Work Bully

It's really easy to talk about the pain of being bullied at work when you are talking to friends.  But, it is shameful.  Embarrasing.  You would think that adults would know better and it becomes confusing when you realize that someone is trying to hurt you just because they have a better title than you and they know that they will receive the support of their higher ups no matter how severe or blatant the offence is. 

Is it just an American thing or is it the entire world that is clueless regarding how one human being should treat another?

I really don't like talking about the incidents that I have suffered at work because people are incredulous and are so likely to blame the victim for someone else's behavior. 

How do adults expect to train their children to respect one another if they can't?

You look at the elections and how the candidates are egged on by their constituents?  If the people who are in the highest office in the land only find virtue by post chips on their shoulder and baiting each other to knock it off what kind of example are we setting?

Society is sick.  American society is sick.  Human beings tout themselves as the most intelligent creatures on earth. If how well you can intimidate someone is part of the criteria  We need a new intelligence scale.

Dress? Who Will I Impress

Last night, my young son had an orchestra concert at his school.  I had intended to take him to the barber shop to get his hair cut but, it was too late when he got home. I was not dressed either.  I had on a collared tee from a company that I had signed up to work for eight years ago and my locs were in disarray.  On the way to his school, my daughter called me.  I told her about the fact that my son's hair wasn't cut.  She told me to take him to a barbershop of a friend of hers.  I said no because there is this lady that tries to hit on me when I go in there.  Mommy she fussed at me, " then you need to dress like a girl".

When she said that to me, she touched a part of me that I have ignored.  How I dress.  I think sometimes that I am so busy in my day to day activities that just to put some clothes on to cover my body is enough for me.  Forget the color, condition,  wether they are ironed or wrinkled, the best i can with my garb is "clean".  Clean is good enough for me. And my hair?  Well that's another story.

But, the discussion about the way I dressed got me to thinking. My daughter informed me that if I dressed better that people would treat me better.  So, if I am dressing...not good, does that mean that people have the right to run over me roughshod?  One thing that my oldest didn't consider is that her boss is an abusive dictator who preys on whomever is in front of her. My daughter is a fabulous dresser.  So this brought many thoughts to mind as I struggle this morning,  to get out of the bed because I am feeling so encumbered by the difficulties of life.

One thing is the fact that I am dealing with my bullying boss at work.  Blatantly, not subtley bullying boss.  Does this give her the right to do what it is she does? No. Even if I come into work naked,  I am not responsible for the way someone else chooses to react to me.  Just like they are not responsible for the way that I choose to react to them. 

I would like to be a smart and suave dresser.  That brings to mind other aspects of my life and personality, like what would I wear and where would I wear it to and for what purpose?

 I don't know.

My daughter suggested that it was time for me to start dating.  I haven't dated for years citing the fact that I am trying to get to know myself better. (As a matter of fact, I don't think I've ever REALLY dated, I just married people when they asked).  It's been ten years since I've been married.  I know myself pretty well.  Now I have to get to the point where I have the desire to share myself only temporarily without confessing my undying love at an alter, at least mentally...with some lucky guy.

Life at 54. It's supposed to be getting easier.  Right?

Hello, Again

i have had to pause for station identification, as they used to say in the 50's and 60's when we were watching our black and white tv's.  i have had to take a brake from the life that i was living to fix the horizontal and vertical artifiact on my tv screen.  they can really ruin your tv watching experience.  make it extremely difficult to tune and oh...that peskey snow that can show up along with that noisy static can make the picture completely unrecognizable.

i've had to clean up the screen and do a little rewiring... then i had to reprogram the line up.  too many commercials interupting and urging people to buy buy buy...stuff that would make everything all right...make you beautiful thin sexy...make your husband love you and your children behave. 

i never realized how vicariously we all live our lives.  coveting those things that don't belong to us, those things that belong to others and things that we think look good, don't want or really need.  we stroke the locks of others as we see them from afar, we drive the cars of anyone's dreams and everyones dream, going to lovely islands that only exist in remote areas of our fantasies....without every realizing or appreciating what we already have..

we don't ask enough questions of the peddlers, the ones that selling happy lives poured into tiny little bottles that cost us a fortune. or the guy standing on the back of the snake oil wagon he smiles winks after handing us our empty promises in smartly decorated paper bags as we robotically pull out our wallets to purchase steam infused power that we are desparate to own. 

