obsessing

our office is very high traffic because we have our own copier and fax machine.  there is a string of people in and out all day.  the problem there is countless interruptions, and because out boss is such a social creature, our office has become the dumping ground for all the negativity against the workplace and also the break room.  we can't even have a department meeting without someone coming in, plopping down in the middle of it and starting a conversation about something totally irrelevant, and the boss's way of handling it is to allow it.

a while back, roberta and i tried again to talk to her about the disruptions and were attempting to explain to her that it affects our job performance when in walks monika and boss's full attention turned to her.  roberta and i threw up our hands and decided we would just have to deal with it.

until yesterday, when i blew.

my transcription desk is in one of the file rooms, put there because the outer office had way too much traffic and the former transcriptionist there finally threw a hissy fit, yanked off her earphones and said - will y'all just SHUT UP!  we recently archived all the records in the outer file room, and the boss has decorated it nicely for christmas.  it's very pretty, and we have enjoyed it immensely.

well, someone suggested that it be turned into a break room...and then they brought all their lunch goodies - pies, cakes, etc and laid them out on the table back there.  and during lunch yesterday, when they said they had claimed it as their lunch/break area, i politely said - well, except between 1 and 4:30.  that's when i'm transcribing. and i explained to them that between 3 different foreign accents, background noise on the tape and the intercom system in the building that it took some concentration to decipher the word esophagogoduedenoscopy spoken in korean and whatever language egyptians and afghanistani's speak.

around 2 when i was transcribing the psych clinic, monika started creeping around the table.  i don't mind that.  then she started bringing people in and their conversations began.

i'm all for laughter and gaeity, but i had asked...

and it was the final straw.  i went out, grabbed my purse and was headed for home. what was the point in staying, anyway?  and then roberta stopped me.  it made no sense to quit, right?

and so we gathered up the food an moved itto my OTHER desk in the outer office.  monika said, did we disturb you?  and that's when i really blew.  i told her - i asked you not to do that, and you felt compelled to do it anyway.  i need you to respect my work area.

what did the boss do?  nothing.  in the workplace, there has to be a boundaries.  there has to be.  i'm not really looking forward to going in today, but the saving grace is, i'm on vacation for the next 7.

Lahoma.

I got an email from Kim today, telling about Lahoma.  I had no idea.  Somehow, I had lost track, wasn't getting journal entry alerts and assumed she had stopped journaling, or made a private one.

Lahoma was the first to make me feel at home in aol journals.  She always stopped by, had interesting emails, the most interesting stories.  She had a hard life, but she didn't let it get her down.  When I first read her, she was going to school and had already battled cancer twice.

Ah, I do believe I told her a time or two how inspiring she is, but that seems so small, now. I wish I hadn't lost track of her.  She was diagnosed with acute myeloid leukemia, and Kim's letter said she had maybe 48 hours to live.

I'm sorry I wasn't there for you, Lahoma, and am glad you had the support of the journalers here, because I know how priceless that is. 

And I don't understand why these things happen, just that they do.  Every prayer I have is with you.

 

 

 

Omigod..

What is this horrid thing called Monday but a cruel joke perpetrated by whichever of the gods the days of the week were named for?  Actually, the Greeks named the days after the sun and moon and planets - which were all given the names of Greek Gods.  Monday is Moon's day - hemera selenes.  Makes sense.  I want to sleep when the moon is about.

Friday, on the other hand, is the day of Aphrodite.  Freya - the Teutonic godess of love.  There must be something to this.  I love Fridays.  I adore Fridays and live for them. 

Saturday is hemera Khronu, day of Cronus, who was worshiped as a harvest deity.  Makes a little sense...We toil all week, hemera selenes through day of Aphrodite.  The harvest most of us reap is Day of Cronus.  Oh, how i long for it this instant!

I Do Not Want To Go.

I just want to ramble.

I have just finished reading Illusions:  The Adventures of a Reluctant Messiah for the second time.  Richard Bach published the book in 1977 - the year I graduated from high school.  I remember reading Jonathan Livingston Seagull and how I impressed the socks off of English Teacher Sara Baucom with my insightful book report.

I can't help it.  There is a spirituality that pervades Richard Bach's works - at least, those two - that speaks to me. It seems to go a little deeper than other works by different authors.  In the book, Richard is a mechanic who encounters Donald Shimoda, the Messiah who will be his teacher.  He gives Richard the Messiah's Handbook, a work filled with maxims that leap from the chapters like a Truth.

Argue for your limitations, and sure enough, they're yours.

You are never given a wish without also being given the power to make it true.  You may have to work for it, however.

The original sin is to limit the Is.   Don't.

In order to live free and happily, you must sacrifice boredom.

Every person, all the events of your life are there because you have drawn them there.  What you choose to do with them is up to you.

