, et vale!
exile in wurkville
I've never felt so alienated and stressed out by incompetent coworkers before.
This place, this shitty ass, sucky place, and the dumb asses I have to work with, makes me want to cry just about every day while I'm there.
Yesterday, I found myself blinking back tears in a patient's room, and had to step into the bathroom to wipe my eyes and set my shoulders, and breeze back in the room pretending this lacrimal duct dysfunction was due to me obviously cutting onions at the nurses' station like five seconds before stepping into his room. He was such a nice guy, but I was getting shoddy indifference from a secretary, shit on by the nurse manager again, feeling like I was drowning in my own shit, which I was.
By four o'clock in the afternoon, all I could think of was going home, going to my freezer, and starting in on a bottle of vodka. I swear to God, it's gotten that bad.
Worse yet, the only friends and family that understand I'm going through hell are hundreds of miles away. I have no idea how the hell I'm going to keep it together to work another assignment, unless things are drastically better in health care in the pacific northwest. I hold out a thimbleful of hope, but don't dare to go beyond that.
Mostly, I'm hoping I can resist learning enough Latin to start swearing fluently at these assholes at work, and getting locked up in a psych ward for an "evaluation of expressive aphasia and brief lost of contact with reality."
I'm losing it. (Or, I fear I've already lost it, and am never going to find it again.)
This place, this shitty ass, sucky place, and the dumb asses I have to work with, makes me want to cry just about every day while I'm there.
Yesterday, I found myself blinking back tears in a patient's room, and had to step into the bathroom to wipe my eyes and set my shoulders, and breeze back in the room pretending this lacrimal duct dysfunction was due to me obviously cutting onions at the nurses' station like five seconds before stepping into his room. He was such a nice guy, but I was getting shoddy indifference from a secretary, shit on by the nurse manager again, feeling like I was drowning in my own shit, which I was.
By four o'clock in the afternoon, all I could think of was going home, going to my freezer, and starting in on a bottle of vodka. I swear to God, it's gotten that bad.
Worse yet, the only friends and family that understand I'm going through hell are hundreds of miles away. I have no idea how the hell I'm going to keep it together to work another assignment, unless things are drastically better in health care in the pacific northwest. I hold out a thimbleful of hope, but don't dare to go beyond that.
Mostly, I'm hoping I can resist learning enough Latin to start swearing fluently at these assholes at work, and getting locked up in a psych ward for an "evaluation of expressive aphasia and brief lost of contact with reality."
I'm losing it. (Or, I fear I've already lost it, and am never going to find it again.)
Thursday, April 19, 2007
a dog's life
A friend sent me this quote, and I think it's priceless:
My dog just barks and plays; has all he wants to eat. He never works; has no trouble about business. In a little while he dies, and that is all. I work with all my strength. I have no time to play. I have trouble everyday. In a little while I will die, and then I go to Hell. I wish that I was a dog. - Col Robert Ingersoll
My dog just barks and plays; has all he wants to eat. He never works; has no trouble about business. In a little while he dies, and that is all. I work with all my strength. I have no time to play. I have trouble everyday. In a little while I will die, and then I go to Hell. I wish that I was a dog. - Col Robert Ingersoll
crazy Jamie
Part of me knows this driving-3200-miles-from-home-thing is totally, totally crazy. And the other part of Totally Crazy is that I'll be in a huge metropolitan area teaming with people, traffic, and all the good and bad that goes along with it.
But, the other part of me has wanted to go to Seattle for months now, and work at New Hospital, which sounds like, if not fun, at least a good teaching hospital, and the manager sounded like a very down-to-earth, non-Stepford wife type. So, we'll see.
And, I know one thing for sure, I probably won't be back for any more Florida nursing.
Funnily enough, I've had three job interviews come up since I accepted at New Hospital, two within hours of accepting the first job, the other in Nashville (but I didn't feel so bad, because they needed nights, I was submitted for days).
Hmmm... I wonder what Piper will think of Seattle?
But, the other part of me has wanted to go to Seattle for months now, and work at New Hospital, which sounds like, if not fun, at least a good teaching hospital, and the manager sounded like a very down-to-earth, non-Stepford wife type. So, we'll see.
And, I know one thing for sure, I probably won't be back for any more Florida nursing.
Funnily enough, I've had three job interviews come up since I accepted at New Hospital, two within hours of accepting the first job, the other in Nashville (but I didn't feel so bad, because they needed nights, I was submitted for days).
Hmmm... I wonder what Piper will think of Seattle?
Wednesday, April 18, 2007
Belltown
I accepted a job offer out at a facility in The Greater Seattle Metropolitan Area, on what sounds like a cardiac surgical and intervention floor.
I'm hoping, what with New Hospital's reputation for being an excellent teaching hospital, that it doesn't turn out to be a lot of Fake Cardiac, with the fake-at-best to nonexistent protocols and fakey medical staff wandering around saying things like, 'So, he's swirling the drain without IV access? He's a full code? Yeah, so he'll die a full code. No, I'm not sending him to intensive care."
I'd love to have a tape recorder around when doctors say these horrible things. I don't care if it's not admissible in court. Families should be able to hear this kind of stuff, especially with compromised loved ones, who can't talk and move, like this guy was.
