Windmills

I'm supposed to go to Summerton with Jay today. He's got a film opening tonight. I decided not to go to the library this morning. I'm trying to download software (unsuccessfully so far) for my printer. It's taking forever.

One of the effects of the synthroid I just started taking is that at 5am I wake up wholly. No sleepiness, no cuddling the pillow. Up and out. I feel like I'm on fire. Bam. So up I went, took the damn little pill and, since I have to wait 30 minutes after taking it before I put anything in my stomach, sat zazen.

The sun rose while I was sitting. Purple and wine and gold. "Oh my goodness," I said, staring at it through the cobwebs framing my kitchen window, slurping my cafe con leche.

"I know!" Lilly yells from her bedroom. "It's wonderful."

"You're up?"

"I have to get to school early to finish my lab. I need every minute, mom. So we have to get out of here on time." She admonishes.

Back home, I decide to take a walk. I walk through the meandering black-topped streets of our neighborhood. It's overcast, but it's beautiful. The dogwoods are in bloom, they float like laughter. The redwoods line the streets, armfuls of lilacs. I love lilacs. When I was little, I used to climb out of the bathroom window at the lab school and sneak out and sit under the big lilac bushes in front and read. Hello, you've arrived, the lilacs say. You're on shore. You're safe. Welcome to life. Summer's coming. School will be out soon.

I walk through my old neighborhood, where I grew up. Down by the creek and over onto the trail they made out of the railroad tracks. It's the same walk I've taken for 35 years, rails or no. During my walk, on the way home, I become convinced that Jay is going to blow me off. He won't show up. What a bastard! I think. Four years and he just blows me off like this. I want to cry. But I won't, I tell myself. I'll just never ever speak to him again. I feel so wronged, so scorned as I walk. This beautiful spring--how could he treat me like this? The lilacs smell like regret now and betrayal.


April 23rd's a hard day for me. 3 years ago, Jay did break up with me on April 23rd. He just stopped calling. I didn't do anything. Just stopped speaking to him. "We need to talk" he said finally, after not calling for seven days. He left a message on my voicemail. "I'm just not ready for a relationship. When can we meet?" But I wouldn't meet him. Wouldn't return his calls Why talk about it? It was done. Then we ran into each other a few weeks later and started dating again as if nothing had ever happened. We never mentioned it. But, man, that was a hard three weeks.


That same day, an ex of mine, Lewis, someone I'd fallen really hard for, called. Out of the blue. "I have a new bike," he told me. "Want to try it out?" Well, of course. I'd been lying face down on the bed crying. It was colder on that April 23rd. But still just as beautiful. He showed up on this beautiful cherry red Victory motorcycle. I hadn't seen him in two years. I'd grown up with him. He's a few years younger than me. The fat kid. He's a detective now. We rode around all afternoon, barely speaking. Over the blacktops throughout the county. My fingers were numb after the ride. We sat on the rickety bench in my front yard under the redbud with him rubbing my hands between his, still not talking. While we were sitting there, my cat came running across the yard with a baby rabbit in its mouth. I yelped and rescued it. "What do I do?" I asked him.

He shook his head. "It's not going to make it." He said.

"It might make it."

"Always taking in strays, Haley," he said, shaking his head. Then he left. Last time I ever saw him.

On my walk today, I found a whole robin's egg in the gutter. I picked it up very carefully, cradling it in my hands to keep warm. Maybe there's a baby bird still in it! The rest of the walk was about the egg, warming it, wondering about whether it was possible to hatch it, worrying about not dropping it or breaking it. I stopped thinking about Jay, I just wanted to get the egg home. I stopped smelling the flowers or listening to the creek or noticing the spring.

Home, I found some old pantyhose, made a nest out of it, and put it on top of my Baldwin Acrosonic under a lamp.

Jay walked in the door. "What is that?"

"It's a robin's egg! I found it on my walk. Do you think it will hatch?"

"It might...what on earth are you going to do with a baby bird if it does? You have to feed them like every three minutes."

"I haven't thought that far. Carry it in my scrubs?"

He just laughs. "Did you know it's Cervantes' birthday today?"

Zazen on Wednesday

Seido Ronci says today, "One of my students has been blogging about me--called me the aged poet." He laughs. I mentally run through whatever entries I've made regarding Seido--and I don't think I've called him aged.

