The Painting

It's been something that I've been thinking about for quite awhile but, only just now felt inspired to write about it. Thus the story begins about 2 weeks ago while I was joyriding through Georgia. My cell rang and the caller ID indicated that it was my grandmother, better known to those of us in the family as, Mom-Mom.

She had been talking to Aunt Emily (one of her many sisters) who informed her that while cleaning out the baptistry at the church she found a painting of Jesus holding a baby. On the back of the painting read - "To Patti, Love Grandmom 1984."

At first there had been some speculation as to whether this "Patti" being addressed was Aunt Emily's daughter Patti, who is in fact my namesake, or me. They finally assumed that considering the nature of the painting's content, and the fact that I was merely a year old, the painting was intended for me. Apparently Grandmom (my great grandmother) had asked Aunt Elsie (another one of Mom-Mom's sisters) to paint the picture for me as a gift.

Her call was not only to tell me about the painting and ponder how it wound up under the baptismal tank, but also to ask me if I wanted it. Of course! Our call ended with her promising to send it to Tennessee as soon as she received it in the mail from Aunt Emily.

As I continued to drive I couldn't help but wonder what Grandmom would think of me if she could see and know the Patti of 2007. I pray with a hopeful heart that she would be proud of the person that I have become, or better yet, the woman I've become. Yet I can't seem to shake the idea that she would be sorely disappointed with this great granddaughter.

I've often been told that I'm "hard on myself." I know too, that I am a pleaser. I like to make people happy, and will often will go to insane lengths to win someone's approval or affections. It would be so nice to know that maybe there was someone who could look at me, and I would know that there was nothing more I could do to make them proud of me. I wish Grandmom could be that person.

Miss Understood

I feel as if I'm not coming across very clearly to my readers. In response to this last blog entry I received a comment that left me a little confused and thus I feel the need to clarify a few things.

Oatmeal's protege is not some creep. He hasn't done anything to hurt me, and he's certainly not trying to win my affections. In fact, he's very involved with his own significant other. I was just merely relating an instance of harmless flirtation and wondering about the meaning behind it all as it jogged some memories from my past involving someone who on a good day I would graciously, and in a very attempted Christian-like manor refer to as only a creep. I could easily think of a few more colorful adjectives to describe said person, but why stoop to that level?

Furthermore, my curiosity doesn't stem from some secret interest in him. He is barely what I would call an acquaintance. That's not to say that I wouldn't care if something happened to him. That would go against my nature. Yet, he is certainly not someone I would confide in (no offense to him) or even remotely someone that I hold near and dear to my heart.

I have a hard time accepting any type of compliment, especially those that I consider to be a little over the top, such as what he said to me the other morning. Which really is no one's fault but my own. I allowed one person, one very unworthy person, to steal my joy and confidence in myself. Thus whenever some Joe Bag o' Donuts says something sickeningly sweet to me I can't help but wonder what his motives are, and what he really means. If it were someone like The Second or even Santa Claus, there would be no question in regards to their sincerity.

Prince Too Charming

I'm not saying that there's anything wrong with being charming. In just the right amounts it can be a very attractive personality trait. It's when people slather on charm like it's going out of style that I become a little more sceptical. Even the Bible warns us about the deceitful nature of too much charm.

Tuesday night, or what Amy might call "my Friday", (which simply means it's my last night working for the week) everything seemed to be going well. I'd had most of my patients for the last 2 nights thus giving me a clear sense of familiarity with both their medical conditions and their families. For the most part everyone could care for themselves to a certain extent except for my patient in room 199, who being 100 years old and struck down with pneumonia gave me reason enough not to care that he required a little more personal attention then my other 5 patients. Just a day earlier the doctor had addressed the patient's code status with the family, and they agreed to make the patient a chemical code only, meaning that if something were to happen to him we would only administer life saving medications in an attempt to save his life - no CPR, no intubation, no defibrillation.

