Twenty-Eight

When I turned 27, I felt like this:

I also got this:

That summer involved a lot of this:

(fake, anxious smiling)

But, fortunately, also some of this:

And this:

Summer ended. School started again.

And then October and November were two of the hardest months of my life.

I did a lot of this:

And this:

And this:

But my friends made sure I also managed to cut loose and have some fun as 2009 came to a close.

In October there was this:

And this:

November included this:

And there was December, with some of this:

And this:

 And this:

January, 2010. A new year, a clean slate. A chance to start fresh.

February, March, April, May, June.

Looking back at those months just seems like a whirlwind of awesome and hilarious adventures.

July.

July 26, 2010.
I am twenty-eight today.
It's been a good year.
It's been a good life, so far.

Healing

As a nurse I see many, many wounds. Surgical incisions, traumatic injuries, bedsores. Gaping holes in the skin right down to the bone. Bruises and abrasions and lacerations with pools of blood or swollen, angry skin.

And I am consistently amazed by how some of the most wretched and horrific wounds are able to, with time and care, heal. The tissue knits itself back together and becomes whole. The result is often imperfect with scars or uneven bumps of flesh. But the body heals.

In the metaphorical sense, I am also healing. Being victimized by verbal and emotional abuse creates wounds. They might not be visible, but they are there. Having your trust betrayed makes it hard to trust again. Being lied to makes it hard to believe in people.

Being manipulated and tormented and belittled hurts.

Areas of scarring and damage become more sensitive, more susceptible to injury. My emotional injuries are no exception. I have emotional scars, that is certain. Because of my experiences I am more cautious and sensitive. I am more likely to be triggered and upset by a seemingly innocuous occurrence because it resembles something from my past. But I think that, with time, even this will fade.

I am healing. The name calling and the hurtful remarks and the deliberate attempts to cut me down-- those memories are fading and the wounds are healing. What I am able to focus on is how quickly people sprang into action to help me. How steadfastly they (you) stood by my side.

Back in November, I wrote about how grateful I was. Even when I was in the thick of it, even through the anxiety and terror, I could still see how lucky I was. What I remember is how amazingly people came through for me. How time and again my friends picked me up and dusted me off. How fiercely, unrelentingly loyal and protective people were. How insanely far people went out of their way for me.

I got to see just how much love there is out there for me. Because of that, my scars are beautiful. And I can heal.

Weekend of Beach Cities

(What is this bird?)

(I had a hard time leaving this seashell store because of my intense desire to TOUCH EVERYTHING.)

(I know it's blurry. I thought it looked neat.)

Today I'm sick. STILL SICK. And mightily frustrated about it! But the bonus about being a nurse and in nurse practitioner school is that I have self-diagnosed myself. I can't self-prescribe yet but I can self-pity like a professional.

I'm spending the day drinking expired codeine cough syrup and eating expired Cheerios. I found them in the garbage. The Cheerios, I mean. On a recent trip to the basement trash room I found cases upon cases of expired Cheerios, so I helped myself. I found the cough syrup in my cabinet and it has made my day pleasantly hazy.

They're fine.
I would like to be well now, please and thank you.

Dishwasher story. Just as interesting as it sounds.

So my dishwasher seems to be broken. I load it up, shake in the powdered soap, close the door and press Start and it makes all kinds of wooshy promising noises and then in thirty minutes or so it gets quiet and the "Clean" light blinks at me. Which has TRICKED ME several times into thinking that the dishes are clean so I open the dishwasher to find the soap powder only semi-used and dishes with water/soap condensation all over them. It is strange.

According to the manual, the flashing "Clean" light ACTUALLY means "Call someone to come fix it." Instead I have interpreted it as: Try it again. Try it again. Turn off and on the circuit breaker and try it again. Try it again. Start using dishwasher as a dish drying rack.

I will eventually get it fixed I'm sure and it's not a big deal-- not like I can't live without a dishwasher. But I really would like to sit it down and reason with it because of all the appliances I use and abuse the dishwasher has a pretty cushy life. I load it up throughout the week and only run it when it is full. AND I am so persnickety and can't stand to put dishes in the dishwasher that have any food at all on them that I pretty much do a total pre-wash before I put them in there. On the other hand I'll toss ANYTHING into the washer and it has already proven itself to be a touch finicky.

I think what my dishwasher needs is and ATTITUDE ADJUSTMENT.

Dress

How sad am I that this dress was too tight and would only zip halfway up?

Very.