Nice to roost for a moment up there in the room, with the other students, hands in the mudra. This thing I do every day (almost) that is always the same.

I've pretty much given up.

Seido said something today--he quoted someone (I'm such a bad zen student--I can never remember who's who)--that when you do become enlightened, you will realize that you've been enlightened the whole time. That everything is and has been perfect just the way it is.

He is so scoured by Zen. He shines like coals in an alabaster bowl. I realize that I'm a little jealous of him, haven't really appreciated the gifts he brings to us. I show up, but I'm cranky and recalcitrant. I want attention. 26 years. It's still like library story hour when I was three. I can't sit still and I want to switch cushions and be the teacher's favorite. Teacher, teacher!

When he says this, I think about my patient with his brains on the pillow and his daughters weeping over him and don't think life is so perfect.

Life can be a horror, even for the good.

Lilly's back from her meeting at church. So...that's my 6 minutes.

Choices

It's Monday. I feel scourged.

Nick is trying to choose a college. He's narrowed down his choices to Sewanee and Loyola New Orleans. My father has sent me 7 emails encouraging me to help him pick a college. Duh. My parents have called three times today.

I had 4 patients over the weekend. One was a suicide. His family was mystified. Beautiful family. It came as a complete surprise. Hard not to hope. Fine line to walk. Sometimes he had responses, some times he didn't. His daughter would grasp onto these--"He's in there. Do you think he can hear me? Do you think there's hope? What would you do?"

I cop out of these questions when I can. When I can't, I stick to the truth.

"Have you seen injuries like this get better?"

"Yes." Well, I have. I had a patient whose brains would come out of his nose when I turned him. Unbelievably, he recovered. It's always amazing how much of your brain you can actually do without and not really notice. We would joke when we suctioned him and find grey matter on the pillow--"Oh, look at that...graduation..."

His sister takes me aside. "Please try not to give these girls any hope."

You try to keep yourself clear, open, present. It's hard.

"I'm so sorry," his sister told me at one point. "I'm sorry I tried to take over."

"Designer death," snorts Wiz. "Everyone wants control over everything. "

Wiz has taken a second job, he won't say where. He is clenched like a fist. Short. Exhausted. Noncommunicative and brutal when he is. No joking, no singing, no weird aphorisms or flights of philosophical soap-boxing. Work. He's checking off his tasks. He acts like a prisoner, like a cart horse.

"You have limits, too," I say to him, after Friday's shift.

"Thank you for your opinion." He says, giving me his back as he walks down the hall.

"Sauce for the goose."

"Go tell aunt Rhodie." He can't resist.

"Don't forget your medication tomorrow!" I call after him cheerfully.

He's a little better Saturday. At least he engages in banter. And he's nice to Marcy. I am submerged with my suicide.

Sunday, we have a care conference to discuss palliative and withdrawal of care. It's perfectly awful. I had a flat tire on the way to work, didn't get my cafe con leche. I also found out this week that I have some sort of growth on my thyroid I have to get biopsied. I worry about telling this to Jay. Somehow, I don't think he's the type for the long haul through sickness. My shrink disagreed with me on this point. "Look at his history," he pointed out. "the more screwed up you are, the better."

"How are you holding up?" Wiz asks me, Sunday.

Oh, good. He's back.

Someone leaves a funeral wreath in the ICU waiting room. One of our crazier family members goes screaming about this all the way to the CEO. It's our fault some lunatic leaves a funeral wreath? Now we're supposed to police the waiting room?

I admit a patient from a car accident. Miraculously all right. His buddy who was in the car with him walks out of the emergency room AMA and up into the unit. He has a gash on his head pouring blood and as he walks, you can see that his right leg is clearly broken, because the bone is torquing the skin. "I want to see Ed!" He screams. "I got to see Ed right fucking now."

"Could you please go back to the waiting room. You also might want to go back to the ER."

"I'm fine. Those fucking doctors don't know what they're doing. I want to see Ed." The same woman who screamed about the wreath screams about this, too. "He's upsetting people!" she tells Wiz. "Make him go to the doctor."

"I can't," Wiz tells her, holding her hands, "it's his choice. People make their own choices. He's not threatening anyone, and he has a friend here. If he becomes disruptive, we can call security, but otherwise, there's really nothing we can do."

"He's disrupting me!" She says.

