This week I worked the late shift at work which means go to work with the big guy and then hanging around for an hour and half until my shift starts.  I don't mind it, I go for a nice long walk by the river usually, but it does make for a long day.  And this past week at work has been brutally busy.

Two days ago I had a young patient, twenty-eight years old with an extremely rare type of cancer.  His poor mother looked shell shocked and he seemed apart from himself somehow which is understandable.  Only six weeks ago he was a healthy young man who ran ultra marathons and rock climbed who is now missing part of his liver and starting chemo.

Yesterday there was a youngish patient, only forty-four, who looked like he was dying.  His wife thought so too because she couldn't stop crying when she came down with him for his chest x-ray.  I helped the x-ray tech position the patient because the patient was too weak to do it himself.

And another lady who was ninety-two and still ticking over, in spite of her cancer.

I've started IVs on young people and old people, on men and women, on people with all different types of cancers and all of those patients are wearing masks.  And I wear a mask all day at work which is hot and unpleasant and makes me thirsty, but it protects my patients.

And then I go on Facebook and have to listen to people complaining about their fucking rights and how it's just a hoax and masks don't matter and OMG people, grow up already!

There are worse things than having to wear a mask when you go out to get your groceries or buy a pair of pants.  You could have lung cancer, even though you never smoked a day in  your life.  Or could have a glioblastoma that is killing you and you have five children under the age of ten at home.

Work is hard right now.  Do more with less.  Our patients always need more.  They need someone to listen to them, someone to be kind to them, someone to be gentle with them.  It's so sad but I truly feel like a cog in a wheel, insignificant, just do your job.  But my job is more than just starting IVs, it's about listening to the young woman with five kids while I start her IV and remembering her name half an hour later when she's leaving and treating her like a human being who matters because she does matter.

I feel like I don't matter.  I feel like none of us matter.  On Tuesday I went for my lunch break an hour and a half late.  Doesn't sound like a big deal but it is.  It's disrespect.  We don't have enough staff to do all the work that is required of us and I don't want to leave patients waiting for hours.  Yesterday I cut my lunch short to make sure the line patient I had at one wouldn't have a late start.  He was a young man, 3200 km from home, waiting for a stem cell transplant.  He matters.

All of my patients matter but nurses don't seem to matter which hurts.  This pandemic is eating away at my sanity.  The big guy says stop reading the news which would be helpful but I also want to know what's going on.  I'm tired of stupid too because right now there is a lot of stupid floating around in the world.  There's also a lot of selfish floating around in the world too.  All of us are selfish at times but right now, my god, it's too much.

So I'm tired and bitchy and hot, three of the seven menopausal dwarfs.  Not sure what the other four are, fat, forgetful, sleepy and sweaty I guess.  Apparently I'm all seven of the menopausal dwarfs.

Something beautiful I saw on my walk before work this week because life for me isn't all bad, just parts of it suck at times.

Last weekend the big guy and the little guy behind our house enjoying themselves.

I feel better for venting.  Today I clean and then relax.  The windows are all open and I can hear a blue jay in the back yard.

As my friend would have said, "Always look on the bright side of life."  I think she always did.

Big sky country indeed.  The view towards Waterton National Park from Police Outpost Provincial Park.

I finished our quilt yesterday which felt good and I put my sewing machine away until the fall. 

We took the dogs for a quick walk after I picked up the big guy from work.  The sky was threatening so we only walked halfway and back.  We had quite the storm last evening.  When it gets hot here, the weather gets bad. 

I'm feeling slightly better which is good.  I'm trying to remember that I have no control over the behavior of others, just my own actions.  I'm trying to remember to breathe.  I'm trying to make it through each day. 

It's sunny today so I've planned on treating myself to a drive and a chance to take photos, something I rarely do by myself.  I always have a list of things to do which gets shorter and longer and shorter and longer.  I cross things off and then add new things.  None of these lists will matter when I'm dead of course.

