Ode to Octopi

Why O Why, fair octopi,
Do you squirt ink?
Now let me think.
Is it because you have so many arms?
Or because you've lost all your charms?


Thank you Monn, for collaborating on this master work lo those many years ago.

Water, Water Everywhere...

...and I can't take a shower. I can't wait until I'm allowed to get my back wet again. I'm going to stay in the shower until the hot water runs out, let the tank fill up again, and repeat it about a thousand times. I'm going to wash my hair every time, too.

My manager said that I don't have to have the hole in my back packed every day anymore, that every three days is enough. That's good. Maybe by next weekend I can fulfill that fantasy.

~~~~~~

I've been meaning to write about this since Sunday. I heard a really good sermon this weekend. The Gospel was the story of the Samaritan woman at the well from John. It's a favorite Gospel of mine, but I gained a different perspective this weekend.

Most of the homilies, sermons, and reflections I've heard about and read about on this particular reading deal with how countercultural it was for Jesus to speak with this woman. First, she was a woman, and a rabbi wouldn't waste his words on a nobody like that. Second, she was a Samaritan, and no self-respecting Jew would deign to speak with one of "them." Finally, she had a bad reputation. She has had five husbands, and is currently living with a man who is not her husband. In short, she was the type of person anyone in their right minds would go out of their way to avoid. But Jesus didn't, and in fact used her to spread his Word. It's a great reading to use when the theme is focusing on how God can use us and how we have value in His eyes despite the fact that we are flawed and fallible.

This past Sunday, the pastor did touch on that, but his main focus was on how this woman was doing something terribly mundane and ordinary, the everyday task of drawing water from the well. And it was when she was doing this ordinary, mundane task that Jesus sought her out, taught her, and used her to reach other people.

It reminded me of the Jubilee conference which I attended every year when I was in college (and coincidentally enough, was going on this past weekend). The main point the Coalition for Christian Outreach tries to get across during this conference was that we have been given gifts by God, and that we need to use those gifts to serve in our everyday, workaday life. Whether we are pastors, or doctors, or bankers, or computer geeks, we can serve Him through the way we perform our jobs and live our lives. Those conferences had a profound effect on me, and I will write about that sometime.

~~~~~~~~~~

Finally, in keeping with the water theme, there is an interesting discussion on removing the water from the baptismal and/or holy water fonts during Lent at Dash's blog. I personally don't like to have the water removed. I like to be reminded of my baptism during Lent, during this time of preparation. But that's just my opinion.

...But First, A Song

There's a hole in my back,
dear Liza, dear Liza,
There's a hole in my back,
Dear Liza, a hole.

With what should I mend it,
Dear Henry, dear Henry,
With what should I mend it,
Dear Henry, with what?

With expensive silver stuff,
Dear Liza, dear Liza,
With expensive silver stuff,
Dear Liza, that's what.

There really is a hole in my back, a rather deep one, too. There's currently stuff stuffed in it that costs $150 a sheet in order to try to get it to heal. The hole in my back is worth more than I am. Maybe it's the pain medicine, but I find that really funny.

So, here is the continuing saga of Sheryl's Abscess (coming soon to daytime TV near you). I went to the doctor of Monday afternoon to follow up. She was appalled. The emergency room nurse never gave me a wound care sheet, so I had no idea what I should have been doing over the weekend. Sunday night, the incision started to ooze something fierce. I was afraid to take the original guaze dressing off because I was afraid of the packing the doctor put in. It was drenched with pus.

When my doctor took the dressing off and the packing out, it just gushed pus. She said that they first of all prescribed an antibiotic that was nowhere near strong enough. Second, since I didn't know that I could change the dressing, the pus sitting on my skin caused a secondary cellulitus, which can be serious. Then when I told her that the ER nurse told me to take the packing out in the shower on Monday morning, she was livid (glad I didn't listen - being a chicken pays off sometimes). She got me some samples of a serious, serious antibiotic, and sent me down to a surgeon's office to have it looked at and repacked. I went and got packed by the surgeon's nurses every day last week.

Well, my manager offered to pack it this weekend, and she looked at it Friday to see what she was dealing with. I told her how they were packing it (cleaning the exterior with betadine, swabbing the interior with peroxide, packing it with a 2 by 2 soaked in betadine). She didn't like the look of the hole, and she didn't like how they were packing it, so she called one of our wound care consultants. She told her to pack it with a strip of the expensive stuff (it has silver, which is an antimicrobial agent, enbedded in it), so that's what she's doing.

There's still a lot of hard area around the hole, which isn't a good thing, but I suppose it's healing. At least I hope so.

_______

Oh, yeah. I'm officially not a temp anymore. Yay! And my manager isn't that bad. I guess she just doesn't like being lied to, which is what L did (she told her she had to have surgery because one of her implants was displaced).

I'll write more tomorrow. Really. Honest

Sheryl's ER Adventure

So, you know that cyst on my back? Well, turns out it was an abcsess. Yeah. No idea where it came from, but there it was. But you want to know the story (OK, probably not, but I'm going to tell you anyhow)

Well, I spent the better part of yesterday trying to convince myself that I was sick enough to go to the emergency room. And when I finally decided that I was, I drove around for another hour trying to convince myself again (I'm stubborn like that). When I finally got there and they took me in for triage, My temperature was 102.7, and my blood pressure and pulse were both really high (the doctor thought because of the fever and infection, plus the fact that I was scared to death). They took me right back, and I knew I was sick. They never take you right in unless you come in in an ambulance or you are in bad shape.