life is difficult enough.  but when we summon our cinderella, tinkerbell and peter pan lives to live in auschwitz worlds we create an impossiblity that we are all too often oblivious to.  we wonder what happened...where it came from... why things are the way the they are... we wander through our lives like zombies. coveting unconsciously whatever doesn't belong to us, devouring it and looking for the next victim

i have paused for station identification for a month and a half now.  not sure where i was headed where is stopped. the only thing in knew was that i needed a cleare picture...sans unsigthly and unnecessary artifact so that i could walk a straighter path. not necessarily try to avoid the bumps in the road but hopefully anticipate them a little better.

 

Proceed?

I don't want to think.  I've been sick all weekend and I've been in the bed sleeping.  I haven't had a chance to rest for the past year and I need to think about what it is that I can do for myself.  I'm tired and sick.  Now.  I don't think that I will come up with a solution to this issue by today at five o'clock.  it has been an issue for too long.  Living a kamakazi life.  I go and just go and just go until I just can't go no more. It's almost like my brain locks down and refuses to think another thought. Because after a while my thought process is null and void. Slow and I can't hold a resolution to anything for long.  Changing my mind like you change position in bed to get comfortable.  And being sick, little makes you comfortable.  All you can do is sleep. 

I realized, that I burned myself out like I always do. Ignoring the fact that I have a life to live and trying to make someone else's life better.  I'm not mad just baffled.  A little delirious maybe.  Curious as to how I end up doing these things. What can I do to love myself unconditionally without putting myself on automatic pilot while running towards the abyss?  Why do I have to find myself in severe emotional and spiritual distress before I even start to ask myself these questions?

I should know that when my days and weeks and minutes begin to run all over the page, and it begins to become difficult to distinguish one from another, that I am too exhausted.  By that time I should know that it's time to rest.  But, I always convince myself that fatigue is a character flaw that I must overcome and therefore I must keep on going. 

So, I let someone talk me into going to church twice a week and going to various functions on the weekend when I have to work just like I let someone convince me to sign a paper saying that i would pay an exorbitant amount for rent and...agreed to not have any repairs done to the house that I'm renting until I finished paying for a loan that this person decided to take out that my heart starts to pound wildly in my chest when I see on the page the carelessness with which I have lived my life. Who else is crazy enough to do these things but me?

I pushed myself to take my son school shopping for his clothes.  That was an exhausting experience.  And we were both sick this weekend.  What am I doing to him?

I made a commitment to take care of two little boys last year so that they could go to school in the same neighborhood that they were in.  I thought that I was doing a good thing but found myself so exhausted by the end of the school year that I don't think I ever recovered. I've stayed on a job where I am hated by my higher ups and their main ambition in life is to make my life as miserable as possible. I haven't had a full weekend off since last summer. And I'm tired.  Very tired. So? Where do I go from here?  What do I do?  How do I proceed?  

I remember at the beginnning of the summer saying that I didn't know how to proceed. Maybe the thing is just to proceed.  Writing.  That is how I will proceed.

One thing I know that I will do is take my time.  I used to think writing was just a dream, a fantasy.  Now I know that writing is a part of who I am.  I love it even if no one reads what I write. I just love to write to spew myself on the page.  It is the most fascinating thing to me.  To see my thoughts in words. 

To proceed.

Uncertainty

I want. At any given time. What I want. What feels good. For the moment. However fleeting. Sometimes. That's how I feel.  Those moments though...the want ones. Are not as frequent. Intense. More fleeting pastel.  Fantasies.  Little fairies dancing in my head.  Playing tricks of possibility on me.  My flame, barely a spark. After thirty years in a profession that I used to love. Instead of myself. And now I love myself.  More. Is there room for both of us in this new love that I found?
The first time I married.  The man. I did not love. Not knowing that I couldn't love anyone. Not without loving myself. As I grew to begin to love.  Begin to define it. Begin to give it.  My husband, yet to be, who I thought and never was.  Decided that I was unloveable.  I wanted. So much. To have. A happy home.  To be loved.  Unconditionally.  By him.  My children. My mother. My someone...anyone.  Then it ended. Whatever it was.  Abruptly. No thirty day notice. On the door, or in the mail, or by messenger. Pigeon.
Sad.  How. You can want something...without really knowing what it is. Or what having it. Entails.  I want.  Something. To be comfortable. In my own skin. Home. Life. Soul. To want it so bad that I can stand it. I can't though. Fleeing.  Into those pixie villages in my head. Prancing amongst the stars. Extraterrestrial lilly fields.  Where I can't gauge. Location, placement. They fade into the distance of my faraway past. Nothing. Do I have to hold on to.