I know this is not going to be a popular opinion, but when you see this kind of indifference to human life on a daily basis, you wonder why the media gets all worked up about the random, violent deaths of 32 young college students, and not the fact that hundreds of patients on a daily basis are subject to the a no-less horrifying death in some crappy-ass hospital. And, instead of a few seconds to a few minutes of suffering--these patients often go through days, weeks and sometimes months of hell, with no one successfully advocating for them.
God knows I've tried, and God knows I've watched other nurses try for shifts and shifts and shifts until the person finally codes, or some doctor finally gets that the problem isn't the stupid, annoying nurses who keep paging during good sex all night long, the problem is that the patient is fucking sick as hell, and needs more or a different kind of care.
So, I'm trying to figure out why I should care as much as the media seems to think I should (eg for days and days and days post shooting about thirty two kids I've never even met) when I've taken care of well over that amount of patients by now who didn't even get a well-paid attending to give a shit about their change in condition or imminent death.
Yeah, kids shooting kids to death = really fucked up and very, very bad.
But, this happens all the time in countries overrun by militant, corrupt governments or rebel political parties. It also happens right here on the streets of America, albeit usually in lower numbers per incident, but it still happens.
So, I don't get the media. Why act all bewildered and shocked that such a horrible thing could happen? Do we seriously think our country is any better because our kids only get shot up en masse every 10 years or so? And, have those media newswhores ever read a tenth grade world history textbook, and looked at all the torture and slave labor of the past, and realize this isn't new?
I guess those people are counting on Middle America to have a real fucking short attention span.
And guess what.
Middle America does.
I'm hoping, what with New Hospital's reputation for being an excellent teaching hospital, that it doesn't turn out to be a lot of Fake Cardiac, with the fake-at-best to nonexistent protocols and fakey medical staff wandering around saying things like, 'So, he's swirling the drain without IV access? He's a full code? Yeah, so he'll die a full code. No, I'm not sending him to intensive care."
I'd love to have a tape recorder around when doctors say these horrible things. I don't care if it's not admissible in court. Families should be able to hear this kind of stuff, especially with compromised loved ones, who can't talk and move, like this guy was.
I know this is not going to be a popular opinion, but when you see this kind of indifference to human life on a daily basis, you wonder why the media gets all worked up about the random, violent deaths of 32 young college students, and not the fact that hundreds of patients on a daily basis are subject to the a no-less horrifying death in some crappy-ass hospital. And, instead of a few seconds to a few minutes of suffering--these patients often go through days, weeks and sometimes months of hell, with no one successfully advocating for them.
God knows I've tried, and God knows I've watched other nurses try for shifts and shifts and shifts until the person finally codes, or some doctor finally gets that the problem isn't the stupid, annoying nurses who keep paging during good sex all night long, the problem is that the patient is fucking sick as hell, and needs more or a different kind of care.
So, I'm trying to figure out why I should care as much as the media seems to think I should (eg for days and days and days post shooting about thirty two kids I've never even met) when I've taken care of well over that amount of patients by now who didn't even get a well-paid attending to give a shit about their change in condition or imminent death.
Yeah, kids shooting kids to death = really fucked up and very, very bad.
But, this happens all the time in countries overrun by militant, corrupt governments or rebel political parties. It also happens right here on the streets of America, albeit usually in lower numbers per incident, but it still happens.
So, I don't get the media. Why act all bewildered and shocked that such a horrible thing could happen? Do we seriously think our country is any better because our kids only get shot up en masse every 10 years or so? And, have those media newswhores ever read a tenth grade world history textbook, and looked at all the torture and slave labor of the past, and realize this isn't new?
I guess those people are counting on Middle America to have a real fucking short attention span.
And guess what.
Middle America does.
Sunday, April 15, 2007
paging dr. godot
I'm so burnt out right now, it's unbelievable, really.
I gave my thirty days notice and am looking for a new job. I have two job offers, both on fantastic sounding floors, but in places I don't think I want to be stuck for 3 months or more without friends or family.
I've spent the weekend agonizing over job choices, and completely exhausted from a hellish two days at work.
I just want to stay at home and knit, and hang out with Piper.
Nothing new to say, just tired and mumbling.
I gave my thirty days notice and am looking for a new job. I have two job offers, both on fantastic sounding floors, but in places I don't think I want to be stuck for 3 months or more without friends or family.
I've spent the weekend agonizing over job choices, and completely exhausted from a hellish two days at work.
I just want to stay at home and knit, and hang out with Piper.
Nothing new to say, just tired and mumbling.
Wednesday, April 11, 2007
back in the saddle
So, I'm going back to work tomorrow. I'm going to have to feign deafness and being pretty fucking lame for a little while in order to cope, but maybe listening to enough gangsta rap before and after my shifts will keep me from a total nervous break down.
Looking onward to gigs in Seattle (!) and Delaware. Already have two interviews lined up! (As they'd say here in the Dirty South: F--- these east coast, O-town bitches, motha').
Looking onward to gigs in Seattle (!) and Delaware. Already have two interviews lined up! (As they'd say here in the Dirty South: F--- these east coast, O-town bitches, motha').
Tuesday, April 10, 2007
go to sleep, bitch.
I never realized how much gangsta rap and my life had in common.
There's actually a lot to be said for Ludacris and his lyrics. There's even good health advice embedded within:
Go 2 sleep, bitch.
If you're tired, be quiet
And go 2 sleep, bitch.