So the doctor finally came in (actually I was probably only waiting about 20 minutes) looked at my thing (that sounds vaguely naughty) and promptly said that he had to get the attending because it was right on the border between being able to be drained in the ER and having to be done in the OR. So that sent me into a minor panic.

The attending came in and decided that they could drain it. Great. So the resident comes back with all this stuff and tells me what he's going to do. He said he's going to inject some "numbing medicine" (lidocaine I would guess - they aren't real used to educated people at this hospital), cut an incision in the abscess, and drain the gook out. Yee Haw. So I survive the injections, (I wish he wouldn't have told me when he was sticking me, though, that made me more tense), and the incision. Then came the draining. When it started to drain on it's own. some of it ran down my side and burned like mad. When it stopped draining by itself, he started to squeeze it. WORST PAIN EVER!!! I was run over by a 15 passenger van and it didn't hurt that bad. And I have a really high threshold for pain. I have a newfound respect for those women among you who have given birth. This couldn't have been that bad, but it was agony. The doctor kept apologizing because he was hurting me and I was crying, and I kept apologizing for crying and making him feel bad (yeah, I'm silly like that). Then he took an instrument, stuck in in the space left by the gook, and moved it around to make sure all the gook was gone. He had to use more of the numbing stuff, cause it hurt like bloody hell when he did it. Finally, he stuck about three feet of antibiotic soaked packing in the cavity to make sure the bacteria doesn't come back. Then he gave me perscription for antibiotics, a pain killer (codeine is good, even if I did sleep all day), told me to see my doctor on Monday, and sent me on my merry way.

The medicine wasn't that expensive (only about $40), but the doctor's visit tomorrow is going to be twice that. I've decided that I just have to pay part of my rent late. I've only been late once in almost three years, and that time and this time I have good excuses.

So today, I went almost the whole day without a fever. I didn't realize how bad I felt until I didn't feel that bad. I was fever free until I decided I had to go to the grocery store. That was probably a bad idea, but I didn't have any food I didn't have to cook, and frankly, all I wanted was yogurt, and I was out. I probably isn't a good idea to be doing laundry, either, but I don't have anything to wear to work tomorrow.

So that's my story. Tomorrow I get the packing out (joy - the doctor told me to be sure to take a pain pill before that). If any of you are still reading (and I know some of you are - thanks for sticking with me!), I'll keep you updated, with less gory details - I promise!

Cautiously Optimistic

Huh. Not even a song title or a lyric or anything...

Well, the manager of the department I work in (the one I'm afraid of) called as I was leaving to pick up my paycheck and asked what my conversion fee was (the fee to convert me from a temp to an employee of the company). That's a good thing. An even better thing is that the business manager at the agency said that she doesn't think there is one since I have been here so long.

I'm not getting my hopes up, but maybe, just maybe...

Stuff, Stuff, Everywhere Stuff

Apologies to whoever wrote and/or sang "Signs."

Well, first of all, I'm honestly, sincerely not well. I have this cyst thing that popped up on my back, and is now approximately the size of a plum. I've also had a fever and chills for the past three days. Fun. Especially since I have no health insurance, no paid time off, and no money. An office visit to my doctor would cost the same as my electric bill, and the metering company won't accept late payments or make payment arrangements. My friend Amy (thanks Amy!) offered to pay my electric bill, but I just can't accept that (Sorry). Call it pride, call it whatever you want, but I've always been a fairly self-reliant person, mostly because I've had to be. Yeah, that's probably my fault, but it is who I am and I don't think I can change.

I don't like the fact that I can't seem to accept help from people. I guess I've just been rebuffed so much when I have asked for help that I've somehow taught myself to turn down help even when it is offered. It is my major weakness, I suppose, but I don't know how to fix it.

Well, if I still don't feel good tomorrow, I guess I'll go to the emergency room. Web MD said that's what I should do anyhow when I checked my symptoms. They are obliged to treat everyone, even without insurance. I just hate the idea of horribly expensive ER bills for what is probably an in-office procedure. The way things are going right now, it'll take me forever to pay them off.



~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Things at work are...weird. I think I'll share the whole story with you.

L, one of the women I work with (she is...or was...the manager of telephone nurse consultants), decided to have breast augmentation surgery. Now I know, from her very loud phone call, that she was already a D cup. I'm not accustomed to looking at other women't chests, but she seemed pretty...ample... to me. But she decided she wanted to go larger and have 750 cc implants put in. Her previous implants (did I mention that this was her second enlargement?) were 375 cc's, so these were twice as big. Yeah. She had a week of vacation time, so she took that to have the surgery.

Well, she had complications. The surgeon had to stretch her skin so tight to accomodate the implant that she had trouble closing the incision. One of her incisions keeps opening. She's been out additional days on bedrest twice, and is most likely going out again starting today.

Well G, the big boss isn't happy about that at all. She wasn't happy she took time off to have the surgery, and she isn't happy about all this time she's had to take subsequently. L is out of PTO, and since this was a cosmetic procedure, it isn't covered under short term disability, even though these are complications.