I think of rest.  A place. To lay my head and sleep for days on end. Waking refreshed. And.
Knowing.

Day 20: New Shoes

I'm wearing new shoes, standing in them.  Not the kind leather kind that you get at the store, but the kind that life hands you when you've either grown out of the old ones, or they get holes in them or the heel wears down, or you don't have anything in your spiritual and emotional closet that doesn't match anymore.  I'd say the last choice is the most appropriate one for me.

I've always loved shoes.  In my younger days I would buy only leather shoes.  I loved colorful sandles and patent leather stilletos and leather boots and sturdy sneakers. If the shoe fit, I'd wear it.  I hated shoes that were uncomfortable or too small.

You can always buy a cute  new outfit to adorn yourself in, but shoes are the things that take you where you want to go.  They have to be comfortable, and sturdy for you to be able walk, run, climb, jump,  over lifes little bumps and mountains in the road.

Shoes

We take everything for granted in life.  We assume that we will have shoes.  the appropriate ones.  We assume that everyone else has shoes.  The appropriate ones.  And when we see someone without shoes-the appropriate ones-we look and whisper to each other.  we don't walk up to the person and ask them where their shoes are, or why they don't have any, or if they'd like to borrow ours. We just assume that they are too lazy to get some or that they- through their own carelessness- or lack of foresight or motivation or diligencefailed to get them...or a million other assumptions, judgements and implications and conjecture (That word conjecture makes me laugh...I have a problem with conjecture.  If you can't prove what you claim..it's cosidered conjecture.  I call it creativiy-.people in an overentitled and selfish society grow up in can make.

We never think that one day, we may have to walk around without shoes, due to old age, or illness or any number of  surprises that life can heap on you. None of us were born with shoes. we acquire them throughout a life span. Any of us...can lose our shoes.
You can walk around without them, but it makes gaining your footing much more difficult. Trapising terrain that is harsh or too soft can be painful and dangerous., it's much more painful without shoes.  If you trip over a barrier and fall you could injure your foot and be out of commission for much longer, this causes journey delay as,  you have to wait till you heal or (heel).

 Some shoes help excercise your muscles and keep your legs strong.  So they are a vital part of our existance.  They help sustain us. And our shoes are especially custom made for us.  We can loan someone our shoes...but they will never quite fit the other person, the same way that they fit us. Or carry us on exact same path...  They can only approximate these things for someone else.

I've always loved shoes.

I don't think it's an accident that when I first became independent, I would always by the nicest shoes that I could find.  Back then, I barely knew what shoes were for.  I simply bought them because they looked nice and they were comfortable and helped to protect my feet. 

Back then, I didn't know what my feet were for either.

Day 8: The Buzzer

Is that your final answer?  That's my final answer.  Bzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz! Huh? But, I thought.  I could've sworn. I...Yi, Yiiiiii. I.

I have resolved to move.  I need to move.  I need to move out of Georgia.  I need to go.  I'm tired.  I have worked here, I have struggled here.  I have fought here...I am tired.

I had decided that I would move to Boston.  I don't want to move to Boston just yet.  I am trying to launch a writing career.  I will make my way up the east coast, but I don't want Boston to be my first stop.  I need spiritual peace and quiet.  I need to still my entire being, my soul.

This morning when I awakened,. The buzzer sounded loud in my head. I thought I had changed my mind.

The buzzer consists of  lack of confidence, guilt, low self esteem.  Should I buy a new outfit? Bzz. Should I go to the hairdresser? Bzz.  Should I take a class. Bzz.  Wrong answer. BZZZZZZZZ!

I envision myself with my hobo pack on my back...hanging on  a stick.  My belongings tied in a blue or red dotted handkerchief.  My left hand steadying the stick on my shoulder, while the right holds my young son's hand.  We melt into a beautiful sunset and the credits roll. But this is just part one of numerous episodes of my life.