Go 2 sleep.
Sure, I think he's probably waxing metaphoric about whacking rival gangsta members, but I also think his common sense makes sense in a very Ben Franklin-would-approve-of-this-message Farmer's Almanac kind of way.
I've been taking a lot of Ludacris's health regimen to heart lately, and I have to say, it might be no-brainer, but he's really right. If you're tired, be quiet and go to sleep. It makes a lot more sense than drinking a fifth of vodka and then passing out.
There's actually a lot to be said for Ludacris and his lyrics. There's even good health advice embedded within:
Go 2 sleep, bitch.
If you're tired, be quiet
And go 2 sleep, bitch.
Go 2 sleep.
Sure, I think he's probably waxing metaphoric about whacking rival gangsta members, but I also think his common sense makes sense in a very Ben Franklin-would-approve-of-this-message Farmer's Almanac kind of way.
I've been taking a lot of Ludacris's health regimen to heart lately, and I have to say, it might be no-brainer, but he's really right. If you're tired, be quiet and go to sleep. It makes a lot more sense than drinking a fifth of vodka and then passing out.
let me not to the marriage of true minds
Today is Favorite Quote Day.
Do you ever have those kinds of days where random quotations you learned in highschool spin around your head?
I like that Shakespeare sonnet, "Let me not to the marriage of true minds/Admit impediments. Love is not love/Which alters when its alteration finds/Or bends with its remover to remove/Oh no! It is an ever fixed mark..."
I have absolutely no training in Shakespeare whatsoever, but I do think he is using the sonnet in much the same ironic vein as he does in "My mistress's eyes are nothing like the sun."
To me, whatever Shakespeare may or may not have ended up with, I've always had this vague inclination that he was actually began the poem in a bit of bitter mood, making mock of lovers' vain belief that misguided self-love is synonymous with real love itself, which is in fact to a large degree selfless and accepting.
Put another way, I've always rather thought "Let me not to the marriage of true minds admit impediments" had several meanings in the context of the sonnet, but that one of the not-so-immediately-ready interpretations is: "If those fools in love are convinced they can effect change in their lovers for the sake of love and being loved--then let those idiots have each other."
Do you ever have those kinds of days where random quotations you learned in highschool spin around your head?
I like that Shakespeare sonnet, "Let me not to the marriage of true minds/Admit impediments. Love is not love/Which alters when its alteration finds/Or bends with its remover to remove/Oh no! It is an ever fixed mark..."
I have absolutely no training in Shakespeare whatsoever, but I do think he is using the sonnet in much the same ironic vein as he does in "My mistress's eyes are nothing like the sun."
To me, whatever Shakespeare may or may not have ended up with, I've always had this vague inclination that he was actually began the poem in a bit of bitter mood, making mock of lovers' vain belief that misguided self-love is synonymous with real love itself, which is in fact to a large degree selfless and accepting.
Put another way, I've always rather thought "Let me not to the marriage of true minds admit impediments" had several meanings in the context of the sonnet, but that one of the not-so-immediately-ready interpretations is: "If those fools in love are convinced they can effect change in their lovers for the sake of love and being loved--then let those idiots have each other."
train in the distance
She was beautiful as southern skies
The night he met her
She was married to someone
He was doggedly determined that he would get her
He was old, he was young
From time to time hed tip his heart
But each time she withdrew
Everybody loves the sound of a train in the distance
Everybody thinks its true
-Paul Simon
The night he met her
She was married to someone
He was doggedly determined that he would get her
He was old, he was young
From time to time hed tip his heart
But each time she withdrew
Everybody loves the sound of a train in the distance
Everybody thinks its true
-Paul Simon
nox est perpetua una dormienda
Vivamus mea Lesbia, atque amemus,
rumoresque senum severiorum
omnes unius aestimemus assis!
soles occidere et redire possunt:
nobis cum semel occidit brevis lux,
nox est perpetua una dormienda.
da mi basia mille, deinde centum,
dein mille altera, dein secunda centum,
deinde usque altera mille, deinde centum.
dein, cum milia multa fecerimus,
conturbabimus illa, ne sciamus,
aut ne quis malus inuidere possit,
cum tantum sciat esse basiorum.
This was also one of those over-done-in-first-year-Catullus poems--but who can blame them for teaching such a rapturous and yet exquisitely nuanced poem?
Even now, I find myself rhapsodizing, "Da mihi basia mille!" But in my head, away from Normal People.
And, I've always loved the line, nox est perpetua una dormienda.
Sigh.
rumoresque senum severiorum
omnes unius aestimemus assis!
soles occidere et redire possunt:
nobis cum semel occidit brevis lux,
nox est perpetua una dormienda.
da mi basia mille, deinde centum,
dein mille altera, dein secunda centum,
deinde usque altera mille, deinde centum.
dein, cum milia multa fecerimus,
conturbabimus illa, ne sciamus,
aut ne quis malus inuidere possit,
cum tantum sciat esse basiorum.
This was also one of those over-done-in-first-year-Catullus poems--but who can blame them for teaching such a rapturous and yet exquisitely nuanced poem?
Even now, I find myself rhapsodizing, "Da mihi basia mille!" But in my head, away from Normal People.
And, I've always loved the line, nox est perpetua una dormienda.