Well (I seem to have a thing for starting sentences like that tonight - forgive me. It's hard to be creative when you are shaking), G called L into her office on Tuesday. She stripped her of her title, and L now reports to one of the people she previously managed. L asked me that day if G had said anything to me about hiring me as a regular employee. I told her know, then she went and talked with K, my immediate supervisor (sorta) in whispers for a while. I didn't know about the whole title thing then, so I started to get paranoid.

L is really upset, and thinks that if she has to go on bed rest again, she won't have a job to come back to, which is probably true. I feel really bad for her, but it's really hard for me to have sympathy when, to an extent, she brought this on herself and I'm sitting there shivering and hurting. I'm trying, though.

This whole thing has made me really paranoid, though. If that can happen to her, I'm actually afraid to miss work since I'm just a temp. It's what kept me from going to the ER last night when my temp hit 103 and I couldn't stop shaking.

I'll write more about that manager another time, and the rest of the stuff I wanted to write about. I need to lay down now. My temp is back up to 101.

The Letter

Before I get to the subject of this post, I have to offer a thank you to Chevy Rose for the advice the other day when I was particularly down. Well, my bathroom only has a shower, so a bath is out; I'm out of tea, but even if I wasn't, I'm trying to cut back on caffeine (trying is the key word - I sometimes need it to stay awake at work...spreadsheets are boring!); and I have horrible writer's block. But I took a nap and then I felt better...or at least less tired.

The good news is that the year old, expired antibiotic ear drops are working, and I don't seem to be dying (though I did have a fever today). I can touch the side of my face without screaming in agony - I count that as a victory. If the nurses I work with knew what I was doing I would probably never hear the end of it. Of course, if the DEM (who is a nurse) would just hire me, pay me more than $9 an hour, and let me have benefits, it would be a moot point.

Not going to go there today.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

If you've been reading my blog regularly, you know that a while back (too lazy to search and link) I said that I was going to send a letter to teh director of pastoral ministries at the church I worked for so that I could finally find closure. Well, I never sent it, and in fact thought I lost it until today. I was looking for a floppy today to save a couple writing samples to (for a job I'm applying for) and I came across the floppy I saved the letter on. I've decided to post it here, and let all of you tell me if I should send it or not. No names are included here, but they are in the letter.

Dear C,

I’ve been struggling with whether or not I should write this letter for some time now. I couldn’t decide if it would give me the freedom to move on or if it would be picking at wounds that are starting to scab over. If you are reading this, you know what decision I made.

I haven’t been able to leave behind my experiences there because I was really hurt by a lot that happened in my 18 months there. I have been hurt by things that have happened since I left. I expressed some of what I felt to Fr. B back in January, but I find that I have been holding a lot of anger toward and frustration with you, and I don’t think I can let it go without expressing it.

First let me say that the reason it has taken me so long to get to this point is because I am so conflicted over my feelings toward you. You have to know that at one point in time I respected you like I have respected few other women in the Catholic Church. I viewed you as intelligent, compassionate, and spirit-filled. I thought you were passionate about your work, and was impressed by your ability to achieve balance between work and home. I thought you were everything a professional lay minister in the 21st century Catholic Church should be.

As time went on, however, I saw another side of you. I saw someone who needed to be in control of everything you were even remotely involved in. I saw that even though you professed to care more about a person’s gifts and their, “piece of the wisdom,” you were far more impressed with a person if they had money, power, or influence. And I discovered that, because the adults I worked with had all three, I matted far less to you than they did.

I don’t even know if you are aware of your need to be in control and to have everything done your way. But I became aware of a pattern in my conversations with you. I would come to you with a problem, or an idea, or a suggestion, and you would subtly manipulate the conversation so that I ended up agreeing with whatever it was you wanted, whether I thought it was a good thing or not. How did that happen? Because I knew of your reputation and I respected it. That’s what makes me think you are not even consciously aware of what you are doing. I’ve seen it happen in staff meetings as well, and I am not the only person to make this observation. What makes it even worse is that your opinion (and occasionally MB’s or K’s) is the only one Fr. B pays any attention to.

Now, I want you to know that I think your longevity has earned you the right to have more weight placed on your opinions and ideas than on those of someone with less seniority. But C, you have to know that sometimes other people have good or even great ideas that differ from your own. Listen to them. Don’t dismiss what they have to say out of hand. Be aware of manipulating them to your ideas, and avoid doing it.

I really want to believe you are also unaware of the value you place on money, power, and influence. I want to believe that it’s just coincidence that you seem to pay attention primarily to people who give a lot of money to the parish, or who hold or have held powerful or influential positions in the parish or community. I want to think that it’s just because there are so many people in the parish who fit that description. But I have seen you dismiss people who don’t have as much money, or who don’t have powerful jobs, or who are unwilling to play the parish politics game. I myself have been victim of that.

Now, I don’t blame you solely for that. There is a prevailing attitude within the parish that unless you have money or, preferably, come from money, you have no value as a human being. You can argue against that all you want, and hold up the parish’s supposed charitable endeavors all you want, but the fact of the matter is that it is a very real problem.

