Nursing Friends

Fragments of words 

Pieces of sentences

Floating back and forth

Darting across the room

Punctuated by hugs and OMG!!

“I know you but tell me your name!!”

“We haven’t seen each other for 50 years!”

“Do you remember when....who...how......?”

50 years gone in an instant

Flashbacks to starched aprons and nurses caps

Curfews and how to break curfews

Word fragments flew

Sentences sections darted and danced.

52 nurses pushed the years aside in our joy

Mindful of the many friendships formed in our youth.

“There are friends, and then there are “nursing friends.”

~ by Ani Burr, RN, from the blog Scrubs

Talking the Walk

Words cover ground while

swishing through grasses

carpeted with swaths of flowers talking over life and living in the heat of a warm spring day sharing matters of past, present and future

while sunshine beams kindly

over glistening blue water 

mirroring clear blue sky.

“words are like nets - we hope they’ll cover what we mean, 

but we know they can’t possibly hold that much joy, or grief, or wonder.”

~ Jodi Picoult, Change of Heart

Plastic, Plastic, Plastic

One does not have to browse through Facebook long before we are shown the damage that plastic is doing to the oceans and the life within her depths. There are a lot of tragedies in this world that I have seen on TV, on Facebook, listening to conversations,…..there is just an overwhelming amount of tragedy in this world. I turn off the news, do not read the newspapers and seldom do a lot of browsing on Facebook. I know that tragedy and sadness is out there, it will occur and in my part of the world I can do little to alleviate it all. It is too, too much.

Then I saw the contents of a whale’s stomach, and then another one. Then I saw whole beaches piled high with plastic and other garbage. Before all of that I had seen a photo of a turtle who, as a hatchling, got tangled in plastic until it was just a part of the poor thing as it grew up, damaging it’s natural growth. Quite some time ago, I started buying my own plastic ware so I wouldn’t be throwing out all these disposable containers from the stores. Then, I started buying glassware, much to the chagrin of those who were afraid of glassware breaking and having to be replaced. On Monday at work, I chatted with a colleague who has been actively changing her shopping habits to avoid the use of plastic.

Today. Well, today I went shopping. My first purchase of something new, just for me, since January of this year. I hadn’t gone out with inundation of plastic in my mind, but as I travelled the city, each transaction I made involved some form of plastic. Purchases made were wrapped in plastic and paid for with plastic. At the bank, I signed a cheque with a pen made of plastic. To ride the bus, I pay with a bus pass made of plastic. I purchased groceries - meat on styrofoam (an early form of plastic) and wrapped with plastic, double bagged in plastic. The nuts and seeds I bought - in plastic bags. As I passed a shop on Cook Street, I purchased a set of marigolds - also in plastic. Back in the grocery store, because I missed one thing on my list, I had a choice between rolled oats in a plastic bag or another brand in a paper bag. The one in the paper bag cost more. But by this late in the day, I was done with plastic!! We just can't keep throwing it into the abyss that we have created!

A kit. That’s what I need. A travel kit with clean bags and containers - some of which will be reused plastic. I will continue using the plastic containers that I have but avoid, as much as possible, buying anything plastic. I know my small commitment to change my relationship with plastic will not clean up any ocean - or even a pond. Because our building has a good recycling program, that includes soft plastics and styrofoam, some of my concerns are alleviated. It is always, on a daily basis, in each little corner of the world that we can change our culture, our way of living. No memos, no task forces, no committees, just daily attention and mindfulness. 

“I’ll tell you what scares me is plastic. Plastic bags and 

plastic bottles. Why does my water have to be in 
a bloody plastic bottle? The landfill and the ocean; 
and I don’t know, I’m just terrified with 
the proliferation of plastic.”

~ Helen Mirren

To Dare

Last year's flowers - hope I get them again this year!

