Denied

She nestled into a nest of grass yesterday afternoon.  

The unemployment was denied, I put in an appeal, but without much hope. I've been rattled ever since. 

Searching for jobs that I could do. Feeling wretched. Reached out to one of my surgeons, and he responded, willing to be a reference. He's a good egg.

"Would you be comfortable as a reference for me? And, if you hear of any jobs for a crabby old RN with shaky people skills but lots of organizational skills and patient care priorities, I could use a hand."

Well, it's true. 

My life is flipped, but it was going to flip anyway, just a matter of when. I keep thinking of all the stuff I will not miss, the handful of people I will not mind never seeing again ever. 

"There are no such things as strangers, only friends I haven't met yet, and people who should have died before I met them."

Kyle Kinane

Ventana

 Blank day, drifting grey,

Mud, weeds, construction noises,

Painless lumpiness. 

Shiver

Cold and a rainy day. "Shiver in my bones just thinking about the weather."

They've halted work on the bus stop construction as the rain falls.  Garden is happy, though.  Rain barrels full.  Hoping the VOA house for young men, the tall white and red building, is open again by summer. 

Worked on the resume this morning, corrected mistakes I hadn't noticed before. As much as I've been idly looking for work the past two years, I unintentionally hampered my own meager efforts. Apparently. 

As much trouble as I had with a handful of my least experienced cow-orkers, I loved all the scrubs, and surgeons, and nurses, and anesthesiologists and the work, oh so much. I love my patients, as proxy family, for the whole time they are my patients. It's a limited time but very real love, I behave lovingly toward them, with full attention and care. Which is exactly why I had trouble with those who were not acting in good faith, within the limits of their responsibilities, when they put patients at risk. 

The scab on the bridge of my nose came off this morning. There will be a scar hidden when I wear glasses. My face a bit yellow-bruised, swelling gone. Other bruises showing up. Feeling the years sticking and dangling, still unbalanced and raw. 
 

Aghast

 I've been sleeping 9-10 hours a night this past week. Still finding bruises and aches from the fall. Woke to cats, Eleanor on my chest, Zeppo off to my right, as is becoming usual.  Waking up at 0700 is sleeping in, after getting up before 0600 for decades. My teenage self would be aghast, I would have to explain it carefully to her. 

Thinking about that, too. That my parents denied me sleep, waking me up, when I didn't need to be up, and I clearly needed to sleep. I've taken walks with my young self this week. We worry about each other, hold hands, commiserate. She sees Aunt Evelyn in me, which is a comfort. I wouldn't want her ashamed of who I've become. She had a soft spot for older folks, so I think she'd understand. 

The job search to resume some time today, which is fine. Pacing myself, the last thing I need is the wrong job. I've already gotten responses, but all for wrong jobs involving relocating and 'fast paced' ORs. Been there, done that, worn the scrubs. Can't do that shit no more. 

I've figured out how to say, "I can't physically be an OR RN anymore."  List my skills and then report how eager I am to use my skills and knowledge base in a clinic, office or WFH situation. 

We are expecting a good bit of rain starting later this afternoon and into tomorrow. I'll be out looking for snails, haven't seen any yet this year. I can't imagine we've actually gotten rid of them, but their numbers are way, way down. I remember going out after a rainstorm and collecting them by the bucketload. Getting the Hedge under control was a big part of it. And the damn English Ivy. 

Went over to Trolley Square, a mall a block away with a bookstore. They were having some sort of bridal dress fashion show, Patriarchy on Parade, lots of young women WoooHoooing very loudly. I've become very sensitive to loud crowds, grating and horrible. Extroverts unleashed. Ugh. 

I've gotten used to the quiet. 

Armenian

 Woke with a bit of song lyric in my mind, no idea where it came from, but vaguely suspected something churchy. Managed to pull enough of it together to research it, and yup. A muddy history, from a time when  the words young christian workers  put together were not outside of reality, a pro union group of some sort. I'm sure I sang it in my church choir, led by I. M. Lancendorfer.  Mid '70s.

Needing a good meal, we went to Hong Kong Tea House, as I sat in the car for Dylan to pick it up, a young woman danced at the bus stop. Against the bronze colored shelter, in grey clothes with white shoes, and dark skin, a block away, I could see her, but not create a video. She had earbuds on a wire in, so I assume she was looping a few bars of music and working out a bit of complex choreography. She was precise, skilled and graceful. I watched until the train arrived, and she vanished. 