I have to leave this place.  I have to leave this place, not because of this place, but because of me.
Sifting through my emotions is grueling.  This is not a good time  to leave because, Brave Old Soldier is sick.  This is not a good time to leave.  But, I am emotionally and spiritually bankrupt and I need to replenish who I am.  Otherwise, I will not be able to build my son up to be who he is. Or, take care of  The Brave Old Soldier when the time comes.

It is our spirit and emotion along with our intellect that makes us who we are.  We can operate independently of either emotion or intellect, but not our spirit. Although, our spirit can function independently of us.  (Some would argue that this is not true. Let 'em argue).

It is essential that I leave the place, to preserve what is left of me, my war torn soul. 

Sometimes, I imagine that I feel like a soldier preparing to return home from battle. 

Day 7: Hard Pill to Swallow

 

My life today is a hard pill to swallow, today.  I look around my house, my room,  my mess and see nothing but disarray.  I’m angry.  I live here, in angry disarray. 

I’ve always wanted to think that I could live my life alone in a vacuum where people are less likely to hurt disappoint you and cause you pain.  I was supposed to take my elder sister to the airport today, but I lost my phone. Now, the next time I need her, she won’t be there for me.  She will leave me, abandon me.

Hard pill.

That fact scares me more than the person who burglarized  my house on Monday.  It is sunny outside today.  I spoke to my friend at work. She is having a baby.  At 45.

I was one of the first people she told when she first found out that she was pregnant.  I was honored to know. She is funny, taking notice of the many changes in her body, enjoying them and dismaying them and wondering why these things happen.

I can’t have anymore-thank God- children that is. At 54 I don’t think I ‘d want anymore. 

Sometimes, I think that my world is too small. How do I expand it…make it bigger? More exciting. What do I want from it.  Who knows?

Maybe this blog is enough for me.

Day 5-Home

I'm home.  I've never been as conscious, as awake, as sober when I'm home as I am now.  I am tired. Exhausted.  I've driven home -to Massachusetts- and it has taken me about 3 days to rest up.  I'm still tired though.  I feel as though  My journey here was smooth.  I drove to D.C. and stayed overnight with my nephew, napping for 4 hours.  And then I continued. Here.
I look around Boston, the Dorchester area and it seems that nothing has changed much. Except that the city, the streets look cleaner.  The demographics has changed slightly.The neighborhoods are more diverse than before. But, then the city has always been diverse.  Grove Hall has a Dunkin Donuts.  Not as many buildings are boarded up and left to rot off their foundations like before. 
My brother, after ten years was able to rescue my grandmother's house after it was sold.  By my aunt and uncle to people who were not able to pay the mortgage. My brother is in the process of renovating it.  It had been gutted by a fire a couple of years ago.  It doesn't look exactly the same inside, but it is still beautiful. As I walk into the yard,  I open the gate, my mouth gapes open.  So many memories.
Memories.
Visions of Nana in the front yard tending to her flowers. Or, sitting on the porch with friends in the summer.  As I enter the enclosed porch, the smell of dinner cooking and seeing the windows steamed from the heat in the kitchen.  Or, watching Nana can her vegetables from the fall harvest of her garden or make homemade soap in a huge metal tub. 
Mother upstairs in her room, glasses hanging off her nose while she reads the bible. Offering  various snacks from the health food store and watching old movies on the tv. I loved mother's room. It reminded me of an old attic.  A flea market.  I would walk around her room and just look at things. Pick things up and put them down.  I used to tell her how much I loved her room because it had so many things in it.  She would just laugh.
Holiday gatherings with family and friends that we usually do not see throughout the year. Or had not seen for many years.
Sooooo many memories.
The bathrooms have the original tiles. The main bathroom is black and white.  The tiles are in a parquet pattern and black and white.  The bottom 1/2 bath...washroom is pink and black.  and much of the original wood and mouldings remain. 

I look out the back door and see that the yard is still the same.  No flowers though and new trees, fruit trees have sprung up in places where there was at first one...then none.  My eyes navigate the layout to look for the blueberry bush...

When we were kids, we would get to the gate and swing it open and catapult to the back. The clinking of the latch echoes in my mind along with the laughter and breathlessness, that I had upon reaching the backyard. Racing towards the swings, my sisters and I would sometimes fight about who was to swing  first.  I don't remember who always won. I don't even remember who won most.  I do remember though, that we'd end up taking turns.