They make perfect sense to me, even taken out of the context of the book in which they were written.

I am not a theologist, and certainly not a reviewer, but  Illusions, to me, is a book full of what we already know at some level,  a guide to finding our own spirituality, and enough answers to make the reader question the questions.  If it makes you think at a deeper level, then it is good.

The book progresses with Richard's learning, and ends the ultimate ending - or is it an ending? - that stirs the reader.  Whether you believe it a guide or a pile of reshaped cliches, it is also a masterful work of pure art that has the honesty and power to touch and inspire examination.

The world is your exercise book, the pages on which you do your sums.  It is not reality, although you can express reality there if you wish.  You are also free to write nonsense, or lies, or to tear the pages.

We already do, don't we?

 

This is not a morose entry. 

It really isn't.  I have decided anything I write about my mother or father will be upbeat and celebrate their living instead of mourning them ahead of time. 

I called my mom before bedtime the other night to make sure everything was ok.  We chatted a bit, then she said - hold on!  i'll be right back.
 
So I held on.  I could hear her in the background.  She stepped on the puppy's foot, apparently, because it yelped and she was cooing to it, "Poor baby.  I'm sorry.  It's ok, it's ok."  Now, you should know, my mother does not like dogs.  Well, she does - but outside only.  But this one she particularly likes because it's so small.

So I waited for her to finsish comforting the dog.  In a bit, I heard her doing dishes.  She had forgotten she had me on the line.  I waited a few more minutes and decided, well, she'll have to hang up the phone.  I'll get her attention.  So I whistled.  Loudly.  Nothing.  I whistled again.  Nothing.  This went on for about 5 minutes, and finally, I shouted into the phone:   JAN!

And she shouted - WHAT??

PICK UP THE PHONE!

I have no clue whose shout she thought she was answering, but "phone" jogged her memory.  She said, You scared me!  I've been outside trying to find where that whistling was coming from!

She laughed, so I figured it was ok if I did, too.  It was funny, but not funny, if you know what I mean.

And now she wants to play bingo online with me, so I will close this. 

The Dogs

woke me at 5 a.m. - perfect timing.  I don't even know if it was my dogs, but it scared the hell out of me and George, too.

At any rate, it's Tuesday.  Only 3 more days until my interview, and you know...I don't care if I get the job or not.  Monica, who drives me nuts (there are very few people who drive me nuts, but she is one of them because of her incessant chatter and she knows everything about everything), came rushing to where I was transcribing, burst into the room, interrupted Dr. E in the midst of a very complicated-to-interpret term and said - "You didn't tell me you had applied for the position!"  She has an interview, too, and has made it her business to eavesdrop outside of doors to find out who else is on the list.

No, I didn't tell ANYbody, because it's nobody's business but mine.  But through Monica, I have become aware of who is in the in-house interviews, whether I wanted to know or not. 

I like the ladies who are on the list.  One of them is miserable in her current position, and I wish her well.  When Monica heard that particular woman was going to interview, she ran to the HTMA and said she might withdraw because she wanted that lady to get the job.

That was sweet, but you know what?  I figure that if someone else is right for the job, my interview won't make a bit of difference.  The job is already theirs.

In the meantime, Monica is plying the HTMA with cake and picking up his mail, having decided she won't withdraw, after all.

And in the meantime, she was in my little transcription cave, keeping me from doing my work by spouting off about the upcoming questionfest, and she said - I'm enjoing this little competition between us all.

I looked her dead in the eye and told her - I'm not competing with you.

And I'm not.  I have an interview on Friday.  I will answer their questions and ask some of my own, but I'm not particular about the job.  The only reason I applied was because I thought I could be of use there, and if one of the other ladies gets the job, I will be thrilled for them.

Even Monica.  I guess.

quote

change is a subtle creature that winds around the soul.  often, its presence is discovered with a contrasting thunderbolt of realization, and a sense of wonder at its stealth.

- me

letters to nobody....just emptying the clutter.

I don't care which way the time change swings, it messes with your body clock.

I'm accustomed to going to bed around 11, so when midnight rolls around, I'm just starting to wind down.  It caught up with me last night, though, and I was out like a light before 8:30. 

My boss, who knows everything about everything that ever happened, existed, or will happen in the future and how to make a phone book better than the phone company, asserts that daylight savings time originated in europe.  it may have, i'm not so fascinated by the topic that I've been spurred to research.  All I know is, I wish the time would be left one way or the other.

Perhaps it's the static jet lag, but I am in a strange mood this week.  I feel a bit detached.  Others have said - you seem a bit distracted.  Nooooo, I'm not distracted.  I'm concentrating on getting my work done, preparing for the Big Inspection that's coming up (we were told to clear out desk drawers of stuff that isn't Kosher - like what? ketchup packets?).