The patio looked bright and inviting in the morning sun. It looked warm and just the place to have breakfast. But was it? It’s been cool most days this last week. Suspicious about this Victoria weather, I hesitated. My hand hovered above my cell phone ready to check the temperature. I stopped while remembering something a man had said a few months ago in response to the question ‘what’s the weather like outside?’. Without missing a beat, he said - ‘Step outside and you’ll find out!’ I don’t recall where I was, what the weather was like or even if I was involved in the conversation.

So, squaring my shoulders, I stepped outside and was greeted by a lovely, lovely warm spring day without a hint of wind. My container gardens needed care - watering, stirring the dirt with my little fork, checking to see which plants made it through the winter and which needed putting in the compost heat. Two daffodils were poking little green shoots through dry soil, so I attended to them. I spread wildflower seeds in my larger container garden, just in one corner. Washing out drip trays, washing winter wind dust from the table and chairs and sweeping the patio felt good. A thin strip of spider web was sacrificed for a tidy, peaceful part of my home. I completely forgot about my breakfast until the patio looked ready for sunshine and lovely days. As satisfaction set in, my stomach growled reminding me of my original goal. I brought my delicious granola and a glass of cold coconut milk into the sun and felt at one with my little world.

“Fortune sides with him who dares.”

~ Virgil

Coming Together!

A memento from our 10 year reunion

Excitement is building!

Nursing class of 1968 arrive in a few days! Regina General Hospital prairie ‘girls’ in Victoria for our 50th reunion! A phone call Sunday evening with the energetic organizer of this event brings it all closer…and closer… and closer!

“Time does not erase the friendships and camaraderie 

you developed at a time when you were developing your life path.”

~ From Memoir Writer’s Journal (Blog) by Kathy Pooler

It's Personal ~ 2

This is my signed copy of Father Martin's book.

Puzzling over what I would write today, I thought to myself: I have nothing in my head, no story to tell….wait... I do have a story to tell. It really is kind of a combination of stories. A story about personal belief.

It was June 1989. I was in Hobbs, New Mexico with friends listening to Father Joseph C. Martin, a Roman Catholic priest who presented the topic of alcoholism in a humorous but serious manner. He was presenting a ‘Chalk Talk’ on Alcoholism, dubbed Chalk Talks because he always used a green chalk board and chalk to outline his points. My understanding was that he originated these talks for the military, but they became so popular that they were expanded to other audiences and treatment centres. Father Martin has since passed away, but I found a series of these Chalk Talks on Alcoholism on You-tube this afternoon. In the talk that I chose, he reviewed the similarities between being anaesthetized before surgery, the behaviours because of the sedatives and the serious risks that are present with sedation. Even for minor surgeries. 

Now I’ll back up a few years. It was still in the eighties, long before I was considering a career in Addiction Nursing. Actually I didn’t even know that there was a specialty for addictions nursing. I was working on a medical unit in Regina at the time so my patients were admitted for medical reasons. Many were actually there for alcohol withdrawal. It was while I was caring for these clients that I began to consider that it was like someone coming out of surgery. The more I thought about it, the more I believed that the nursing care for withdrawal from alcohol would be similar to the nursing care for someone coming out of anaesthetic. I have maintained that belief since that time. Today, I can include in that belief, opiates as they are often part of the drug cocktail that is used in anaesthesia. The opiates, however, continue in use for pain control in a longer term recovery period and may continue once discharged home.

This Chalk Talk I listened to today restored my belief in my own belief! Alcohol and drugs affect the brain as an organ. Alcohol and drugs alter behaviour. Not everyone becomes addicted to either, but it does occur to some. Why? I have no idea. Anymore than I know why I have epilepsy, a brother had epilepsy and the rest of my siblings do not. What I do know for sure is that withdrawal management for alcohol and or drugs, outside of any political hot potato issues, is critical to recovery and should not be taken lightly. Brain damage is brain damage and should be recognized as a critical issue for those who wish to get that monkey permanently off their back. In nursing and in medicine, the care that we take with our patients can support their opportunity to recover, or can deal a too heavy blow.

“My belief is you have one chance to make a first impression.”

~ Kevin McCarthy