For my local friends and readers: Does anyone have a BIG suitcase that Lala can borrow for her AIDS ride? It should be able to fit all her stuff and a sleeping bag and sleeping roll….
Thanks!
Archives for May 2008
Cough.
What a weird word that is. That’s not what I sound like. No sissy little coff for me. No, I sound more like *QKOOOOH quuuoooohh quuuooohhhh. Pft."
I have read the whole internets. All of them. And there is nothing left of Ravelry for me to discover. Why aren’t you writing more? I should comment more, but instead I find myself playing card games, a surefire way of knowing I’m sick. Not like the constant coughing and fever wouldn’t tell me. I just HAD the flu. This is ridiculous.
And man, am I bummed. I was hoping to go to take care of the little mama tomorrow on my weekend, but I’m too sick to go. I wouldn’t dare expose her to this. I feel like I’m letting her down. (She’s doing a tiny bit better, but is still in the hospital with no date for release yet…..) Bethany, who was with me last week, is sick, too. Whatever germs that hospital had were doozies, knocked us on our asses. Christy is going down tomorrow, so there will be one daughter with her, which is good since Dad has to leave town for a couple of days, but I wish I were going to be there, too. Blast it.
Heat wave here. I’ve been at work during all daylight hours (and quite a few of the night hours, too), so I wouldn’t know about the heat, but Lala sent me a picture of Our Cat Digit today in which you can almost see the heat waves rising:
We do not do heat.
Edited to add: I was just preparing to play another computer card game. I found myself staring at the screen. I don’t remember how to play this. How do I start? Then I realized I was staring at the calculator.
BART!
The Day Just Got Brighter
Lala just called me and proposed.
Because we can get married in California, you know.
We’ll probably wait till after the AIDS ride, though.
Oh, love is good. Love is really good.
Back North
Oh, this is hard. It’s hard, being back up north, so far from the little mama, who’s still so sick. She’s moving hospitals today and going in for a kidney biopsy.
But a girl’s gotta work. I just feel so helpless. It’s like watching out a plane window. I know I can’t help steer the plane, can’t tell the pilot if he’s getting too close to another plane, but I still need to be there, at the window, watching. Just in case. I feel like I’ve been seated in the middle seat of a jumbo jet and I can’t see out the window. Hate this feeling.
But oh, you darlings. I’ve received the BEST EMAILS this week. I feel such support, and love, and prayers. (I told Mom about the prayers coming in for her, from all around the world, and her face was surprised, and then she beamed. It was gorgeous.) Each email is like food to my soul, and even if I don’t respond, know that I am incredibly moved by everything you’ve all shared with me this week.
I am so lucky to have so much support. I love my job. For many, many reasons, I love my job. They support me so much. From my bosses and management, to my peers (I got good, big bear hugs from coworkers and management alike today), to my friends (that’s YOU!), it makes this time easier.
And because you’re so good, I’ll reward you with a sneak peek at the Little Mama sweater I finished at her bedside this week:
Es compleeet! More pics soon. Or kinda soon. When I can. You understand.
Candy-Striping
I was a candy-striper here, twenty-one years ago. I walked these very same halls in my pink-striped pleated dress. I loved that dress. To me, it had the cachet of historical reenactment. I was sure Florence Nightingale had worn something similar, when in fact I was wearing polyester circa 1986. But I loved the way I looked in the mirror. I looked like someone who knew what to do.
We had to wear white shoes with the dress. I was desperate to have a pair of big, clunky, brilliantly white nursing shoes, but I only had a pair of white tennis shoes from the discount store that had a thin red stripe running along the sides. I was ashamed of those red stripes.
The volunteer Auxiliary Ladies frightened me. Most were the age of the average patient, but they were so loud, so lively. Working in their pink pantsuits, monitoring flowers coming in and out, directing people to the right beds: it was their social hour. They had cocktails after their shifts. I wanted to be like them, but I was about sixty years shy of being able to join their ranks.
My favorite part was pouring water. Keeping the water jugs full. I was good at that. I liked writing down how many cc’s I poured, enjoyed encouraging hydration (still do). I liked delivering food trays. I liked the little old ladies who didn’t really know who I was but wanted to chat anyway. I was painfully shy (hard to imagine now), but I tried to chat back.
My least favorite part was seeing people in pain, people who somehow thought the fourteen-year old in front of them could actually help them, could give them medical advice, could help them to the commode. I would apologize and scuttle backwards like a candy-cane crab. I’d fetch a nurse and feel stupid.
Mom’s still in the hospital today. She has congestive heart failure, atrial fibrulation, and extreme hypercalcemia. She might be doing a bit better today; I’m not quite sure. She ain’t getting out of here today, that’s for sure. It’s hard. Knitting is good. Nurses are even better than knitting, I tell you that (one in the ICU showed me the shawl she was working on in her down-time (Mom was their only patient that night) — it was good to bond with a knitter).
While I’m writing this, Mom is asleep and I’m showing Bethany how to knit socks on two circs. What do people do in the hospital without knitting? Unimaginable. Thank god Mom doesn’t have a roommate yet. Most people, we understand, watch TV in the hospital. I can think of almost nothing worse. Movies, sure. But no TV. It seems like such an assault.
The Auxiliary Ladies are still out in full force, although they’re less intimidating now, and now they’re the age of my mother. One yesterday pointed out that tiny little mama lying in the bed took up almost no room, and then she commented that she, herself, was about the same age and size as Mom. For four seconds I was fiercely jealous that this tiny 67-year old volunteer was running around delivering flowers and Mom was lying in the hospital bed.
I haven’t seen any candy-stripers walking the floor, although yesterday I saw one getting ready for her shift in the volunteer room. Looks like they don’t wear dresses anymore, something that they’re probably glad about. The girl was about fourteen or fifteen, and she sat alone in the room, wearing a pink striped shirt and white pants. She held up her cell phone and took a picture of herself. She grinned at the camera. If I’d had a cell phone back then, I’d have done the same thing.