Flunking ACLS

Well, the John Prine song I love best is..

You come home late and you come home early
You come on big when you're feeling small
You come home straight and you come home curly
Sometimes you don't come home at all

So what in the world's come over you
And what in heaven's name have you done
You've broken the speed of the sound of loneliness
You're out there running just to be on the run...etc.

The code I was so proud of--something happened and no one will tell me what.

"You don't want to know," Wiz said, cutting me short when I asked. "I can't believe it. It's appalling. Just stay well clear of this."

And do I care about the patient? No. All I want to know is "is it me? me? me? Did I do something wrong?" Ego.

Wiz looks agonized. Truly upset. What happened, I wonder? I can't look it up on the computer--because the patient's not on the floor any more and that would be violating HIPPAA. I don't want to ask too many questions, because if Wiz is getting some heat, raising people's awareness of it will just make it worse, and there are a lot of people who don't like Wiz. That goes for everyone involved, actually. Did Drunken Disaster do something wrong?

I'm taking the ACLS refresher this week. No more teachers. Just a computerized dummy and a simulation, which doesn't always record the actions you take. You wear headphones, and they've simulated the sound of breathing and all the beeps and hmms of the monitors, and half of the work is figuring out your way around the computer. I believe I'm becoming stupider with every passing day. And as you make stupid choices, or click on the wrong god damn thing, the patient gets worse, and so your nice day off wearing clean clothes and regular shoes turns into a little flashback of hell. I was in there eight hours. With an hour break to turn in the reimbursement forms for two of the zen students' trip to Mt. Baldy. Of course, there are things left out, because they're Nick and Lilly's age, so I'm sitting arguing pleasantly with the reimbursement czar, and finally in exasperation I end up calling one of them to bring the correct documentation NOW PLEASE, sounding exactly like his mother. "Okay," he says meekly, "I'll be right over."

Hard to keep from being mom...

Then back to the education building--which is way, way, way over on the other side of town, in this terrible building with no right angles It's supposed to stimulate creativity, but it makes me feel as if I have low blood sugar. The whole building trembles slightly with the passing traffic from the highway, and it's always freezing cold. Not just the temperature--but a strange, layered cold that seeps into your very soul. I hate that building.

I pull into the parking lot and almost have a head-on with the only person who has ever written me up--on something stupid--5 years ago--I won--then I go back inside the cramped little simulation room and try to finish up my simulations--and actually don't, I'm ashamed to say.

5:00. I reward myself with chocolate brownie ice cream. Jay buys. We sit out on the sidewalk in the crisp fall air, not saying too much. He looks so good. He smells so good. I wish I could trust the smallest little particle of him. But I don't. I should have paid attention. Mistrust comes back at you like a scorpion's tail. You hang on at first, just wanting things to be okay, but then, whoosh. The sting. And the slow, hard baked anger, that eventually poisons and silences..

I go home. I've got an email saying they made a mistake about my raise, and I'm actually NOT getting one. Then Jay calls. He left his keys inside the bank and wants to know if he can borrow one of my cars tonight. I drive back downtown, park on 9th and walk up the street to the bar.

I've been feeling the strangest way, lately, as if all my pretty is just leaching out of me. As I'm going up the street, I see Hali, Jay's ex, walking in that self contained, complacent, replete way she has. She's a pretty woman. She's walking her bicycle, she has a tiered skirt swinging around her shins and clogs. I think bad thoughts, try not to. But really, why is she such a part of our lives? She senses my glower, gives me a tentative wave. She looks like Elena when she does that, and I give her a real smile and wave back. Elena who's shy, and funny, and who I like most of the time.

I wish I understood anything.

Jay's at the bar with Hunter, who is staggeringly drunk. He lectures us about being positive. "The trick to life is to stay positive."

"Another trick," I say, snarkily, "is to stay sober."

But I'm probably wrong about that, too.

I loan Jay Nick's thunderbird. And Jay drives off. I get hit in the stomach suddenly, watching the taillights disappear, with an ache so hard I want to curl up in the street. For my son, for the past, for this fragmented life. Where is it all going? What was I thinking?

Hohum.

That's my 1/2 hour.

Love

Nicholas has friends over: the beautiful Madonna and three other boys that look exactly like Nick, differing only in the severity of their acne. They're all sitting on the couch eating fritos and watching Transformers.
Nick is doing better. His grandfather gave him a car on the day after Madonna broke up with him. It's a 92 Thunderbird, bright red, and he really souped it up. It's kind of a county boy's dream--floor matts with flames, red and black leather seat covers, which is not Nick's dream, but he's happy to have a car. So happy, in fact, that he actually jumped up and down a litle bit, just a teeny little bounce. He asked me, "How long do you think I have to wait to remove the flamey floor mats without making Granddad feel bad?"
So, nothing like a car to balance out a girl, I guess.
I'm so tired.
My orientee had to deal with her first death today. She had a hard time with it. I feel nothing, I think. Just tired. It went smoothly, the patient was elderly and the family withdrew care and within 15 minutes, the patient had passed. The doctor was there to pronounce this time.
Last night both kids were out of the house--Lilly at her best friend's and Nick at a debate tournament so I went out to Jay's. We had a drink with Hunter before we headed out--I told you about him before. Hunter has recently gotten himself trapped into a relationship with Sybil, an old girlfriend from 20 years ago of Jay's (things get incestuous in our town). For the annual pumpkin festival parade, he and Sybil and their kids dressed up as monkeys, and dressed their VW bug as a monkey, too.
"Let me tell you," Hunter says, smacking his reptilian lips, "Sybil makes a pretty sexy monkey."
"I think that's enough." Jay says.
"I mean," Hunter continues, "if Sybil really were a monkey, I would cross species." Sybil's a bit of a grifter--a pretty bird in her mid forties, running out of options, looking for a soft place to land. Never learned how to do anything, never held a job. I know a lot of women like this--and they all seem to end up okay. I'm a little resentful--I've worked so hard to make it by myself. Maybe I should have taken a different tack--but then again, I'm not that pretty. And then again again, who would want to end up with Hunter?
"If I were a monkey," Jay asks me, "would you still love me?"
He never uses the word love.
"Of course. What about if I was something, like a rabbit?"
"I wouldn't fuck you, but I would still love you."
"Would you date other women?"
"Well, that depends."
"On what?"
"Are you saying that you are a rabbit, or did you turn into a rabbit. Were you you first?"
"I turned into a rabbit. Sybil cursed me."
"Can you talk?"
"Yes,"
"Okay, then no. I wouldn't date other women. Or at least, I wouldn't bring them back to the house. Because you would yell at me and then they would freak out."
"But you would go to their houses. How would you protect me from the cats while you were away?"
"This is a silly conversation."
"You started it."
"I asked you if you would still love me if I were a monkey , a monkey is a primate. A rabbit is something completely different."
"the issue is unconditional love, not what species I've transformed into."
We stop talking, watch a movie about a guy who starts a movie theater on Fiji, stop watching in the middle, make love.
I'm falling asleep.
"I would still have sex with you, " Jay says, "and I would still love you, even if you did turn into a rabbit."
Well, I think, sometimes you just have to take what you can get, I guess.

That's my 1/2 hour.