The nursery school, now boarded up. Memories.  Some good, some not so good. Nevertheless, it is good to have memories. 

It's good to be home. I've never appreciated home as much as I do now.  "Home" has a new meaning. Home is not only where the heart is.  It's where your head is too. Where you feel most loved at. The place where you can take your socks off and put your feet up and know that you have a roof over your head and where you can eat and have family and friends and know who you are. It's that place that you can  go a long way from for a long time come back to and still feel familiar. It's that place where you know you belong.

I'm home.

Day 3- What It Means to Stand Your Ground

I've never stood my ground.  I have always run away from challenging situations like a scared rabbit.  I am trying to stand my ground at work, at home, in Georgia.  It's difficult, when you have never done it before.  Coming face to face with fear, your human limitations and developing courage is what it's all about.  You don't need a gun in your hand to stand your ground.

It's real easy to be courageous when you know or think you have the upper hand.

I used to think that standing your ground meant taking action.  In the situation with my boss, I thought that had to retaliate or respond in kind.  Granted, I think she is wrong and thinks that she is entitled by virtue of her degree or status to be wrong. She thinks that she can do anything and treat anyone as she pleases.  She can.  But, what she fails to realize is that consequences exist for all the evil nasty and hateful things you do.  But, is that any of my business, what she reaps, wether she has wronged me or not?

No. It's not.

We human beings, here on earth think that we have to fix everything. We think that life itself, somehow entitles us to the things the way we want them. I've learned that life is life and it does exactly as it pleases.  Life does what it pleases without consequence.  We bear the brunt of the consequences of our actions and life's actions. What a huge cross to bear.

In order to carry it, you have to get a grip and secure your footing.

Now that being said, I am standing my ground.  Standing my ground is a show of strength. It is a message to yourself and whoever else cares to act out of their own human frailty that it is only in standing firm that you can really accomplish anything.  Strength and courage are huge character traits to accomplish.  With these two things life would be much better. The earth would not look like an ant hill that has been kicked by a busy four year old if we stood our ground.  We'd accomplish more, think more, smile more, love more...maybe.

I'm standing my ground with my boss and life.  Not out of anger or fear, but out of love for myself...and maybe for her. I want to become strong and courageous.

Day 2

I used to be really excited about going home.  A high that was unbelievable often overtook me and I'd have this euphoria.  I'm supposed to leave Sunday night to go to Massachusetts.  The usual high has been interrupted, or suppressed by the reality that life goes on.  I will go home, talk to people that I haven't seen for years and realize that many have died.  Many that I never got a chance to say goodbye to.  I will stay for a while, reminisce and then come back to Georgia, and torture myself with these huge question marks in my mind?

Where did the time go?  How is it that time has passed me and I'm so ignorant about what has happened in between then and now? Who the hell am I anyway?  Really?

I've changed somewhat, but I'm basically still the same angry brat that I was when I left Boston.  Always wanting things my way and pounding my fists and stamping my feet when they don't turn out the way that I want.  The only difference is that there is a subtlety to my tantrums.  People don't often know that I'm screaming out loud until I have snuck up from behind and pounded them once with my virtual psychological mallet...then, it's too late.  They just don't know what hit them.  Oh! I'm also a little kinder, I don't hit more than once and I don't hit as hard.  I don't like hitting either.  I had a sadistic quality to my attacks back then...

I am uncomfortable today.  Circumstances that have to do with work again.  But, I've chosen to just sit with my discomfort.  I decided that if I could change the world that I live in, that I would have.  But, I decided that it would be best to just focus on trying to change...the world that lives in me.  To what end?  Maybe to no end. Maybe, simply to the end that I would just like to continue to discover my deep down inside.  Most people go through life ignoring their deep down inside.  I do...sometimes.  But, that loud voice that calls to me and implores me to uncover those vital parts of Who I  Am just won't be quiet some days. 

It takes so much more courage to explore inner space that outer space.  Some days I am inundated with fear and I don't have bravery.  But, anytime I decided to overrule my fear, I know that an infinite
resource awaits for my own examination.  This deep down inside is just as vast as "externia" itself.  It is just as mind boggling and leaves me as awestruck as anything that I could see outside of me.  But, it is much closer and more difficult to see.