Do you want some proof that money, power, and influence are all that matters? I came to you several times because of the problems I was having with PC last year. I told you about the fact that she bypassed my authority on several occasions, and that we just seemed to have a personality conflict that I couldn’t seem to get around. I was looking for advice since she managed to involve herself in every ministry that fell under me, and I felt like I couldn’t work with her effectively. I never got any real advice from you; the closest you came to making a suggestion was essentially telling me to grin and bear it because of the amount of influence she had. Now I see in the bulletin that she is coordinator for high school PSR. This woman, who once told me that I pray wrong, who told me that I was an inferior person because I was an “I” and a “P”, who tried to rally other adults against me, and who regularly humiliated me in front of not only other adults but young people as well is coordinating high school religious education. I have to tell you that I take that as a personal affront.

What I wrote about above was not just an isolated incident. I can’t tell you the number of times I was made to feel inferior, by both parishioners and staff. I may not have grown up with all the advantages all of you did. We never had money for vacations, or dances, or sororities, or whatever. Heck, there were times when things were so tight that we were on public assistance. But the fact of the matter is that it didn’t stop my parents from raising me well. They may not have been able to afford to send me on trips or to special programs, or to pay for sorority dues, or whatever, but they went out of their way to expose me to museums, and libraries, and other cultural experiences. They knew I had been blessed with intelligence and a gift for writing (I’m not bragging, just stating a fact), and they sacrificed to nurture it. Yet there were times when you (both you singularly and you collectively, as a parish and/or staff) made me feel like I didn’t posses the intelligence God gave gnats. I may not have the best organization skills in the world, and I may not have a type-A personality, but I know I have gifts and skills that I was never given the opportunity to use.

That’s really what has hurt most about this whole experience. Do you know that at one point during the time since I left there, I felt so worthless that…well…some pretty dark thoughts crossed my mind? No, of course you don’t, but I’ll write about that later. If it weren’t for my friends reminding me that I am a fantastic writer (this letter not withstanding – I’m too emotionally keyed up to pay attention to conventions of standard written English), a terrific teacher, and a person who has intrinsic value as a child of God, I don’t know where I would be. Those thoughts still cross my mind sometimes. This letter is one of the ways of exorcising those figurative demons.

I have to tell you that I am bothered about the way I was dismissed. I felt like a common criminal. Neither you nor MB even looked me in the eye that day, and NW stood over my shoulder watching everything I did like I was going to try to walk away with the computer system in my back pocket. I resent the fact that I was not allowed to return the following day to collect the things that belonged to me. Of the stuff you people dumped on my doorstep that day, only one small box actually belonged to me, and it did not include about six pairs of good scissors, several books, and a DVD and several CD’s that did. If I had been allowed to return to get my things the following day, when I was more composed, that would not have happened, and you would not have had the extra work.

I also have to tell you how hurt I am that no one from that place has ever called to see how I am doing, except for T. You know I have no family and a weak support system, the entirety of which is 1200 miles away. Did it not occur to you, then the DPM and now the pastoral associate, that I just needed someone to acknowledge me? Did you know I spent all of February sick? I had a staph infection that it turns out I was probably suffering from since the middle of November. I was on five different antibiotics simultaneously which left me constantly exhausted and nauseated and barely able to get out of bed. But of course you didn’t know that – or you didn’t care.

Here are some of the things I wrote in my journal when I hit the nadir of my depression:

The only thing this whole mess has succeeded in doing is making me realize just how incompetant and worthless I really am.

I never should have left Pittsburgh. I'd give anything to go back, but I can't. I don't have anyone there. I don't have anyone here. I'm all alone and I hate it and I can't do anything about it. It's just not fair.

I have no doubt that God exists. I have no doubt that He's up there (or whatever) listening. I just have trouble believing right now that He offers any guidance. That he speaks to us. He just lets us fumble our way along down here and we suffer for it.

I don't know.

I'm just so freaking sad.

I hate having to pretend to be happy and content when I'm not. And I hate having to pretend that I think the Catholic church is the be all and end all of churches everywhere. It may claim apostolic succession, but it is anything but the church the apostles founded.

I Hate Myself
I really do. I can't seem to be happy. I have an interview in Houston on Monday, but probably won't take the job because I can't afford to move. A friend offered me a way to get back to Pittsburgh, complete with a job, and I can't take it. I'm sad when people don't care about me, I'm sad when they do. I thought I had a good chance at an awesome job in Connecticut, but the guy hasn't gotten back to me since he asked me for my resume, references, and transcripts, so I probably put him off, too. Then, people profess to give a damn about me, but desert me when I need someone. There must be something wrong with me that makes people humiliate me, hate me, abandon me. I would fix it if I knew what it was.

God, I sound like a damn cliche.



I didn’t share these things with you to garner your sympathy. But you need to know how utterly alone I felt. Unlike you, and everyone else there, I have no family to lean on for support, which you know. All it would have taken to make me feel less like a waste of skin was a simple phone call. I may not have spoken for long, or at all, but sometimes it’s the sentiment that matters more than the action. After all, I am still a parishioner (at least in name). Isn’t it part of your job (or Fr. B’s job) to reach out to people who are hurting?