Sigh.
odi et amo
This is a famous, and over-analyzed poem of Catullus to be sure, but I feel the need to share its brilliantly chiastic structure with you today in honor of Random Catullus Appreciation Day:
odi et amo. quare id faciam, fortasse requiris.
nescio, sed fieri sentio et excrucior.
Or, in an even more befitting Ancient Roman script:
ODIETAMOQVAREIDFACIAMFORTASSEREQVUIRIS
NESCIOSEDFIERISENTIOETEXCRVCIOR
(Sidebar: I'm glad for the sake of print-loving generations to come that someone eventually thought of punctuation, lower-case letters. and spaces between words and all.)
odi et amo. quare id faciam, fortasse requiris.
nescio, sed fieri sentio et excrucior.
Or, in an even more befitting Ancient Roman script:
ODIETAMOQVAREIDFACIAMFORTASSEREQVUIRIS
NESCIOSEDFIERISENTIOETEXCRVCIOR
(Sidebar: I'm glad for the sake of print-loving generations to come that someone eventually thought of punctuation, lower-case letters. and spaces between words and all.)
quid moraris emori?
One of the things I love best about Catullus's poetry is how poignantly tender and wistful he can be, even when at his most ironic and scathing in his socio-political criticisms.
The opening line of Carmen 52: "Quid est, Catulle? Quid moraris emori?" is one of these moments.
What is it, Catullus? Why do you not make haste to die?
The opening line of Carmen 52: "Quid est, Catulle? Quid moraris emori?" is one of these moments.
What is it, Catullus? Why do you not make haste to die?
Saturday, April 07, 2007
bitchatolla
The late and great S.W. had many fantastic quotations, which I can't give away all at once or else you'd be weeping the loss of his genius in blog entries to come.
Among these varied phrases and particularly S.W. repeat-worthy phrases that captured the essence of his radical deontological hippie rocker perspective (yeah, that was for you, Amy) was the classic portmanteau, "Bitchatolla."
I use this word all the time now, and I think it should enter American vocabulary officially, sweep the nation's lexicon of lewdness, and become a word associated with bold, free-style, creative left-wing anarchy.
I think someone like Catullus probably made up a word like "Bitchatolla" and if I were a Classicist, I'd know what it was.
Among these varied phrases and particularly S.W. repeat-worthy phrases that captured the essence of his radical deontological hippie rocker perspective (yeah, that was for you, Amy) was the classic portmanteau, "Bitchatolla."
I use this word all the time now, and I think it should enter American vocabulary officially, sweep the nation's lexicon of lewdness, and become a word associated with bold, free-style, creative left-wing anarchy.
I think someone like Catullus probably made up a word like "Bitchatolla" and if I were a Classicist, I'd know what it was.
a gift to be simple
Yesterday I had a patient who needed her hair washed.
Everybody I asked was "too busy" to do it, and it was already 6 p.m. I'd just been through nursing management hell, and was in no mood to do anything but down a double shot of vodka. The tech was the second float of the day, complained she had gotten to the floor late and was swamped and "couldn't promise anything." That had been two hours ago.
I got up from a puddle of tears in the breakroom--my initial inclination was to walk off the floor and never come back, but as a nurse, that's called patient abandonment and involves legal charges against you--and went into the patient's room, faking Everything Was Okay (with the red puffy eyes and tear stained cheeks). She probably couldn't see too well any way, I figured, and she just wanted her hair washed.
So, I washed her hair the best I could with the Fake Hospital All Purpose Cleaner, feeling embarrassed we use the same stuff to wash patients' butts that we use to wash their hair, but her admission was probably costing her around $3000 bucks a day. She was this very nice, sweet lady with the Really Nice Family Members. The kind that actually give a shit about their loved one for the right reasons.
You would have thought I gave her a million dollars, or saved her life using some denture cream and popsicle sticks, or something.
I wanted to thank her. Washing her hair was this no-brainer, completely gratuitous, non-essential-to-life thing, and yet, being what it was, it also gave me a little bit of my humanity and dignity back that day.
Everybody I asked was "too busy" to do it, and it was already 6 p.m. I'd just been through nursing management hell, and was in no mood to do anything but down a double shot of vodka. The tech was the second float of the day, complained she had gotten to the floor late and was swamped and "couldn't promise anything." That had been two hours ago.
I got up from a puddle of tears in the breakroom--my initial inclination was to walk off the floor and never come back, but as a nurse, that's called patient abandonment and involves legal charges against you--and went into the patient's room, faking Everything Was Okay (with the red puffy eyes and tear stained cheeks). She probably couldn't see too well any way, I figured, and she just wanted her hair washed.
So, I washed her hair the best I could with the Fake Hospital All Purpose Cleaner, feeling embarrassed we use the same stuff to wash patients' butts that we use to wash their hair, but her admission was probably costing her around $3000 bucks a day. She was this very nice, sweet lady with the Really Nice Family Members. The kind that actually give a shit about their loved one for the right reasons.
You would have thought I gave her a million dollars, or saved her life using some denture cream and popsicle sticks, or something.
I wanted to thank her. Washing her hair was this no-brainer, completely gratuitous, non-essential-to-life thing, and yet, being what it was, it also gave me a little bit of my humanity and dignity back that day.
whose beeper is it, any way?
Various hospital facilities have various "codes" for things.