 I admit, when I first came back to the hospital, I discovered that all the "real" scissors had been confiscated and replaced with safety scissors - which is understandable.  It IS  a prison.  But while rummaging through my new/old desk drawer, I found REAL scissors.  Scared the hell out of me.  What if we should have an inspection and they discovered the contraband cutting instrument in my desk drawer?  I was all about turning them in when my boss said - no, don't.  Keep them!  BULL.  I locked them in the closet, wrapped up and hidden under a few boxes and ink pens.  I should have wiped my fingerprints off.

But I am in a strange kind of mood.  I just want to get my work done.  I don't care to hear the word "stupid" used to describe a situation, a person, or a task.  I don't want to hear the names of people I like/respect being used in denigrating sentences that go on  and on and on...and I'm struggling to remain positive. 

Y'know, I like people, mostly.  There is something good in almost everybody, and it isn't that hard to feel respect, and to realize that there are aspects of their jobs that 1. I don't know about.  2.  Are none of my business.  And it isn't fair for anyone presume or proclaim that other departments do nothing all day.  How could anyone know?

It could be a lot worse.  A LOT worse.  So I'll wash my hair, do my makeup, go to work and seem to be distracted all day.  For all anyone else knows or presumes to know, I could be in a zone where negativity does not affect me.

Made it!

It wasn't such a bad day, after all.  The census has been low at work, not many discharges and hardly any admissions for the last few days.  That seems to be the part of my job I like least - taking care of the census.  Pull the card or assign a medical record number, type in the information, make ID labels and bracelet and create a folder for admissions.  For discharges, you pull the folder from the filing room, tag it with the year sticker...type the info on the card and tag that.  Doesn't sound hard, does it?

I hate it.  I don't know why.

The best part of the job is transcription.  Man, can my fingers fly...it's a challenge, too, with the different accents and some of the terminology.  Neisseria meningitidis - a causative agent of meningitis.  See what I mean?  It's interesting.  It's meaty.  Makes me wish I had gone into some field of medicine, but I'm happy with the terminology, and I study from there, just so I'll know what the doctors are talking about, and because I am curious.

And now dinner is out of the way, and it's unwind time. 

Day 11 of the diet.  Sticking to it!

crash...

i am so tired.

if i could call in, i would, but don't want to use up hours that will be needed later when my parents will need me to take that time for them.

and there's so much that needs doing.  finish the transcription.  get ready for the inspection.  fill out applications.  get charts ready to send to health services.  do the filing.  help ms. horton.  i swear, carol would run the woman to death.

but it's so hard to get going.  some days, i feel every bit of my age + some.   yet, 48 isn't old...not TOO old.  is it?

gotta get ready to go.  damn it.

Starting Over.

I have around...3 weblogs - 4, if you count the one I set up on MSN and just can't seem to use.  I do, however, like their downloadable writing program.  Tinkering with it is fun.  BUT ANYWAY - I had originally created this one for poetry.  And then I decided, since it was low profile and nobody really knows about it, I would use it for whatever.  Yes, I could do the same thing privately, but you know what...it's a psychological thing.  I had gotten so used to having pen pals to write or posting on boards that somehow, I'm more prolific doing journals online than writing privately.  Perhaps this little blog is a step toward that.  And now that I have worked through self-analysis (omigod, that could take years), down to business.

I am a vain creature.  I like sparkles, bangles and jangles and dangly jewelry, make-up and am forever on a diet and falling off the wagon after significant weight loss.  It's definitely not a healthy way, but I've done it again.  My jeans are getting snug.  Not only that, but I have noticed (ouch) that the tendon at the back of my right ankle has become increasingly painful.  And I noticed I was shuffling when I walked, or limping and that just won't do.  And walking up the hill to the hospital every morning (have you ever noticed that most hospitals are built on top of hills) left me so breathless, I prayed that nobody would say good morning in the hallway, because that meant I would have to speak.  Try speaking when you still can't breathe.

At the other prison, I was up and down stairs all day.  I could sprint across to the other units in no time flat, and boy was my butt tight.  All that was a year ago, March 1, and now it's time to get myself back on track before hospital life kills me.

I started south beach diet (again) 1 week ago.  The fatigue is improved, my foot doesn't hurt so much and I breathe better coming up the hill.  That's after 1 week, mind you.  I have begun an exercise program, but still have a way to go on that.  I'm just not disciplined enough.

And I have noticed...little things we do for ourselves help, too.  Lipstick.  That makes me feel a bit better about appearance.  A long soak in the tub (when there's time).  A good book.  Hey, a facial and a new pair of earrings.  :-D

The important thing is health.  When you feel better and look better, you do a better job for everybody else, and that's what this is about.  For me, and the people who need me.