So, I'm going home.  Not excited, but needing to go.  Each time I go, I get to reclaim a part of me that I had forgotten existed.  I will return back here with it.  I will fall in love with it again. Maybe try to cling to it as it dissipates, fades into the background.

For now, I will sit here in my imaginary rocking chair and relax and hum to myself. Time is all that we have.  It's all I have.

Day 1

I'm doing a personality fast.  I guess it's where you avoid expressing your personality.  It's a spiritual thing.  I don't know wether anyone else would hear about it or not. When you do a personality fast, you kinda just accept things the way they are, and don't judge anyone and just plain try to slow down.  Some people call this mindfulness.  I used to think it meant trying to achieve perfection.

During this time  I don't know exactly what I want to achieve.  I just want to just do it.  I'm exhausting myself trying to change the world in my head.  It's not working guys.  I really wish things were different in this world. I wish people were kinder and more intelligent. I thought that if I practice  kindness reciprocity, that Karma would reciprocate.  It doesn't work that way.  Well, it does work that way...just not on the level that I was trying to do it. ( Not only that, if you are being kind to someone just so someone will be kind to you, is that true kindness?)

Anyway, so this mindfulness or just taking the world in and not trying to will it to change through mental telepathy, doesn't work.  It has taken me all my life to actually experience this.  I kind of realized it at short infrequent intervals throughout my life. But, when you actually stop trying to spend the world in the opposite direction, a realization that you aren't spinning the world in any direction hits kind of hard.  Not only that, you kind of begin to realize that you are not even spinning your own little personal world in the right direction. What a bummer.

Another realization that I've come to as I train myself to stop practicing daily frantic excercises in futility is the subtle and discreet ways that I try to manipulate and control people.  The obvious ways that I try to manipulate and control came to the fore a few years ago.  I thought I was cured.  But, I realize that I still try to make people like me, I still try to scare people away, I still try to make people love themselves so that they will love me. Crazy huh?

That's me on a microscopic level.  It's like looking at yucky things under a real microscope, like skin cells and bugs and stuff.  Except...It's my psyche.

My Now

 

I am posting from my windows live writer account.  I kinda like this because blogger has limited fonts.  I am wonder what this will look like when I am finished.  My young one stayed home from school today.  His allergies to pollen are really bad.  I feel bad for him because my allergies to pollen were really bad and I hated it.  I remember my eyes getting all red and itchy and my nose running like a damned water faucet. That’s what he suffers.  and none of the antihistamines really work. Just a little.  They work just a little.  His father’s allergies were just as bad.  I asked his dad one time what his mom did for his allergies when he was young and he said, “nothing”.  It made me sad.

Just Thinkin'

Not sure when blogging became such a cumbersome task for me but I had stopped for a while.  I have loved being on stage virtually and so here I am, tap tap tapping on my computer keys. Yes folks,
blogging again! I guess this is the beginning of me blogging again.  There is something about blogging that is just addicive.

I am sitting here in my pajamas just dying to write down my thoughts.  After browsing the headlines. You know...about elections Rick Sanitarium and Mitt Ramen...how US investors are eyeing vacation spots in countries where dictators have been ousted.  I remember a poetess declaring to me on a ride home from downtown Boston on the MBTA one day-- after I had confessed to her that I was an Aquarian (something that I discovered that we both had in common)-- she said, "The world just drives you crazy, doesn't it?"  I had to agree with her at that time...yes...the world had indeed driven her insane.

I don't know most of the time.  It kinda scares me how we just take our daily lives for granted.  Not savoring them and judging everyone elses. Just assuming that we will wake up in the morning and just go about business as usual.  How, we here in this great country, America feel that we are the models that everyone else in the world should follow in order to live good, righteous Christian lives.  It never ceases to amaze me how blind we are to the suffering of our fellow human beings but, also to our own reflections in the mirror.

What happens to a country that was build off of the blood, sweat and tears of other groups of human beings, but denies those human beings credit? 

Maybe, it's not my life I should fear for but, those in denial.

You Are Here

Just because I don't feel like blogging or writing or doing anything today, doesn't mean I shouldn't.  Ever feel the hopeless pressure of futility?  Every so often I get wedged in between the excitement of life and the uselessness of it all and I just have to sit and think about what this is all for?  Who knows?  The best thing for me to do is to remain in a frenzy of useless activity to avoid encountering the unanswerable questions that life presents. They are just trick questions.