Sickness and Chico adventures, unrelated (hopefully)

I am sick today. And grumpy.
I am achy and tired and my throat hurts and my head feels... my head feels. Everything. Thinking is bothersome because I can feel it happening.

Anyhow. Can I tell you a little about my weekend trip to Chico?

Jenny and I hit the road on Saturday, after her night of shenanigans with Califmom. We had wanted to do a little shopping in Chico because we always seem to have strangely good luck there so we picked up Stella and went to the mall. The former Gottschalks had been turned into a GIANT Forever 21 which seemed cool at first but was way too overwhelming. We puttered around the mall and ate yummy chocolate peanut butter bar thingies and then decided to go get pedicures.

We found a place that was open (it was lateish-- about 5:30) and sat down for the MOST PAINFUL PEDICURE I'VE EVER GOTTEN IN MY LIFE. I couldn't believe how terrible it was.
Now, people tend to laugh at me when I get pedicures because I'm so ticklish that I end up writhing around in my chair and giggling. This time there was no giggling, but there certainly was WRITHING. He did all the stuff that usually feels great but he made it uncomfortable and painful. He raked salt scrub into my skin and brushed it off with a stiff plastic-bristled brush. He aggressively massaged the lotion on and then he PUNCHED MY FOOT. I got out of there all shaky and sweaty and disoriented. We went back to Stella's house for some much-needed drinkiepies and snacks and an impromptu haircut for Jenny.

We went out. I wore a fantastic hand-me-down dress and lounged in the trunk of a car at 2 am. We danced at club and then danced at a hookah bar. We had FUN.

Later, we stopped by Carl's Junior for a late-night/early-morn snack. We ordered, paid, and sat down to wait for our food. The lady came out and said "Number 36? Number 51?" And we said "over here!" She stared at us and narrowed her eyes. "Did you order, like, chicken fingers and stuff?" "Yes!" we said. She put the tray down in front of us "Are you sure? Because if you steal someone else's food..." she trailed off in an ominous manner. The three of us all at once tried to explain that NO we weren't trying to steal someone else's food, that we had paid for the food, and that here were our little plastic numbers! "Well it happens. Every. Day." she snarked and then huffed away.

So, in conclusion, I always have fun in Chico. Because going out on the town in Chico is REALLY REALLY fun. Even if everything else might suck.

The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe

Thanks to online library requests, I accidentally checked out the GIANT "read aloud" version.

Bigger than my head, people.

There's this passive-aggressive note in the book about how even though The Magician's Nephew was written later, it's SUPPOSED to be first so that's how HarperCollins is publishing them. Which, did somebody do a fact-check on that? Because, while *I* certianly don't care what order the individual consumer decides to read to books, I think that my respect for C.S. Lewis might drop down a few rungs if he really MEANT the Magician's Nephew to be read first.
One of the reasons I enjoyed reading the Magician's Nephew so much was that I already KNEW the story of the Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe so it was neat to be like "Oh THAT's the explanation for such and such" or "Oh THAT's where this came from." It was FUN. If you are supposed to read the explanations FIRST, the information isn't surprising and intriguing, it's just information. Like how the new Star Wars movies came out and everybody was all excited at first but if you watch the prequel trilogy first, you miss out on the DRAMA that occurs when (spoiler alert!) Luke finds out Vader is his father. You're supposed to read Graceling and THEN read Fire because then you're all spooked and fascinated. Prequels are neat because we already KNOW what happens later. That's the POINT.

Uh. Anyhow.

That aside, this book was enjoyable. It was quick and fun and lovey I thought I hadn't read it before but now I think maybe I have because I totally remembered the part where Edmund draws spectacles on a stone lion, did that happen in any of the movie representations, is that why I remember it? And I know the witch is horrible and such but I kind of like the name Jadis now, is that crazy?

Also, there is one part where the children are asking the Beaver friends about the White Witch and why she's so bent out of shape about humans because isn't she a human herself? Mr. Beaver explains that she is not a human because she is the daughter of "Adam's first wife, Lilith" and then he just CONTINUES ON WITH HIS STORY and none of children stop him to go "Adam's first wife? Exsqueeze me?" and the plot carries on and adventures ensue and everyone fawns over Aslan and the kids chase him as he frolics through the meadow and they fight exciting battles and there is even a unicorn (!!!) and (spoiler alert!) the kids make it back out of the Wardrobe and whew! But I'm still stuck on Adam's first wife? Exsqueeze me?