Thanks to a few good friends and some total strangers I have regained some of the confidence I lost at the hands of that place. I got the job I mentioned above, the one in Connecticut (I got the one in Houston too, but had to turn it down). I had to turn it down because the director had to withdraw his offer of housing and I couldn’t afford to move, but he went out of his way to find a way to get me up there to interview and he told me that I was far and away the best candidate he interviewed, and that he wants me to keep in contact because he may be opening another school next year and he wants me on staff if he does. I submitted a short story / first chapterof a novel (I enclosed it for your reading pleasure) to an online writer’s workshop, and it was rated to be of publishable quality by professional writers and editors. I am recovering despite you (singularly and collectively) and despite that place.

I want you to know that I’m not sure I still consider myself to be Catholic. It took me a long time to find my way back to a mass (at other churches – not there), and the ones I have attended have left me feeling tense, angry, and disaffected. Oh, I haven’t lost my faith in God, or my appreciation for ritual and sacrament, or my baptismal call. But I have been on the inside of the institutional church now. I have seen and experienced hypocracy, disregard for the inherent value of human beings, and selfishness. At the moment, I can’t separate my love of the Church from my dislike of the church (capitalization is intentional). I can’t bring myself to be a part of a church that at best ignores these things when they happen and at worst advocates them with its policy and structures.

Maybe someday that will happen. Maybe someday those scabs will scar over and I’ll be able to return to the Church I was baptized in, the Church I grew up in, the Church I once loved despite its flaws. But for now, I’m just seeking and searching, like so many others who have found the Catholic Church wanting in some regard.

Now, having said all this, I want to make sure that you know that I accept that most of the blame for my lack of success there lies with me in one way or another. If I were less laid back, or more assertive, or more refined, or more organized, or less quiet, etc, etc., I might still be there. But the fact of the matter is that you (and this time I do mean you singular) set everything on the wrong path by telling me to defer to R and the other adults when I first got there. I was never able to work with the leadership to establish a vision for youth ministry from the get-go. I couldn’t implement some of the programs I wanted to implement, and I couldn’t set myself up as a leader as a result. I see that it looks like you aren’t making that same error with S. On one level, I’m glad for his sake. He will have a hard enough time separating himself from the students as it is due to his age. But on the other hand, I resent that I wasn’t given the same chance, and I wonder if it is because I was an outsider – not from the parish, not from Baton Rouge, not from a natinally known college, not from money.

I want to close by saying that I didn’t write this letter to hurt you, although I may have succeeded in doing just that. In fact, if I get up the nerve to actually send it, I will probably regret it later. But I think I need to say these things and have someone there read them in order to gain a sense of closure on that phase of my life.

I don’t expect a response to this letter. If you want to, fine, if not, that’s fine, too. It really doesn’t matter to me. I’m writing it as a catharsis, and I’m only sending it because the significance wouldn’t be as great if I just let it sit on my hard drive.

Despite everything I have said here, I want you to know that bygones are now bygones. I will harbor no ill will toward you in the future. Holding a grudge isn’t worth the energy it requires. Now that I have said what needs to be said I can let it go.

C, I truly wish you all the best in your changing position. I hope that you can provide the kind of compassionate, competent leadership I saw in you when I first arrived. I hope you have learned from the mistakes that were made during my tenure there and that you are able to mentor S more effectively than you did me. And I hope that you find a sense of peace within yourself.

I will be praying for you.


~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

So, there you have it. Of course, I'd have to change the end part and tell her about the Lutheran Church I've been going to and why, but that's minor.

Should I send it, or should I settle for a private catharsis?

Saw this on a message board I post to regularly. Apparently, I'm a Clumber Spaniel. I'd never heard of that breed before, but here is a picture:




Cute, no?

I Have Become...

...uncomfortably numb.

With apologies to Pink Floyd for the paraphrase (I think - I know songs but never who sings them).

I realized this week that I have hit the point where I really don't care about anything in terms of my career or lack there of. As I sat at my computer working on spreadsheets all blooming week, to the point that my wrist is actually bruised from mouse overusage, that I don't care if this company hires me, I don't car if I find another job, I don't care if I ever find career fulfillment. That scares me.

That's why I haven't posted anything of any significance of late. I just couldn't bring myself to care. I thought about posting a lot, but never quite got around to it. Why? Usually when I post I'm feeling something worth writing about. But I haven't felt anything at all this week. I haven't been happy or sad, frustrated, angry, elated, or anything else. I've just been tired. Really, amazingly tired.

I don't know what that means, if it means anything. I do know that tomorrow marks 11 months that I have been temping in the same place. I do know that they would never be able to get all the work that needs to be done done without me. I do know that they don't seem to have any inclination toward hiring me, despite the fact that they talk about it all the time. I do know that I, in all likelyhood have an ear infection, but since I don't have any insurance or money I am treating it with year old antibiotic drops and praying I don't die.

And I don't care if I do or don't.

Hmm...

Single People of the World Unite!

Saw this on Gillian's LiveJournal (she's Australian, FYI). Had to link it because I was just saying this very thing today as everyone in the office left early (again) to deal with family obligations, and there I was, sitting alone at my desk yet again. Well, I left early too, and I don't feel guilty about it now. I had family obiligations, too - I was tired.

So there.

I Fear for the Future

Saw this in Rob's blog. And people wonder what's wrong with this country.