So, how is a trick question defined?  It is defined by the fact that you will probably almost always answer it wrong, because it doesn't have a real answer.  It only has a presumed answer or an answer that sounds right or a  wrong answer that should be right. That is life.

So, you are here.  You are at a crossroads, looking down it and tryna see where it leads.  And guess what?  No one can see that far.  So, because you can't see that far and are scared to proceed you just kind of stand there  and you go to step on the pavement of one of those roads and you change your mind because you are not sure that it's the right way to go or what you will meet there or whether there is a hairy mutlicolored monster-the one that resided under your bed when you were a little child-waiting at the end to either devour you or greet you with a hug and eternal Reese's Peanut Butter Cup.

Although, you like  buttercups, the uncertainty is too much to bear and you step back off the pavement and stand there again, with this blank question mark looking expression.  Clouds begin to form overhead so you pitch your tent with the red, green and violet butterfly lily print and you pull out your portable director's chair and you just sit ther outside the tent.  (By the way, the director's chair has the word Actor printed on the back).

So, then the sun peaks through the clouds but it's getting dark and you just pull out your sleeping bag after opening a can of beans and you make your bed and go to sleep.

You are asleep.  You have sweet and weird dreams that may or may not give you the answer to all of the problems that you have at the present, or even some of them.  But, they are sweet, so you snore...which really indicates that you are enjoying yor sleep. Snoring is evidence of just how futile life can be, especially if you wake yourself up with it.

Why question the futility of life?  It's futile.  And you are here.

I'm Back from The Shack

After going through some turmoil and slight hell at work with the mad woman that is my boss, I have returned.  I'm no saner though than I was when I was going toe to toe with her.  I'm exhausted though. I'm batting around the idea of leaving this great state of Georgia.  I've lived here for the last 17 years banging my head against the wall and trying to be the nurse that I know I was trained to be.   The issues that I see here in healthcare, frighten me more than they did 17 years ago.

Too many obstacles exist her to really be great at what you do.  And if you are great at what you do, you are more likely to be harrassed and harangued than others.  Nursing here is a profession where underpriveldged women in a patriarchal culture run the store while walking behind the men.  They are so busy  trying to get the approval of their administration higher ups...who are usually men that they will do anything to look good.  The most common thing that they do is beat up each other  The doctors have all the "power" here.  However, you define "power". The doctors and people who hold high level degrees, have all of the vaguely defined "power", I should say.  They don't have to know what they are doing either.  They just have to have a  degree and a title. Most people here respect that.
Should you go to the emergency room one night with a sore throat and fever but find yourself on the operating table having a kidney removed, don't say I didn't warn you.  The healthcare system in this state is doomed to collapse because of the people who run it. They are only interested in monetary gain.

My boss and her minions tried to set me up this past Christmas holiday.  I keep trying to understand how someone who holds such an important position can be so sick?  She tried to make me me look incompetent by requiring that I go to the employee assistance program.  Then she started writing me up.  I in turn wrote a letter to the administration to alert them to the fact that I was being bullied by my boss. I tried alerting HR but, HR in turn alerted her and she wrote me up and then happily went on vacation. This was just before the Thanksgiving holiday.

I was able to have a meeting with the assistant nursing director and the director of HR.  I didn't say much, didn't prove my case.  I am aware that they are all buddies which is why my boss feels that she has "cart blanche" to ruin my life and anyone elses that she deems she does not like.  They must've told her to be quiet in the meeting because she didn't say much. She kept looking at me like she was about to grab me by the throat, though.
Anyway, the HR director finally determined that there was no bullying.  She looked at me and added was there.  I sat there for a minute and she asked me "Do you agree?"  I said, "No, I don't.  There was bullying."  She stated that that was my opinion.  I agreed, "I know". It wasn't really my opinion, it was fact.  I didn't argue my point.  I was just test driving the system. My overwhelmed meter was about to break.  What a way to spend your Christmas holiday.
I shake my head at nursing.  How do people who are so pathological slither into this profession and just wreck it unnoticed?  This hospital is working to achieve Magnet status.  I don't see it in my crystal ball for years to come.  Not with people like Attila the Hun running the floor.
I love nursing.  I just love it...I don't always love the people in nursing.