A man walked by as Dylan was packing the food into the back with a seatbelt. He wore a thick chain at his belt, and I remembered that my eldest brother was mugged in high school on the way home from a dance. They hit him in the head with a chain. A passerby witnessed it and got him help. He was in the hospital for at least a week with a concussion. I was 4 or 5 yrs old. 

Just saw a truck go by with this flag. Looked it up.  Armenia. Which makes sense. Acknowledging the genocide there. I'd known about this a long time, I grew up in a neighborhood that was once heavily Armenian,  a few were left, as well as the Armenian Hall a block away. 

I looked harder at the near intersection, and it's crazier than I realized. There are six lanes, one right and one left turn lane and four middle lanes. No wonder we get so many crashes there. It is in dire need of traffic calming methods, narrowed and better marked. 

My mind seems to be a roiled pond, left to settle, and unexpected memories are bobbing up, sinking down. 

Skidding to a halt. 

Scabbing

 

Still looking pretty rough, but starting to gain on the exhaustion. The nose looks bad, but at least it's stopped oozing. 

Managed to vacuum and clean the stovetop. The garden has always had my attention. The new bus stop is developing. Got some dog time with next door neighbor's dog Spike, and his various doggy friends.  Getting outside is good. 

Writing my career summary has gotten away from me. It's either too long or too short, finding a middle is proving elusive. 

Mortal

Samuel Bear is charged with taking care of my glasses, in the midst of confusion. I'm very grateful he is willing to provide this service. 

I finished all the tasks necessary for Unemployment today. I need to do a bit of modernizing with my resume, a paragraph for Career Summary. Well, I can write. I will likely work out the style here. Likely write the negatives here, and then evert it. 

 There was a death at the corner, man on an electric scooter vs a car, and no other information. Street closed off, surveyors and cops for hours.  Usually I hear, but for some reason this time did not. There were plenty of responders, as is so often the case in this neighborhood. One neighbor, out with his dogs, witnessed it. The other heard it. 

This from the news site, I did not go out with a camera. 

Later, much later, after all this was cleared, the crew building the moved bus stop began work. 

Heard about a former co-worker, who's old friend and new fiancé, was shot to death yesterday. Not by police, I feel the need to add.

The world seems a sad and mortal place today. 

Dollop

 One of my dear friends here in Blogistan is worried about me. I won't say who, Catalyst...

So, to prove my relaxation, this is us at about 8PM last evening. Sound off for relaxation, sound on to hear Zeppo complain to me about life. (Zeppo never makes an appearance, he's just a voice actor here.)

Thing is, most of what I'm feeling is accumulated exhaustion, with a big dollop of worry over money - and by extension our medical care. I need some extensive and expensive dental work, and that will have to be pushed back indefinitely. So, I have to do all the initial forms to make sure we have income and healthcare. 

The precipitating event was more a tap on the shoulder that alerted me to just how close to the edge, physically, I was working. I knew I was pushing through every day, knew it was getting harder and harder,  but part of what I do is push through a crisis, get to the other end and collapse. It's part of what I fundamentally am. Head down, survive, then when safe, crumble. 

This time, though, One step back, and Wile E. Coyote drop time. 

Yes, I probably lost the confidence of some of my co-workers.  But they definitely lost my trust and respect, and over time. Two (otherwise very good) nurses last year who reacted to the mandatory masking in the building by wearing those stupid mesh masks. I had no power to stop them, although I did alert those who did, and they started wearing proper masks the next time I saw them. One of the nurses for whom I had deep respect,  found out she was not going to be vaccinated. I overheard that conversation in the hallway. The facility never did make any provisions for a safe place for staff to eat lunch. And with the new construction, staff lunchroom and locker rooms would not be expanded at all. 

I've done this work for over 25 years, and as much as I know my experience is readily transferrable, I cannot predict what that will look like. I learned new systems, procedures, equipment, new surgeons with different requirements, constantly, weekly. Daily. I liked all the scrubs I was working with recently, just a great bunch of young folks. And surgeons who did good work for their patients.  I've got a deep and wide knowledge base, it will repurpose well. I'm organized as fuck. 

I won't miss dealing with new med students and residents constantly. Some were gems, but so many were difficult, and I'd gotten so I could not place their names. Never could, but it's getting worse.  The aide who should not be working with patients, ever, will no doubt leave or be pushed out, fairly soon. It's not my job, and I don't care now. Life will get him, no need for me to even think about it.  Not my problem. 