For example, the standard "code" at some hospitals for "whatever, dude" is "STAT." (I know the well-meaning people of Middle Earth think this means "do it now" but if you ever actually have to spend time in a hospital for whatever godforsaken community service reason, you'll know in under 30 seconds flat that "STAT" means "we're gonna lose or forget that page/lab specimen/request for rapid intubation as soon as humanly possible."
And of course, we all know from movies that "code blue" means "your shit's totally fucked up, man; especially since our one intern on call is three city blocks away in another part of the hospital writing "rule out sepsis" orders for a dead patient, on an old wing from 1875 where the overhead paging system doesn't work. Oh wait, dude, we're a community hospital. We don't even have interns/residents, Beavis."
One designation I particularly like is "code brown." In Corporate Hospital Speak, this is supposed to represent "a natural disaster."
In Nurse Speak, this also represents "a natural disaster" of a very different type: it means "bowel evacuation."
For example, the standard "code" at some hospitals for "whatever, dude" is "STAT." (I know the well-meaning people of Middle Earth think this means "do it now" but if you ever actually have to spend time in a hospital for whatever godforsaken community service reason, you'll know in under 30 seconds flat that "STAT" means "we're gonna lose or forget that page/lab specimen/request for rapid intubation as soon as humanly possible."
And of course, we all know from movies that "code blue" means "your shit's totally fucked up, man; especially since our one intern on call is three city blocks away in another part of the hospital writing "rule out sepsis" orders for a dead patient, on an old wing from 1875 where the overhead paging system doesn't work. Oh wait, dude, we're a community hospital. We don't even have interns/residents, Beavis."
One designation I particularly like is "code brown." In Corporate Hospital Speak, this is supposed to represent "a natural disaster."
In Nurse Speak, this also represents "a natural disaster" of a very different type: it means "bowel evacuation."
Friday, April 06, 2007
soul asylum
Landmark: yesterday, at work, my soul was utterly crushed, my spirit evacuated of life, and my humanity utterly crushed.
I know this sounds totally melodramatic and implausible, but believe me, when you find yourself sobbing in the break room for the second time in two weeks, you know there's something objectively wrong with your working conditions.
I remember saying to a colleague: "I have been broken today as a human being, and I feel like I can never be fixed today."
The worst thing about this scenario: nurses and staff helped to precipitate this ontological crisis.
(Coincidentally, it was Good Friday, and I'm not sure which of the Stations of the Cross I actually didn't complete. It felt as if everyone yesterday got to beat me up, drag me into a public space, and then scream, "Crucify her! Crucify her!" And, I don't even get to have any theological benefit to this torture, either.)
I know this sounds totally melodramatic and implausible, but believe me, when you find yourself sobbing in the break room for the second time in two weeks, you know there's something objectively wrong with your working conditions.
I remember saying to a colleague: "I have been broken today as a human being, and I feel like I can never be fixed today."
The worst thing about this scenario: nurses and staff helped to precipitate this ontological crisis.
(Coincidentally, it was Good Friday, and I'm not sure which of the Stations of the Cross I actually didn't complete. It felt as if everyone yesterday got to beat me up, drag me into a public space, and then scream, "Crucify her! Crucify her!" And, I don't even get to have any theological benefit to this torture, either.)
Thursday, April 05, 2007
as the world devolves.
I'm going to cop a line from one of my friends and just say that every time I go back to bedside nursing, even with the two-week reprieve, I just think:
Jesus Christ, how did my promising career devolve into a complete piece of shit?!
Then it goes even further, and I feel like my life has devolved into a complete piece of shit.
I mean, as someone else pointed out, you spend about a third of your life at work, and if work sucks, it typically carries over into other areas of your life.
One of the things I bitch about all the time is how I"m generally stuck in some hellish version of Sartre's No Exit meets The ABC After School Special meets General Hospital.
I work with people who talk about babies and weddings and cheating boyfriends, none of which I have any interest in talking about, especially at work, when I'm trying to do a job in an already chaotic environment that invites mistakes with each coming distraction. If I wish to talk about something outside of whose ass I have to kiss or wipe next, it's not going to be about how cute I think the transporter's ass looks in those scrubs; it'd be about books, pop culture trends, or maybe even current events.
Unfortunately, the level of intellectual stimulation I get at work, along with emotional maturity, makes junior high cliques look like bona fide meetings of The Blue Stockings.
I have gotten one intellectually rewarding reprieve in two years of nursing:
Yesterday, two Indian doctors were talking about Number Theory, and actually included me in the conversation for a change. It was almost like being at school again, with one of them getting increasingly fervered and worshipful of brilliant mathematicians, and bringing up the back story to The Hardy-Ramanujan number, the smallest number expressible by the sum of two cubes in two different ways:
(Nota bene: I'm not a mathematician, and have read somewhere that the actual correct terminology should be "positive cubes," so uh, forgive my mathematical bumpkiness).
The point of the whole thing is that someone was talking about Number Theory at work! Something elegant, brilliant, and philosophical, and worth having a conversation about, in my opinion.
Why can't I work with more people who get all excited about Number Theory?!
Why do I instead generally work with people who talk about how "Christina Applegate was totally frickin' hot when she was younger, but she's kind of lost it now." (Those were doctors having that particular conversation, just so you don't think I'm pinning the sin of Middle American Culture squarely on the shoulders of any one profession.)