A Good Day, A Bad Day, A Blah Day

A Good Day

I had lunch with someone I worked with at the St. Al's CCC. T was the only person there who kept in contact with me since we parted ways. She was also one of the people who I "came out" to (for those of you who have not been following my saga, this has nothing to do with sex and everything to do with religion. Read some of my earlier posts if you're interested). When she didn't call me after I sent her the letter admitting that I've been going to a Protestant Church, I thought the worst. But she called me out of the blue last week and suggested that we have lunch.

I had been dreading it since we made the appointment. I almost considered making an excuse and cancelling today. I'm so glad I didn't.

T validated everything I was feeling, and told me that she probably would have made the same decisions if she were in my shoes. She told me that if she were treated the way I was, she probably would have walked away from the Catholic Church as well. She also told me that if I've found a church where I can be happy, have community, and find God, that was all that mattered.

Talking with T really released me from some of the guilt and trepidation I was feeling. It paved the way a little bit for me to move on if i decide to. T was a real gift for me today.

She's planning to take training to become a spiritual director. I think she'll be wonderful in that capacity.

A Bad Day.

I really hate my job. The new manager either ignores me or is condescending. I hate doing nothing by spreadsheets all day long. I hate the fact that get paid next to nothing and have no benefits.

I'm still sending out resumes, for all the good it's doing.

A Blah Day

It hasn't stopped raining all day. It's absolutely miserable. I have to do laundry but I don't feel like walking across the complex in the rain to go to the laundry room.

Blah.

Freedom of Expression Unimportant?

This makes me sad.

I'm not little miss flag waver by any stretch of the imagination. I have no problem with saying that the US has problems. Big problems. I don't feel like listing them now because I don't want this blog to turn into some big political debate.

But the fact of the matter is that one of the things that makes me glad I live in the US is the fact that our newspapers are not censored by the government, we are free to express ourselves by whatever means we feel, and we are free to practice the religion we choose. Those freedoms provide another check in our system of checks and balances.

Now, that doesn't mean I think that news agencies should just report every lead that crosses their desks willy-nilly. I think CBS learned that lesson. The journalistic profession needs to police itself though, and enforce a code of ethics within its ranks. That isn't up to the government.

And while I may think that some forms of "self-expression" in "art" are icky and inappropriate, not everyone holds that opinion. The artist didn't, for one. If we censor the arts, well, that's the first step to a marxist society.

And while I think flag-burning is a pointless means of protest, I would defend anyone's right to do it. It is just a piece of fabric, after all.

Finally, freedom of religion keeps us from turning into a theocracy run by fundamentalists who have some pretty scary ideas of what society should be like. I like being able to choose the manner in which I practice (or don't practice) my religion without government interference.

I worry about the next generation. I really do.

I'm Sad, Kinda

I just saw in the bulletin from my church in Pittsburgh that Fr. Massung died.

Fr. Massung was probably the kindest person I have ever known. He truly lived his priesthood as a vocation, and he loved what he did. He always had time for his parishioners, and he made everyone feel valued, no matter who they were or what they did for a living, or how much money they had. He was a man of God in the truest sense of the world.

I could tell any number of stories about Fr. Massung, but the most important one to me is the way he treated my family. It was important to my dad that I go to a Catholic school, but there was no way we could afford it on a cab driver's salary. So Fr. Massung worked with my parents. My mom worked at the school for a couple hours a day and therefore got an "employee's discount" on tuition, and my dad did various odd jobs around the parish on weekends to work off a little bit more. I never knew about any of this until I was older, of course, and neither did anyone else. We were treated with dignity and respect, as were so many other families he made deals with. Of course that is probably the reason why that parish is still in debt today, but oh well. He acted out of love, treating people as Christ would have, not as customers in a business.

Fr. Massung also paid for my uniforms when the school switched to them when I was in 7th grade. He did the same for several other families. He didn't want to see anyone have to switch school over that.

The children of the parish flocked to Fr. Massung everywhere he went. I think that we could just sense his inherent goodness and gentleness. We felt safe with him, and he love being with us. We loved it when he'd come into our classrooms. After our well-rehearsed, "Good Morning, Fr. Massung," we all clambered for the chance to show him our work (at least until Sister put us in our places). The wee little ones (including me at that age) presented him with pictures they colored or drew during Mass, and he taped every one of them up in either the sacristy or his office. It was like some cacophonous wallpaper, an interior decorator's nightmare, but somehow fitting for this humble man.

Fr. Massung will be sorely missed. His 92 years on the earth were a gift to so many people, including me. Seeing the other end of the priestly spectrum as I did in my recent job nightmare have made me appreciate his giftedness all the more. I stated at the beginning that I was only kinda sad. I'm sad he's gone from this world, but happy that he will be forever in the presence of God now. He deserves the rest.

Today's My Mum's Birthday

She would have been 70.

When I realized that little piece of information it really surprised me. That meant that she was 60 when she died. It seemed to me like she was older at the time. I wonder why that is? Maybe it's because she was so sick and weak. Maybe it's because I wasn't ready for that parent/child role reversal at the age of 24. Maybe it's something else.