He didn't look good. Which really it's strange that we say that because generally sick people don't look good, they look sick! Yet we nurses constantly say it to each other knowing that the other person knows what we're really trying to say. I suppose it's more or less code talk for - "This patient looks like they're about to die." Thus I wasn't surprised when The Patrolwoman called me into the room and I found the patient not breathing. As protocol goes, I called the code and waited for what seemed like a year before the code team arrived, pushed 1 round of Epi, and then called the time of death after getting all persnickety and stating the obvious that the patient wasn't "circulating" and therefore it was inevitable that he would die.

I felt so helpless. With a room full of docs and ICU nurses I felt this overwhelming need to present myself as professional, when really all I wanted to do was sit next to that bed and mourn for my patient.

What follows next is even worse then the death itself and really, truly calls for professionalism. You call the family, you call organ donor services, clean up the body, fill out mounds of paperwork, ask the family to sign the death certificate, call the funeral home, and then send the body away to eventually be buried. Somewhere in between all this chaos you manage to find time to cry some more and comfort the family. Then comes what I like to call the crash and burn. All this time you've been functioning solely on the adrenaline attained from the initial code 99. Now it's worn off and you more or less feel like vomiting and then going to bed for 2 or 3 days. Needless to say, the rest of my night went a little more smoothly.

At shift change that morning I was beginning to feel better, but not surprisingly, anxious to clock out and go home. As promised the day before, Oatmeal's protege stopped in for his usual morning chat. He asked how my night went, to which I explained that I had someone code and die, but otherwise things had smoothed themselves over and the night wasn't half bad, which really is quite optimistic coming from me, especially considering the circumstances! He quickly replied with something to the effect of "Oh, well he saw the beautiful and sexy nurse taking care of him and decided that he had seen all that he ever needed to see, and thus decided that now was as good a time as ever." Geez Louise! I haven't felt that embarrassed since Santa Claus told The Second what my mother used to call my situation when I was little. Urg!

Unfortunately as flattering as the statement was, I just couldn't take it at face value. I had to go and dissect, and question, and analyze the whole thing until I had made myself just plain mad. For whatever reason that single comment triggered a flood of memories that I really would've rather left buried and forgotten. I suddenly saw myself back in that little apartment on Eastview Terrace, with that certain someone, who within a second's time grabbed me, kissed me, and told me that I was "worth my weight in gold", which really isn't squat diddily, but at the time that didn't matter to me. I believed what he said. In all my silly foolishness I believed at that moment, that he loved me, only to come to find that he never "had feelings for me like that."

Yet even more pathetic then the fact that I remember that day so vividly is that it seems so unreal that it even happened at all. I suppose a little of that stems from the fact that the girl who thought she loved that man, is so very different from the woman writing this blog. I suppose too I just wish I could believe everyday that I was so supposedly wonderful.All that flattery is just way to deceitful for me. It's too much for me to handle. I got burned over those types of lines once before and I'd feel even more foolish if I let myself do it again.

I'm definitely more secure in who I am and I can actually look in the mirror and stare back at a reflection that ain't half bad. But when it comes to what men think of me, I'd rather not know, that way I don't have to wonder if it's the truth or just a bunch of sugarcoated B.S. I'm not saying that I don't enjoy compliments, because heaven knows they're really quite wonderful, especially when they come from someone you love. I guess really what it comes down to is being able to forget the past and not judging other people and their actions according to what someone else has done. There's nothing wrong with keeping your guard up. It's when it gets in the way of enjoying life's simple joys that you realize maybe you need to loosen up a bit.

When Irish Eyes Are Smiling

I suppose it would be far more accurate to revise this saying so it reads, "When Polish eyes are smiling" considering the fact that I'm far more Polish than Irish, but it just sounds so much better the way it is.

I hate my smile. I always have. Of all my physical attributes it is definitely something that I wouldn't mind changing. I feel as if my smile is 90% gums and only 10% teeth, closely resembling that of a horse. Despite this personal distaste for my smile, it seems that there are some people I know who quite honestly don't find anything particularly repulsive about it, and would in fact, rather see it than not.

I remember the first summer that I spent in Tennessee, or rather the summer that I spent serving lunch and dinner in the cafeteria at my alma mater, Southern. The guys working for plant services would stumble in around noon sweaty and tired. I recall serving one particular guy who had a knack for making me laugh and therefore producing a smile. We became friends and he still says it was my smile that made him want to come to the cafeteria for lunch, despite his exhaustion. Go figure!

