I am more myself when I’m near big water. There’s something about it that I understand and identify with on some underlying spiritual level. I love sparkling reflections and I am endlessly fascinated by the way light moves through water in rhythmic soulful patterns. The constant movement and seemingly directionless stirrings of the ocean exist simultaneously with mighty gravitational forces above and formidable currents within. Sometimes I feel like there is fierceness in me than I can’t adequately translate, more power beneath the dark and brooding sloshing on the surface than I could ever harness. It’s usually just the sparkling shallows that I open up and share with the world, the bits of me that are clear and gentle enough to be inviting and not intimidating. The shoreline is constantly rearranged, torn down, and reestablished by the vast unseen energy potentials. The most consistent thing about the sea is that it’s constantly changing. In the medical field we would call that consistently inconsistent, which is a completely stupid thing to call it and we should absolutely fix that weirdness.
Looking for a place to sit and write, I ended up in the corner of my old college library. How strange to choose this place now, after all those years of wishing to be rid of it. The view is unbeatable though, and I couldn’t come up with any good reason to avoid this place now that the pressures and deadlines are no longer attached to it. It’s just an old backdrop to the future I now live. I can see my past from here and that, along with the view of the bay make this one of the better choices I’ve made today. Also there’s air conditioning. I couldn’t hack it out in the sweltering beach sunshine today, even with the emerald waters calling to me.
My husband and I have gone and done something insane. We’ve booked a cruise. I’m outlandishly stoked, and equally terrified about this craziness. I’ve never been on a cruise and although I’m undeniably connected to the water and the seas, I am not entirely okay with the idea of being miles or days away from the nearest shore. That’s a giant commitment to watery awesomeness. My husband, stud that he is, has never been a fan of heights and flying isn’t his idea of a good time, but that hasn’t stopped him from being the world’s best travel partner. That crazy man of mine got on a plane for the first time in his life just to take me on an unforgettable honeymoon, and we’ve been plane hopping ever since to more destinations than I can count. I guess I’ve always just assumed that if something went terribly wrong in a plane, the horror would be over in a matter of minutes. However, if a boat goes down it could potentially take days for that terror to end and I’m just not built for that kind of horrific stamina. All of that aside, I’m smashing through my comfort zones. I will face my fear of a slow and sharky death and hop onto that modern day Titanic. Thank you, shark week, for the vivid reminder of all the hungry goblin-esque creatures that lurk in the depths.
I wait anxiously for shark week all year long and then I watch ravenously from the corners of my squinted eyes and half turned head when the promised craziness ensues. WHY do presumably intelligent people swim with the sharks? No seriously, WHY? They go out in their perfectly seaworthy boats, and then some genius decides it’s a great idea to put himself in a metal cage and get dunked in the shark buffet. I will never understand this. I will however watch it like a train wreck. It is my version of a horror film. I don’t do horror. I can’t handle it at all. Those terrifying snapshots of evil infiltrate my psyche like oil spilled in the ocean. You may not see it all the time, but I promise you it turns up again and suffocates the awesome out of things. So I abstain from chainsaw massacres and I shark week instead because while I can’t evade the rampant predatory psychosis that dwells in every layer of humanity, I can reasonably expect to protect myself against sharks by, oh I don’t know, NOT getting in the chummed up ocean with them. I could also protect the dunces on the Discovery channel from getting eaten by sharks but they don’t seem to hear me when I bellow warnings and advice at the screen. Stay in the boat, buddy. Don’t get in that water! Dude stay in the cage. Seriously? Why would you get out of a perfectly good cage?! Have you no respect for your digits and limbs? Back away from the giant vat of chum! #baddecisions
Aside from all the always imminent gore, this year’s shark week included a show called Shark Versus Dolphin. It was fantastical and full of bright and dark forces in a constant battle for dominance. So who wins? Plot twist/spoiler alert: Orcas!
There are nurses that fit the role of shark. They’re the fiercely competent ones that get right in there, assess and attack the problem with instinct and skill until they shake the death right out of patients. It happens quickly without any pretense or cutesy feels. I’ve seen them do it and it’s amazing. I kind of want to be them. Unfortunately, despite being staunchly Team Shark, (at least from a nursing standpoint), I’m afraid I’m much more Dolphiny in my own practices. This is both awesome and inhibitory.
I want to be that kind smiley nurse who takes care of the little things that deeply matter to people and patients. I’ve been a patient, and the things that made a lasting impact on me, that I remember and carry with me still, all these years later, were insignificantly small. I remember the doctor who stopped everything to call my parents for me when I was scared and alone, the nurse who took that extra five minutes to add a humidifier to my O2 to make me more comfortable, the food service person who came down to the atrium when she found me away from my room. She searched me out, not because that meal would be lifesaving, but because she cared, and that small gesture became part of my story, a piece of the cure. It was the small things that made a difference for me, and when I think about the nurse I want to become, those little kindnesses are just as much a part of that as the fierce instincts and seasoned sharky confidence I admire so much.
It’s hard to juggle all those forces, but I know I want to try. I will likely spend my entire career attempting to find the right balance between priority of acuity and equality of compassion.
It’s all about balance isn’t it? I really want to eat rainbow chip icing by the spoonful, but I also really don’t want to be mistaken for a tasty rainbow chip whale should my cruise ship fail me.
Do you suppose sharks have cravings just like humans? One of the shark week shows called elephant seals a “highly caloric” meal for the shark. Poor hangry sharks, they just want to get their snack on without being judged or gaining extra chins. I feel you shark. Elephant seals are the forbidden Cheetos of the ocean. I bet you enjoy eating low calorie sardines about as much as I enjoy eating kale. The struggle is real, my friend. The struggle is real.
In the words of my favorite animated fish,
“Just keep swimming.” -Dory
The Glittery Nurse