Mum and I had an odd relationship. In some ways, we had so much in common. We were both born to older parents, I was an only child and she might as well have been (her closest brother was 12 years older), we had a bunch of the same interests, and I knew I could go to her with anything and she would be supportive.

But there was a certain distance in her that made it difficult to get really close. Oh, I never doubted that she loved me, and she never hesitated to show it. But it always felt like she was holding a part of herself separate from everyone else, and that that part held the key to really knowing her. I guess it was a defense mechanism in part - her father was an abusive alcoholic who left my grandmother when Mum was five, and, as horrible as it is to say it, my grandmother just didn't have time for the touchy-feely stuff when my mum was growing up. It was tough to be a single mother in the 1940's and 50's.

But that piece she held back, when she allowed a glimpse of it, was deep and beautiful and terrifying. It gave testament to how much more there was to her than what people saw, and how much pain she carried around with her without burdening other people.

I guess that's where I get that tendency from. I learned a great many positive things from Mum, but I guess I picked up her unfortunate traits as well.

I regret that Mum and I weren't able to stay as close as I grew older. Oh, on the surface you probably couldn't see it, but we were drifting. I guess that as I got older, that piece I hold back and that piece she held back continued to grow as well. Those pieces were enough to start to form a wall, I suppose. Fortunately that wall wasn't complete.

But I guess the fact that I couldn't face dealing with another parent's declining health had something to do with it, too. There was only two years between my parents' deaths. That isn't much time at any age, but it's a blink of the eye in your early 20's. If I'm going to be completely honest, I didn't deal well after my dad died, and as a result I wasn't there as much as I wanted to be for my mum. Add to that neighbors who questioned the decisions Mum and I made together about finishing my education, and extended it to question my worth as a human being, and well, I was pretty closed off at that time. I just couldn't face the fact that my mum wasn't the same person who carried my to the bathroom when I had pneumonia in first grade, or was the team mother for my softball team, or helped me move into my dorm room my freshman year of college. It hurt.

I remember when a home health care nurse was trying to get me to change the packing in an incision my mother had where she had a cyst removed on her back. I couldn't do it. I'm not squeamish, but I couldn't stand a) the fact that my mother needed such things, and b) the idea of causing her any pain. My had literally shook so much that the nurse gave up on trying to teach me, and I ended up vomiting.

I guess I wasn't the daughter I should have been.

Despite the hedgewall of our own creation, I loved my mum perhaps more than I can even wrap my brain around to write about. I hate that I only had 24 years to learn from her, to share with her, and to love her. She wasn't perfect, but she was a precious gift in my life. I thank God that he gave me the privledge of being her daughter.

Who Stole My Mouse?

...to paraphrase that popular self-help book of a few years ago (Who Stole My Cheese? - I'd link, but it's too hard without a mouse).

I came into work this morning and my mouse was gone. I'm out of the office for one day (at a training session that was pretty much pointless) and my mouse disappears. I can work without it using keyboard shortcuts, but it's hard. I'm waiting for IS to bring me a new one. I could have gone to Office Depot and bought one myself by now.



I'll write more later, but now I'm going to go back to relearning keyboard shortcuts. Is this week over yet?

Random Question of the Day

Yesterday at lunch with the young adult group, the question arose: When do you stop being a young adult? Here were some of the suggestions:

• When you have children
• When you aren't thrilled that the pastor pays for lunch once a month
• When you can go a whole year without worrying about meeting your rent once
• When your student loas are paid off (if that's the definition, I'll still be a young adult when I'm 60!)
• When you purposely turn your car radio to light and airy favorites

So I put the question to anyone who wanders over here - When do you stop being a young adult and become just an adult?

I'm a Little Freaked Out

OK. This is going to sound totally weird, but apparently someone broke into my car...and cleaned it.

Yeah.

All I know is that when I left work today, after having been at my desk all day, the bag of trash I had in my front seat was gone, as well as the drink containers that were in the cup holder an the random bits of trash on the floor of the passenger side.

Nothing was taken, nothing was broken. The only other thing was that the parking break was on.

I'm I going crazy? Am I having disassociative episodes and cleaning my car during them? Or do I have a really weird stalker?

All I know is that I am really weirded out.

Just Another Wacky Wednesday

...with apologies to Katrina and the Waves (didn't they do Manic Monday...or was that the Bangles...or someone else? So much 80's pop just blends together).

Work is still miserable. Sent out two more resumes today, both for teaching positions in private schools. I don't know why I sent them. I don't want to teach in a regular school/classroom environment. I guess I'm just desperate right now.

My boss was crowing over the fact that "we" have all the market analyses done for proposed new start-ups and branches caught up. She said, "It makes me look good to the higher-ups...I mean it makes us look good." Yeah. Right. None of the higher ups know I exist, yet I did every one of those analyses (over 30 of them) myself from start to finish. But her name is on them, so she gets all the credit.

I'm just so frustrated with that. I mean, I know part of my function as a peon is to make my bosses look good. But it's hard to care about that when I get no credit, little respect, and I make less than half of everyone else in the department. Am I being petty? Maybe. But after 10 months, I think I've earned a little pettiness.