Yesterday morning, right before shift change, Oatmeal's protege snuck onto the floor without my knowing and popped up behind me sometime later claiming that he just had to catch a glimpse of my smile to brighten his day. With quite a bit of scepticism, I smiled and laughed.

While attending Southern and rushing to class one day I passed someone's dorm room whose door had a noteboard up with a quote that read, "Always smile because you never know who's falling in love with it." So if you see me smiling it's not because I've decided I like my smile, but because I figure I need all the help I can get!

Amour

You stole my heart
Yeah you packed it up
And took it away from me
You stole my heart

Yeah it followed you up on the train
When you left me
Yeah you stole my heart
And I want it back

So please come back to me
Life was going on just fine
Until you decided you didn't want to be mine
You gave back all the things I'd given you

But kept the things you'd stolen
My hopes my dreams
And the most important thing
My heart

You stole my heart
Yeah you packed it up
And took it away from me
You stole my heart

Yeah it followed you up on the train
When you left me
You stole my heart
And I want it back

So please come back to me
Why are you doing this?
When you know I'll love you to death
I don't want anyone but you to possess me

I'd chosen you to give my heart to
You stole my heart
Yeah you packed it up
And took it away from me

You stole my heart
It followed you up on the train
When you left me
You stole my heart
And I want it back
So please come back to me. . . . .

- Harmony

I heard this song for the first time the other evening, and I suppose I was in a meloncholy mood because it really triggered a chain of thoughts that I've tried to organize over the last few days. Love does that sort of thing to me. It makes me think even when I'm sure there's nothing more I could ever care to know about love. My heart is in a constant battle, and currently has yet to decide, if I'm going to be cynical about love or romantic about love.

Why is it that when we get hurt by love we automatically accuse the other person of "stealing" our heart? Normally it's not like me to rally behind the accused. I seem to have made a bad habit of pointing the finger at some poor soul, when I know deep down in my heart of hearts that there is no one worth blaming but myself.

I don't guard my heart very carefully. It's just hanging 10 on my sleeve, and usually jumps ship when I least expect it. Then once I realize how in love I am, it seems I become even more willing to just give of myself. As if it wasn't bad enough that I fall in love when I least expect it, and with the person I least expected, I've got to offer what little bit of myself that remains. And really it's not that I ever minded. There is no better feeling than being in love, except when that person loves you back. But I'm beginning to feel as if there isn't going to be anything left of me for the person who was meant to love me, the person who was meant to have this heart.

Life would just be so much easier if we were able to pick the people with whom we fall in love with. But I suppose that's just another one of life's sick little twists. Life wouldn't be worth living without love, yet there are those times when you're drowning in misery - all because of love. And so regardless of how many times someone steals our heart, or in my case, how many times I try to give it away, we come back for more. We laugh, we cry, we cry some more, we search for what can't be found, we doctor broken hearts for years, and then we swear that this is the last time, only to turn around and do it all over again.

I'm Fine

Recently I've had a number of individuals from work approach me and ask if I was "okay?" accompanied by that look - it's not quite the hairy eyeball but closely resembles it. Apparently I've given a few people the impression that there is something bothering me. Someone even went so far as to say that the last time they saw me I was frowning. Of course I don't walk around with a mirror to verify whether I was really frowning or not. I suppose it's not out the realm of possibilities. Even the happiest person in the world, on occasion, will find a reason to frown.

Regardless of whether I was really frowning or not, I've examined my behavior over the last few days in case there is something that I can detect that is bothering me. The only thing I could come up with is the fact that the same couple of people keep insisting that there is something bothering me. To be quite honest, it's raking on my nerves just slightly. It's almost as if they want something to be wrong. I will admit that I've been a lot more quiet than usual, but that's not related to any kind of depression. I suppose it's possible that their concern is simply being misconstrued as something else, but I'm really preparing myself for a full-on volcanic eruption the next time someone asks me if I'm okay!

I appreciate the concern, but please don't ask me 3 days in a row if I am okay, when I've already insisted that I'm fine. I have a wonderful support group and if there was something bothering me, I wouldn't hesistate to contact one of them and have a chat.