Jesus Christ, how did my promising career devolve into a complete piece of shit?!
Then it goes even further, and I feel like my life has devolved into a complete piece of shit.
I mean, as someone else pointed out, you spend about a third of your life at work, and if work sucks, it typically carries over into other areas of your life.
One of the things I bitch about all the time is how I"m generally stuck in some hellish version of Sartre's No Exit meets The ABC After School Special meets General Hospital.
I work with people who talk about babies and weddings and cheating boyfriends, none of which I have any interest in talking about, especially at work, when I'm trying to do a job in an already chaotic environment that invites mistakes with each coming distraction. If I wish to talk about something outside of whose ass I have to kiss or wipe next, it's not going to be about how cute I think the transporter's ass looks in those scrubs; it'd be about books, pop culture trends, or maybe even current events.
Unfortunately, the level of intellectual stimulation I get at work, along with emotional maturity, makes junior high cliques look like bona fide meetings of The Blue Stockings.
I have gotten one intellectually rewarding reprieve in two years of nursing:
Yesterday, two Indian doctors were talking about Number Theory, and actually included me in the conversation for a change. It was almost like being at school again, with one of them getting increasingly fervered and worshipful of brilliant mathematicians, and bringing up the back story to The Hardy-Ramanujan number, the smallest number expressible by the sum of two cubes in two different ways:
(Nota bene: I'm not a mathematician, and have read somewhere that the actual correct terminology should be "positive cubes," so uh, forgive my mathematical bumpkiness).
The point of the whole thing is that someone was talking about Number Theory at work! Something elegant, brilliant, and philosophical, and worth having a conversation about, in my opinion.
Why can't I work with more people who get all excited about Number Theory?!
Why do I instead generally work with people who talk about how "Christina Applegate was totally frickin' hot when she was younger, but she's kind of lost it now." (Those were doctors having that particular conversation, just so you don't think I'm pinning the sin of Middle American Culture squarely on the shoulders of any one profession.)
Emperor Neuro (Nero)
This post is a continuation of other posts In Which Jamie Laments The Lack of Liberal Arts Values In Contemporary Workplace, so if you'd rather be drinking a beer, scratching yourself, and watching porn, I'd suggest now is a good time to be doing those activities rather than reading this blog.
Yesterday I was having a conversation with a nurse who claimed to "like nursing." This is the first time I've ever heard a nurse (even the nice, happy, shiny, friendly nurses who seem to exist in Mr. Roger's Neighborhood with the hand puppets in make-believe land) claim to like nursing. I've heard nurses say, "I like [insert this one, vague theoretical reason] about nursing, but I hate [insert twenty five gazillion specific, detailed, multi-faceted things about one of the crappiest professions on earth]."
I don't pretend to like nursing. In fact, I hate it. I like some of my patients, and I like some of the sympatico bond nurses share, but otherwise, I detest the job on just about every level I can think of. I feel like often times, my education and conscience are nothing but a handicap to my satisfaction level with the job, and an annoyance and hindrance to others around me.
Like, if I could just pretend I found being heckled for twelve hours over Mother's Plugged Up Bowels was an enjoyable experience, it'd be half the battle! Plus, I get weird, baffled looks by people all the time when I tell them things I think are important to know about patient care, like, "That patient isn't going to brain surgery tonight, after all." In return, I get a lame response like, "I don't care! I'm her GI doc! Brains don't exist in my bowel-obsessed world!"
Uh, okay, dude.
At work, I've found myself lately declining Latin nouns in my head while some Crazy Doctor or Family Member is yelling at me for no particular reason that makes sense. I hear the screaming, but in my head, I'm reciting, "agricola, agricolae, agricolae, agricolam, agricola, agricolarum, agricolis agricolas, agricolis."
This strategy probably gives me a glazed over, spacey look, but who cares what I look like? It doesn't make it any easier to kiss some person's ass, but I at least have some kind of distraction while I'm intoning tonelessly: "Yes, I understand why you're irrationally angry at the wrong fucking person." or, "Oh, that's interesting! I never thought of being handed my own ass on a platter as germane to patient care! Thank you so, so much for bringing that to my attention!" or, "Okay! You're sooooo right, Psycho Family Member/Egotistical Doctor: eating my own shit is a completely enjoyable and well-deserved activity! I do suck ass! Thank you for reminding me of my own insignificance in the world!"
Afterwards, I have a fantasy in which I'm a student attending university again, and my job doesn't suck.
Yesterday I was having a conversation with a nurse who claimed to "like nursing." This is the first time I've ever heard a nurse (even the nice, happy, shiny, friendly nurses who seem to exist in Mr. Roger's Neighborhood with the hand puppets in make-believe land) claim to like nursing. I've heard nurses say, "I like [insert this one, vague theoretical reason] about nursing, but I hate [insert twenty five gazillion specific, detailed, multi-faceted things about one of the crappiest professions on earth]."
I don't pretend to like nursing. In fact, I hate it. I like some of my patients, and I like some of the sympatico bond nurses share, but otherwise, I detest the job on just about every level I can think of. I feel like often times, my education and conscience are nothing but a handicap to my satisfaction level with the job, and an annoyance and hindrance to others around me.