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I rented Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless mind last weekend. I was looking forward to it with all the good reviews it has gotten. I have to say I didn't like it. Jim Carrey's performance was good, but not great. Kate Winslet was not really all that great. The storyline was actually kind of cliche, and the way the camera jumped around was annoying. I don't know what movie all the critics who gave it such good reviews were watching, but I don't think it was the same one I saw. I actually fell asleep during it and had to go back and watch the end of it again. If you are thinking about renting it, my advice is...don't.

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I had to use my laundry money to buy gas today, thanks to the stupid cashier at Albertson's. I sometimes rely on them to get me through between paychecks because I know I can write a check there on Wednesday and it won't clear my account until after I deposit my paycheck on Friday. I've been writing checks for more than my purchase total there for months on end now. Well today, the cashier declares to me that it has always been store policy not to allow checks for more than the purchase price if the check number is under 500. I asked her why I was able to do so two weeks ago, and she got really snippy with me and said, "Well, you must have been seeing part time cashiers. I know better, and I'm not going to let you try to put that over on me." Well, I was livid. I actually wrote a letter of complaint to the store. I wasn't complaining about the policy, per se; they have the right to set whatever policies they choose to. I was complaining that the policy wasn't posted, that it wasn't consistently enforced, and that the cashier was rude.

I'm getting assertive in my old age.

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Finally, two links.

First, Samantha Bennett's column in the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette. She's writing about Biloxi, but it could just as easily be anywhere in the deep south.

My friend Amy sent me this article from the New York Times in an e-mail today (her brother lives in New York and sent it to her). I was just reflecting today that the one thing that draws everyone together in Pittsburgh, crossing racial, economic, educational, and geographic barriers is the Steelers. Generally speaking, you would never see a random white guy and a random black guy speaking together at a bus stop in Pittsburgh (yes, racism is alive and well there, it's just more subtle there than here), but bring the Steelers into the equation, and all bets are off. Now if only they played year round.

Well, I'm off. I had oatmeal cookies for dinner tonight. Is that healthy? They have whole grains (oatmeal), fruit (raisins), and protein (nuts). Sounds like a meal to me.

2005 Part Deux

Hey, I live in Louisiana, might as well get as much milage as I can out of my few words of French (I think I'm up to 10, now, though I can't spell any of them).

I've been meaning to pop in here for a while now, but just haven't. No big reason, but lots of little ones.

Let's see...the injury report, first, I think. Well, last Friday I was supposed to go to a wedding (never made it, but I'll get to that later). I had trouble getting my door to close when I left, but didn't think too much about itat the time, because my door sticks all the time (they've been suppose to fix it for a couple years now, but if they can't fix the hole in my wall, I guess the door is even lower on the priority list). When I got home from missing the wedding, it was raining (good omen for John and Cat) - a lot. I got in my apartment and went to close the door, but it stuck again, and as my hands were wet and the door handle was wet, my had slipped of the handle and I cut open my wrist on a sharp edge on the handle. It isn't too bad, but it bruised pretty good and it is going to scar.

Well, on Sunday I was coming home from church and opened the door, and couldn't get it to close again. At all. And in my efforts, I split the middle finger nail on my right hand. It hurts.

Oh, I finally got the door to close by spraying WD-40 along the track and under the door where it runs on the track. Worked like a charm. No wonder my dad swore by it.

Oh, and I have an ingrown toenail. No injury there, but, well, it fit here best.

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Is it possible to get stupider if you do mind numbing work for weeks on end? I find myself misspelling simple words, drawing stupid conclusions, and just generally not thinking lately.

Last week, for example, I was driving home from work when I had the sudden fear that I left my keys on my desk and wouldn't be able to get them to get into my apartment because the office is restricted to card-key access after 5:30 p.m. Note that I was driving. Note also that all my keys are on the same key ring. Duh.

Today as I was reformatting data, I actually discovered that I whole chunk of time passed without me having any conscious thought. I mean none. It was actually kind of scary for me, who has nothing going for her except for intellect.

As of Friday, I will have been temping at this company for 10 months. Supposedly this new manager plans to hire me, with added responsibility, but who knows. I just think that people don't realize all that I do because my boss' name is the name that's on everything that goes out. Every project she gets I end up doing the lion's share of the work and she gets all the credit. I'm kind of tired of it, but I have no recourse.

I've sent out a few more resumes this week. We'll see what happens.

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I watched Luther again a couple weekends ago. I know it was a Hollywood-ized version of what was really the beginning of the Reformation, but it was still a compelling movie.

The pastor of the church I've been going to gave me a book to read that gives a basic outline of Luther's theology. It's pretty interesting so far. I'd provide a link to it, or at least give you the author, but I'm too lazy to get up and get it right now. Besides, my toe hurts.

I wrote a letter to one of my Catholic friends outlining the journey I've been on. She hasn't gotten back in touch with me, and I know she must have received it by now. Oh well. I kind of had a feeling that all this might lead to the loss of Catholic friends. I just didn't think it would be her.

This Sunday is young adult Sunday at the church. I'm looking forward to it.

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One good thing this week so far: I found a disk that had a bit of a short story on it that I thought I had lost. I'm not going to continue that particular piece, but there were a couple scenes that I really liked. After I clean them up, I'll post them.

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Well, that's all I have for tonight. I'm going to go make mac and cheese for dinner now, even though my toe hurts. Yeah, I'm whining about it. Oh well.