When I broke my wrist two years ago, it was the beginning of the end, and I kinda knew it. But if I'd left then, I would have been in much worse shape financially and with healthcare. There weren't any safety nets at the time, or jobs that I could transfer into. Only more fire outside the frying pan.  Today, it's starting to look much different.  Still unknown, but the known perils of the last few years are much less perilous. 

What this isn't is anger. It's exhaustion, disorientation, pain, loss, financial worry. And an enormous packing crate of relief. I keep thinking of crap I will never have to do again, assholes I will never have to mollify again. 

Zeppo came in later for a belly rub from both of us. Eleanor never stirred. 

Fallen

 

Went out to get groceries, and took a header onto the asphalt parking lot. Everything at once, hands, knees,  face. Nothing broken, just some blood on my nose and cheek. Even my glasses are fine.  Two people stared at me. One guy asked what happened. 

"I tripped."

"You ok?"

"Yeah, nothing broken. Thanks."  Shaken. I know I yelled when I hit, out of frustration as much as anything. Terrified of breaking. 

I am not having a good stretch here. 

I continued on, because the restrooms at Trader Joe's were closer than home, and I could wash up and assess the damage. Road rash on the bridge of my nose, so I wadded up paper towel and held it in place with mask and glasses. Slice on my cheek that would stop bleeding before I got home. Picked up dinner, although in a bit of a haze. Didn't have my phone, for some reason.  Got home feeling less shaken, but with my nose starting to throb. 

Going to go sob a bit. 

Attractant

I cleaned the laundry folding table. 

It didn't take long to attract cats. 

I slept better last night than I have in a week. Feeling floaty and fuzzy today, going slower. Even slower than that. Nearly stopped completely. Grit in the wheels slow. 

I have cleaned the kitchen counter. 

Have taken a few photoshop self portraits, and I see such strain in my face, even when I intended to be smiling. I feel like I should believe my face.  So much needs to be done, but as Catalyst tells me, I try to relax. It will all get done, just not today. 
 

Adaptation

Apparently they decided to stay in bed. 

 Woke up at the usual time, tea & cereal, showered, dressed, walked around the block, finished my Unemployment application.  Started cleaning up the shop to make it my proper desk.  Time to stop using the kitchen table as such, but it was related to getting up too damn early, having breakfast while reading weather, comics, the news, then off to work. I would dress there, from when Dylan was still asleep when I got up. 

Everything is changing, no point holding on to obsolete habits. Adapt, change. Grow. 

Addendum:

I moved into the shop, and the cats decided this was fine. Opened the window, and Zeppo liked this. Then Eleanor took her rightful precedence. 

Raw

 

Both on the bed mid-morning. So I opened the blinds for them to sun. 

I'm up and down today. Tried to complete the Unemployment documents yesterday, and after spending a lot of time accurately answering the questions about why I left, the site kicked me out without warning, saving or reason.  I felt like I'd been punched in the gut. Poured out my raw pain in carefully neutral and precisely chosen language, and ... poof.  I will write it elsewhere and save it, copy paste and finish the application tomorrow morning.  Then start my job search. 

“Ptraci didn’t just derail the train of thought, she ripped up the rails, burned the stations, and melted the bridges for scrap.”

― Terry Pratchett, The Wit and Wisdom of Discworld

The problematic aide at my former job was likely her brother.  A troll, a sealion, a walking AskReddit post, a bully and a misogynist at 19.  Lumpen fool. 

I will never roll bias bandages ever again for the one surgeon who used them. A job I took on long ago because it wasn't getting done well, and I was working with said surgeon - and getting chewed out about them being too short. It wasn't a bad job, I could roll up several months' worth in about 15-20 minutes, if I had the time and there were the steel OR tables available. Rarely got help, which was silly of them, because I had a really efficient system, it wasn't hard, and anyone looking to stay a bit longer to get their hours in could have milked it nicely.

Not my circus. Not my monkeys.

Spent a long time in the garden, thinning the sunflowers, pulling the spiky-seed grass. Oiled the hand mower, to keep the mint along the edge short this summer. 

Creamer

 Dylan noticed an estate sale while he was out walking this morning. He had to go to work, so I went myself. The house is a rambling old Victorian pile across from the Indian convenience store. And it was full of treasures. First estate sale I've gone to for over a year and a half, every one masked, likely most of us vaccinated. It was such a return to normal.

I found this silver-plated creamer/lidded pitcher. The bottom stamped Statler Hotel, the # in the box indicates when it was made, so 1953. Which city is a mystery, the one in Los Angeles probably the most likely. I spent some time removing tarnish, aluminum foil, baking soda, boiling water. 