18. picnic in the park

So what I had envisioned for a picnic in the park involved me wearing a flowy dress and a big hat, sitting primly on a blanket, nibbling finger sandwiches. Nevermind that I neither sit primly nor nibble but rather slouch and fling food down my gullet.

I think when I wrote "picnic in the park," I really meant "picnic in the 1800s."

But picnic we did. The weather was cold and windy and foggy as San Francisco is wont to be, but we managed to find a spot in Golden Gate Park that was sheltered by a grove of trees (which doubled as a bathroom since there wasn't one nearby).

I had bought a little picnic basket at the Salvation Army for seven dollars, and I was so! excited! to! use! it!

Hot dogs, potato salad, macaroni salad, Doritos, grapes, and french bread with cheese spread. Happy 4th, indeed!

See those red plates and cups? They came IN the picnic basket, still in their wrappers.

The boys played football while I ate the leftover kept birds away from the food. I played, too, actually. I can throw all right, but catching would probably be easier if I weren't such a cliche afraid-of-the-ball sissy.

Not sure why I am making that weird face. My guess is that I am in some kind of cheesy bread trance.

The picnic was fun, even if I didn't get to stroll amongst the flowers twirling my parasol.

Sometimes

Sometimes the world feels like a bleak and dismal place.

Today I saw an very old and bent woman trying to cross the street. She had a little cart in front of her and one of those long white canes with the red tip-- you know, for blind or visually impaired people. I was at the opposite corner, in my car, making a left-hand turn. She was trying to walk across the street and I could tell she had gotten confused about which way she was going because she was tapping her cane on both sides of the curb and stepping in and out of the street and meanwhile the cars coming toward her had a green light. I couldn't do anything, I was in my car praying that someone closer to her would notice her and help her. Finally, just as a big black SUV came barreling toward her through the intersection, a young woman pulled her out of the street. And I was SO RELIEVED. But I was also irritated-- because WTF, SUV? I know that San Francisco in general and that neighborhood in particular is a place with jaywalkers aplenty but you and I both know that there is a big difference between 'Joe I'vegottabesomewhereinahurry' and the LITTLE OLD BLIND WOMAN crossing the street. So how about CALMING THE FUCK DOWN AND HITTING THE BREAKS?!

And then the other day I heard about a patient who had been tricked by a young man into signing away a bunch of her money and property to him and but he was never prosecuted because she died.

I remember also when I was working at a senior center and somebody STOLE a bunch of stuff from the computer room and I was like, seriously? You're stealing from a nonprofit senior center?

And I remember a couple years ago there was a video on the news about a young man who mugged an old woman. He punched her in the face and knocked her over, her walker fell on top of her. He stole her purse which had, like, seven dollars inside it.

Sometimes it is incredibly hard to walk into a nursing home and see people in their dim rooms with feeding tubes, skinny limbs, pressure sores, lying semi-conscious for days or weeks or years.

It is so difficult to watch the decline of Alzheimer's disease-- the confusion, the frustration, the loss. Or people who had sudden strokes. One day they were fine, and the next they can't remember how to speak.

It hurts to see people who were once whole and happy and well become sick and suffering. It breaks my heart to see people suffer. And there is so much suffering.

Cancer. Dementia. Cancer. Dementia. Arthritis. Heart disease. Stroke. Kidney failure. Parkinson's. Cancer. Dementia.
Depression. Loneliness.


Pain.

Sometimes I feel like I want to just lay down and go to sleep and pretend I don't see or hear all the pain.

And sometimes there are other stories. Other people.

One of the patients I saw the other day was a very old woman with severe dementia. She has a caregiver who lives with her and provides all of her care, including feeding, bathing, toileting, and dressing. The caregiver takes the woman outdoors whenever the weather is nice, brings her to church, invites her own family over, and plays music for her. The caregiver is paid a small stipend by the church because the woman doesn't have any family.
When I met her the caregiver was cheerful and bubbly. She has been caring for the woman for about 5 years and is going to continue for the rest of the woman's life.
I examined the woman on my visit and noted that she was impeccably well cared for. Her clothes were fresh and her mouth was clean and even her feet were moisturized with neatly trimmed toenails.
The woman had no bedsores-- because the caregiver sleeps on a mat on the floor in the woman's room and gets up every hour to turn her. Every hour.


Sometimes, all it takes is one person like this to remind me why I keep doing this.

I can't cure the world or end suffering, but I can keep learning and working and trying and helping and caring. And maybe I can make a difference in someone's life.