Like, if I could just pretend I found being heckled for twelve hours over Mother's Plugged Up Bowels was an enjoyable experience, it'd be half the battle! Plus, I get weird, baffled looks by people all the time when I tell them things I think are important to know about patient care, like, "That patient isn't going to brain surgery tonight, after all." In return, I get a lame response like, "I don't care! I'm her GI doc! Brains don't exist in my bowel-obsessed world!"
Uh, okay, dude.
At work, I've found myself lately declining Latin nouns in my head while some Crazy Doctor or Family Member is yelling at me for no particular reason that makes sense. I hear the screaming, but in my head, I'm reciting, "agricola, agricolae, agricolae, agricolam, agricola, agricolarum, agricolis agricolas, agricolis."
This strategy probably gives me a glazed over, spacey look, but who cares what I look like? It doesn't make it any easier to kiss some person's ass, but I at least have some kind of distraction while I'm intoning tonelessly: "Yes, I understand why you're irrationally angry at the wrong fucking person." or, "Oh, that's interesting! I never thought of being handed my own ass on a platter as germane to patient care! Thank you so, so much for bringing that to my attention!" or, "Okay! You're sooooo right, Psycho Family Member/Egotistical Doctor: eating my own shit is a completely enjoyable and well-deserved activity! I do suck ass! Thank you for reminding me of my own insignificance in the world!"
Afterwards, I have a fantasy in which I'm a student attending university again, and my job doesn't suck.
hooky
So, I'm playing hooky from this stupid class I'm supposed to be taking, on diabetic protocol and wound care protocol that sounds nice in theory, but actually will never be ordered in actual practice, or will take thirty one pages over five different nursing shifts, and still never implemented, because the patient by that time is discharged.
I decided, in order to preserve my sanity (8 hours of class today, followed by 36 hours in 3 consecutive days of work) to Just. Not. Do. It. Especially since last time I went to some class, I was forced to do a skit on "how to clock in and out by swiping your badge."
Someone just has to say, "No, I'm sorry, I don't "do" lame."
I decided, in order to preserve my sanity (8 hours of class today, followed by 36 hours in 3 consecutive days of work) to Just. Not. Do. It. Especially since last time I went to some class, I was forced to do a skit on "how to clock in and out by swiping your badge."
Someone just has to say, "No, I'm sorry, I don't "do" lame."
Wednesday, April 04, 2007
can't get it right today
Like Joe Purdy sings: "I just can't get it right today."
Or yesterday. Or probably tomorrow.
When work has been foul, and my personal life is going to hell in a handbasket, my traditional response options have been:
a) stoically endure the pain until I'm left clenched in the fetal position, unable to move any of my muscles as if myoclonically paralyzed.
b) have freaked out nightmares about work, In Which Someone Dies, And It's My Fault.
c) drive around the city in mid-day traffic until I realize urban traffic pisses me off more than anything else going on in my life
d) (the time honored favorite): drown my sorrows in straight up vodka. No chasers, no froo-froo mix. Just pure potato goodness, my friends.
I finally broke down and moved from options a-c to The Big Guns option "d" this afternoon, after refraining from buying the new edition of Wheelock's Latin and 501 Latin Verbs to cheer me up considerably.
As Josh Radin sang: "Digging a hole/and the walls are caving in."
That song was about falling in love, but I think it's temporarily applicable to my mental state as well.
Or yesterday. Or probably tomorrow.
When work has been foul, and my personal life is going to hell in a handbasket, my traditional response options have been:
a) stoically endure the pain until I'm left clenched in the fetal position, unable to move any of my muscles as if myoclonically paralyzed.
b) have freaked out nightmares about work, In Which Someone Dies, And It's My Fault.
c) drive around the city in mid-day traffic until I realize urban traffic pisses me off more than anything else going on in my life
d) (the time honored favorite): drown my sorrows in straight up vodka. No chasers, no froo-froo mix. Just pure potato goodness, my friends.
I finally broke down and moved from options a-c to The Big Guns option "d" this afternoon, after refraining from buying the new edition of Wheelock's Latin and 501 Latin Verbs to cheer me up considerably.
As Josh Radin sang: "Digging a hole/and the walls are caving in."
That song was about falling in love, but I think it's temporarily applicable to my mental state as well.
Tuesday, April 03, 2007
bottled up
I wish to address mmr's thought-provoking comments from my last blog entry, but am too tired to do it justice, so will hold off at present.
Today I had a day that, for the first time at my job, I sincerely, honestly thought about keeping a flask of vodka in my glove compartment, and thought longingly of taking a swig of it before going home.
Also, I admitted a prisoner with two sheriff's deputies guarding him. You want to know the ugly irony of this situation? Prison Guy With HIV = decent, really nice, friendly guy. The guy who had occupied his bed less than four hours prior? Free Citizen, and Complete Whiny, Rude Ingrate who left AMA (against medical advice).
So, to recapitulate the fucked up essence of nursing in the 21st century: 1) Guy Shackled to the Bed And Incarcerated = Nice and Friendly To the Nurse, Happy To Be In the Hospital; 2) Guy Faking Stroke For Pain Medicine = Whiny, Rude and Abusive to the Nurse, and a Complete Asshole.
Today I had a day that, for the first time at my job, I sincerely, honestly thought about keeping a flask of vodka in my glove compartment, and thought longingly of taking a swig of it before going home.