The family decides to withdraw care. We page the palliative team. Everyone wants a piece of this death. The wife and daughters are under siege. Is there anyone out there who knows what it means to really support someone? There's a doctor in the family who goes on and on about what will happen when they remove the vent. There's a friend who keeps interrupting the wife and saying "What she's trying to say is..."

I'm so glad to get out of there. Finally the shift is over. And then at the end, one of the daughters says, "Will you be there, with him when they withdraw care?"

"I'm not working tomorrow." I tell them.

"Oh, that's too bad. Do you know who it will be?"

"No." Shit. So I went today. Put on my twin set and rode my bicycle over. The bike lock's rusted. Couldn't find socks. Is there anything that makes you feel more poverty stricken than not wearing socks? The crazy wife notices. "You're not wearing socks!" She says, pointing at my feet. I wonder if she'll complain about this, too.

"I know. My kids did the wash."

She laughs. "I have socks if you want them," she tells me.

That's my 1/2 hour.

Happy Tax Day

Tomorrow is tax day. I sent my cousin Sara a DVD of Milo and Otis.

Sara is a year younger than me. She's apparently having a nervous breakdown. My Aunt Esther, who lives in Seal Beach, in a house on beach tells my dad that this is worse than when she (Esther) had cancer and didn't know whether she would live or die. She says that Sara stands in the middle of the living room and sobs, for hours.

Esther is really an amazing person. After getting kicked out of Stephens College for inappropriate behavior, my nana, never one to admit defeat, pronounced her educated and sent her on a world tour. While circumnavigating, she met Stuart, a marine. They got married. Stuart was really good looking but a complete hick--from the Tennessee backwoods. Grew up without electricity and running water. My family, being the sniping pretentious pretenders they are predictably treated him like crap.

Stuart got even.

The only job he could get was as a gas station attendant. He worked and worked and worked. He bought the gas station. Then he worked and worked and worked. And bought another gas station. And another and another. He became a tycoon. He wore loose net shirts with big gold medallions nestled in his curly black chest hairs. He was a complete embarrassment and he could buy and sell every one of us. He and Esther had a good time, but unfortunately, Stuart was also having a good time at his office at the top of some LA High Rise. He hired pretty girls just to walk around naked and have sex with him--while he was at work! Then he fired his accountant--big mistake, because she drove right over to the house and told Esther all about it. Esther, distraught, took off to Kansas City to stay with me for a few days (I was 21). She took me out on the town--unfortunately, when it came time to pay the tab, we discovered Stuart had canceled all her credit cards and I had to pay our ginormous bill with the traveler's checks my mother had sewn into the waistband of my 501's.

They got divorced. Esther got 14 million dollars, which is ok. She married Ted, a sober decidedly unglamorous mechanical engineer who used to fly missions in Viet Nam. She finished her mental health degree and takes in disadvantaged children to foster. She also ran the guardian ad litem program. She became a mennonite. She is the most tanned, surgically altered, millionaire California girl mennonite ever. But she's so sincere and good.

So Sara. Her daughter. My cousin.

Sara was a physical therapist. She made great money. She was good at it. She has the best sense of humor--sly and dark. When I got divorced, she came down to Florida to keep me company. Worked as a traveler. Went to kickboxing with me when I was in love with my teacher and he'd rejected me and I was too proud to stop going (what an idiot. I should have stopped going. I didn't want him to think I had feelings for him.) Drove all the way from Fort Lauderdale every Saturday afternoon to do this! Then we had a fight over something silly. I can't remember what it was, and we stopped speaking. Xavier. She wasn't very nice to Xavier. Some other stuff,too, I think. I guess if I can't remember, it must not have been that important.

She went back to LA. Had a bad relationship. Quit physical therapy and became a teacher in an inner city junior high. She won best teacher her first year there. She was a great teacher, but she wanted to get married. She joined an online dating service, met a geologist and married and had three kids with him. They live in a house by the redwoods. Except something went wrong, and she packed up and left him and the kids and is now standing in my aunt's living room, sobbing. She says she doesn't know how to be a mother.

When we had our fight, after not speaking for a few months, I sent her a happy tax day card and we started getting along again. So, for the next 10 years or so, instead of a Christmas card, we would send each other Happy Tax Day cards. Then our lives got crazy--well, then she got married. She bought the kids a VHS of Milo and Otis, so, there it was at Gerbes--that's my 1/2 hour.