A bit of upholstery fabric, and a narrow shovel (not shown.) $14 all told. Going back tomorrow with both of us. I'm mindful of our uncertain future income. Although part of me is a little afraid I will be working so soon I won't get a chance to take a breath. Then I worry about getting work at all. 

 I did dream that the arrogant aide kept touching my arm, I kept shoving him away, until I started shouting for him to get away from me. He started to crumble and cry, and I kept swearing at him. He said "Well, I guess I won't be working here Monday!" and I said, no, I wouldn't be here Monday. 

We will finish signing up for Obamacare and Unemployment tomorrow. I start seriously looking for a job on Monday. The fog remains, but it is thinning out a bit. 

Moot

 Turned in my badge and cleared out my locker and cubby. E, the office manager stayed with me*, told me she was pissed about the whole thing, and gave me a long warm hug. P, who is the only staff there longer than me, was teary eyed along with me. J from SP came and hugged me so long I was a little afraid for her. So, I got to say a few goodbyes, and that will do. I have phone numbers and will need references, and who knows I might have a gathering here when I'm bringing in income again. Who knows?

I kept assuring them I was ok, I would do fine, maybe a bad thing for a good thing. Felt like they were more bothered than me. It's all sad and hard, but it was the right time, even if not a graceful exit. I've done worse with more witnesses. Fell on my face, fell on my wrist and broke it.  I mean, maybe I do need to be out of there before I wind up with a concussion or worse. 

My OR shoes really are very comfortable, it's more noticeable on wood floors... . I kept my cloth hats, for now anyway. I may give them away once I know what I'll be doing. 

I let the nurse who was going to cover a shift for me in May know, since she would be expecting the paperwork this Friday. She was amazingly supportive, which doesn't surprize me. Most nurses really are this way, which is why the other kind are so shocking. 

She pointedly didn't ask, but I told her why anyway. Let others learn from me. I don't see any point in keeping it secret, even as it shines a harsh light on me. I put it thusly:

Some of it was my own physical pain, I thought I could make it to 62 and retire. More was investigating me because I pushed a hand away while turning a patient prone, and the person with the hand saw it as a slap, and it all rather snowballed. My own inability to use my words in a situation with so much going on, and a person lacking situational awareness, bad combo. I decided to take it as an opportunity to do less physical work, not be analyzed for my ‘behavior’ again (taught by old OR nurses, that early training really sticks) and take a little unemployment insurance that I have never used in 40 years of work.

I wonder when I'll find out the oblivious, arrogant aide has gotten fired, if I were to bet I'd say within the month. I expect I'll hear. Irrelevant, of course, moot. Always best to let Fate mete out retribution, never jostle her arm. 

*Which is probably policy, but it protects me as much as them, so I accepted it without comment. 

Mourn

 The past two years have been increasingly difficult both physically and mentally.  And my ability to care for my patients is not at the level I would want to be. 

I was burning out, broke my wrist, my mother died, my beloved cat died.  I had to return to work before my wrist was sufficiently healed.  My illness in December of '19 was Covid, part of the reason I dropped to 30 hours. Which helped, but I never fully recovered.  I was in a lot of pain most of the time, my vision issues mean I am no longer safe scrubbing, my wrists stop me from doing chest compressions for CPR. 

My CPTSD, always a lingering issue, was worsened by several difficult co-workers. I returned to my EMDR therapist, went on anti-anxiety medication, used a Bi-tapp machine, and made a lot of progress. I believe I made as much progress as possible, and most of the time I'm on top of it. 

But over time, I realize that there will always be gaps, and some people will intentionally push me, and I cannot reliably manage to not react.  Not when there are a lot of things happening and a patient's safety is involved. When I was taught the OR, pushing a hand away, rapping knuckles with an instrument, moving another person that was standing in the way in the midst of a trauma or positioning, was normal practice, not read as violent at all. I was taught to not take it personally and to learn from it.  In the moment, I don't know that I can completely abandon this early training. I realize it is no longer the norm, but I also know that when my words fail, I will put my hand out. 

I can cash out my PTO and will be allowed to apply for unemployment insurance I can leave with a modicum of grace. 

I will be looking for work, but not today.  Today I mourn. 