Also, I admitted a prisoner with two sheriff's deputies guarding him. You want to know the ugly irony of this situation? Prison Guy With HIV = decent, really nice, friendly guy. The guy who had occupied his bed less than four hours prior? Free Citizen, and Complete Whiny, Rude Ingrate who left AMA (against medical advice).
So, to recapitulate the fucked up essence of nursing in the 21st century: 1) Guy Shackled to the Bed And Incarcerated = Nice and Friendly To the Nurse, Happy To Be In the Hospital; 2) Guy Faking Stroke For Pain Medicine = Whiny, Rude and Abusive to the Nurse, and a Complete Asshole.
Sunday, April 01, 2007
sins of omission
Sometimes I am not a very nice person.
I do things, and say things, that are mean and horrible and bitchy.
Worse yet, I do them to people I love, like relatives and friends.
Luckily, most of these people love me back, and forgive me, otherwise I'd probably be sitting on a corner somewhere with Piper, my banjo and straw hat for tips, all homeless and beat up, because even the homeless people don't like me very much.
Forgiveness, when it's genuine, is redemptive. Sometimes I think that Christianity has the crux of human salvation-- that is, through the act of forgiveness-- quite right, even if the economics and politics of sin through official church institutions turn me off, and I'm at lost how to explain how we forgive corporate sin (as defined by theologians, not Walmart.)
I've always thought of forgiveness and redemption though, as quite a human mediated process--no matter what the divine consequences may be--and think Judaism has this particular facet down much better than Christianity.
Here's why: Jesus can forgive you all He wants for being an asshole to your mom or unsuspecting coworker or best friend, but you know, your mom/unsuspecting coworker/best friend still has to forgive you, or at least accept that you fucked up, for the whole process to begin to work properly.
(And, if you've ever noticed, it's easier to ask Jesus for forgiveness for being a jerk than it is your mom or best friend. Because Jesus = dead guy, not around. Mom/Best Friend/Whomever You Just Pissed Off = not dead, and around for awhile.
It's like, "So Jesus forgives you for being a fuck up. Dude man, that's not all that special. It's his job to forgive you for being a fuck up. He's like, Jesus and shit. That's what he does."
Human beings, on the other hand, who I think of as not generally possessing divine powers of absolution, have a choice to forgive you. I think this idea of choice is what is partially meant when Catholics go on and on about free will and grace, and Protestants go on about how that Catholic free will/grace talk is bullshit.
And, generally the choice you have means you have to genuinely want to be forgiven and they have to genuinely want to forgive you.
Sometimes you don't. Sometimes they don't.
We are all going to fuck up, that much is clear.
But, over all, choosing not to ask someone for forgiveness, and choosing not to forgive others is overall a good working definition of what Catholics call a "sin of omission," and sometimes can be even more damaging than that which is committed.
While this definition probably isn't helpful when we're talking about Really Bad Stuff, I do think it works on an interpersonal level.
And who the hell really knows what to do about the Really Bad Stuff, any way? Granting pardons for for say, genocide, must be God's territory, because it certainly isn't mine.
I do things, and say things, that are mean and horrible and bitchy.
Worse yet, I do them to people I love, like relatives and friends.
Luckily, most of these people love me back, and forgive me, otherwise I'd probably be sitting on a corner somewhere with Piper, my banjo and straw hat for tips, all homeless and beat up, because even the homeless people don't like me very much.
Forgiveness, when it's genuine, is redemptive. Sometimes I think that Christianity has the crux of human salvation-- that is, through the act of forgiveness-- quite right, even if the economics and politics of sin through official church institutions turn me off, and I'm at lost how to explain how we forgive corporate sin (as defined by theologians, not Walmart.)
I've always thought of forgiveness and redemption though, as quite a human mediated process--no matter what the divine consequences may be--and think Judaism has this particular facet down much better than Christianity.
Here's why: Jesus can forgive you all He wants for being an asshole to your mom or unsuspecting coworker or best friend, but you know, your mom/unsuspecting coworker/best friend still has to forgive you, or at least accept that you fucked up, for the whole process to begin to work properly.
(And, if you've ever noticed, it's easier to ask Jesus for forgiveness for being a jerk than it is your mom or best friend. Because Jesus = dead guy, not around. Mom/Best Friend/Whomever You Just Pissed Off = not dead, and around for awhile.
It's like, "So Jesus forgives you for being a fuck up. Dude man, that's not all that special. It's his job to forgive you for being a fuck up. He's like, Jesus and shit. That's what he does."
Human beings, on the other hand, who I think of as not generally possessing divine powers of absolution, have a choice to forgive you. I think this idea of choice is what is partially meant when Catholics go on and on about free will and grace, and Protestants go on about how that Catholic free will/grace talk is bullshit.
And, generally the choice you have means you have to genuinely want to be forgiven and they have to genuinely want to forgive you.
Sometimes you don't. Sometimes they don't.
We are all going to fuck up, that much is clear.
But, over all, choosing not to ask someone for forgiveness, and choosing not to forgive others is overall a good working definition of what Catholics call a "sin of omission," and sometimes can be even more damaging than that which is committed.
While this definition probably isn't helpful when we're talking about Really Bad Stuff, I do think it works on an interpersonal level.
And who the hell really knows what to do about the Really Bad Stuff, any way? Granting pardons for for say, genocide, must be God's territory, because it certainly isn't mine.
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