I was on Elizabeth's blog this morning and she was writing about her daughter's seizures.  I imagine she's always waiting.  Waiting for a seizure, waiting to see how long the seizure is, waiting to see how severe the seizure is, waiting to see if Sophie survives the seizure.  Endless waiting.  She's done this for twenty-five years. 

The pandemic feels like this endless waiting too.  It's a heavy burden for Elizabeth to bear and she does bear it with grace and wit and dark humor.  Now with this pandemic, we all know a little of what Elizabeth has faced for the past twenty-five years.

A friend of mine in Australia, a friend from my teenage years, is waiting too.  Her husband has been diagnosed with lymphoma and they are waiting for pathology reports and waiting for CT scans and waiting for a treatment plan. 

So I guess I can buck up and learn to wait and accept with equanimity because there are no other choices.  I've tried them all, anger, denial, bargaining, depression and it's gotten me nowhere.  And now there is a pandemic.  I always want to control things.  I have no control over a pandemic or how others react to this.  I wash my hands, I wear a mask in public, I limit my interactions with others and that's all I can do. 

With my son I have set boundaries that he can no longer cross and that's all I can do.  I need to accept.  The universe is a tough teacher and tenacious, but what about me?  Can I learn?  Can I unlearn?  That's the real question, isn't it?

 Miss Katie had her birthday party today and she had so much fun.  She loved having her nephew there and she laughed and laughed and laughed. 

When my baby girl is happy, I'm happy.

The Sweet Grass Hills of Montana in the distance.

The Sweet Grass Hills of Montana in the distance and Writing on Stone Provincial Park in the foreground.  This area is a sacred place for the First Nations peoples of this area who have inhabited the area for around 9000 years.  From Wikipedia...

Other First Nations groups such as the Shoshone also travelled through the valley and may have also created some of the art. These carvings and paintings tell of the lives and journeys of those who created them, and of the spirits they found here. The towering cliffs and hoodoos had a powerful impact on the native visitors, who believed these were the homes of powerful spirits. The shelter of the coulees and the abundance of game and berries made the area that is now the park an excellent location for these nomadic people to stop on their seasonal migrations. While the greatest use of the area was made by those in transit, there is some evidence, including tipi rings and a medicine wheel, that there was some permanent settlement here.

The area was so beautiful and peaceful and awe inspiring.  The center of the photo is the Milk River Valley and the Milk River, where there are cottonwoods and camping and a beach.  Apparently the First Nations peoples appreciated the cottonwood trees.  They are hardy trees that survive in Alberta and are underappreciated I think.

Except for two rain storms the skies were sunny all day, we saw deer and antelope and never heard a discouraging word:)

It was a good break from the pandemic.  Back in the real world, two of my coworkers were losing it yesterday.  One nurse, the one who drives my crazy, was saying she was going to divorce her husband.  Apparently he has a runny nose, like he gets every year at this time because of allergies, and he decided to get a COVID test and now has to self isolate until he gets the results, and their son is getting married on Saturday.  She was beside herself and I suggested that instead if divorcing him, she just push him down the stairs.  She laughed and said they don't have enough stairs in their house. 

The other coworker is an xray tech who is normally grumpy anyway but he was having a hissy fit over the regular shit at work.  Everyone is worn down, myself included.  The pandemic has added a thick layer of stress overtop all the other stresses that we deal with everyday anyway.

I had a lovely surprise last night as I lay in bed, a phone call from the other side of the world.  My girlfriend from Australia called me and we talked for almost an hour an a half.  We laughed, talked seriously, were silly, nostalgic and and then laughed some more.  It was a boon, for both of us I think.  We have known each other since we were teenagers.  She was the beautiful, sophisticated one and I was the weirdly, awkward girl.  Now we're both just in our fifties and still friends.

And today as I sit here I have the back door open, listening to the rain come down.  It hasn't stopped raining since we got home and the back yard is green and lush.  Our grandson is coming over in an hour and he'll spend the day and the night with us.  Gracie starts a job tomorrow so I'll take the little guy to daycare and pick him up.  In spite of everything, life goes on.