Pipe

 Yesterday I dug out a pipe buried near the hedge in the front garden/meadow.  And another L-shaped bit of metal.  Today I went for another pipe, that had what looked like the bit of an old sprinkler head. That one was connected, 18" down to a horizontal pipe, and I don't think I'm ever getting that out. Not connected to anything anymore, but too much and too deep to dig out by hand.  I'm trying to imagine making it Art, I have some ideas. But it is so near the sidewalk, it has to be durable and cemented in place, or it will disappear immediately. 

I raked out the leaves from the narrow space between the garages, 3/4 filled the yard waste bin. Too much flaking paint to compost it here. Let the city use it for mulch. 

Everything coming up, more or less. I have to remind myself how early it still is. And keep hoping for more rain. I think the two rose bushes are going to put on quite the show this year. The raspberries in back are getting a bit leafy, the blackberry in front is showing some color in the stem. 

Our next door neighbors will be staying in the house for the next four years, renting from the current owners and previous neighbors.  I'm glad to have this lovely couple and their two dogs for the next few years. Old neighbors I will miss, but the house was too small for them with two kids and family visiting often.  And the current neighbors... park better. 

Reading John Pavlovitz, and finding so much comfort.  He's one of those who lives his faith, and although I don't share the belief, I respect those who dig down and really work at it. Like Biden, who genuinely cares and strives to do his duty. 

I also vacuumed and mopped and shopped yesterday.  There is a comfort in a simple sense of accomplishment. Today we replaced the old plug assembly that wouldn't hold a plug.  As I suspected, one of the wires was screwed in the wrong way - which was the case for another one in this house. Whomever wired them up was either not paying attention, or had no clue what they were doing. The wire needs to go on so that the screw pulls it in the same direction. Seems obvious, but apparently not so much. 

Mantle

Early morning cat

Sprawled, curled, settled on my belly

Waiting for head rub. 

She'd been there for hours, and made a mrrrping squeak as I stirred. Patiently glued to me until I woke enough to pull my hands out and cup her face in my palms.  Zeppo also appeared, or at least made his presence audibly known, by my hip. One hand had to pass between them, to lay on his haunches. 

I tried to read Pale Horse, Pale Rider - because it was in part about the 1918 flu epidemic.  I found the misogyny and emotional toxicity of the family unbearable. I was much more tolerant of disfunction and despairing endings when I was young, but even then I couldn't read Dickens for instance, or any of the Bronte sisters. I wonder if what I always considered my reading cowardice, my inability to chew my way through classic literature, to actually be the lack of joy and humor there. Not enough to draw me through the density of the words, past the hopelessly awful lives of the women therein. 

I need a bit of joy in my reading, with a bit of hope at the end. 

Eleanor exploring the mantle. Not for the first time, but it's not terribly common. Zeppo tried it out the next day.  He's a very cautious creature, not a confident jumper. There is a screen on these, so I may need to open these windows when it warms up a bit more. It's 36˚F this morning. 

Something innate about that, reinforced by experience. I was a cautious and fearful child, but how much of that was because my parents added to my fear? Gave me reason to be afraid? Disinclined to throw myself into anything? Nowadays it's because I know how fragile I have become, how easily I could break another bone and lose our stability. None of this is new, but it all feels so much more immediate.  I don't want to wrap the world in cotton and keep it away from danger, but I feel all the risks so keenly. 

And I am helpless to stop the damage. 

Every day that I work, it has been profoundly irritating to my sore back. So for the last week or so I've been wearing my corset as a back brace under the scrubs. Makes a huge difference, I think I tend to slump after about 6 hours, this keeps my posture better so I don't hurt so much after 10 hours. 

Zeppo thinking about getting up on the sill that Eleanor usually monopolizes at night. She gets up on the chest and noses behind the shade confidently. Zeppo is thinking about maybe trying it one day, because he realllllly wants to look out there too. 

Poor cat, so easily frightened. I get it. All I can do is step back and be patient, with both of us. 

Masks

 Just got my result for the Covid study, and it looks like yes indeed, I did have it a year ago December. Well, that was the last time I was sick, and I was OHSOsick. We are both vaccinated as well.  And will keep wearing masks, because they are less cumbersome than a sandwichboard with my vaccine record printed in 36 point font. 

I had a job once wearing a sandwich board, and it was miserable. Masks are fine.

One thing I've noticed the last few months.  Patients coming out of anesthesia used to always pull their O2 masks off, repeatedly.  But not so much anymore.  It's a really marked change. I think it's because they are used to having something on their face, so it doesn't bother them so much. 

My red tulips are blooming this week. 

And Eleanor is fluffily sunning.