The last two days have been very productive and healing.

I'm really enjoying my work, my co-workers, and all of the kids. I feel needed and very fortunate to be a nurse working at Children's Hospital Oakland. I want to thank people like Claudia, Felicia, nurse manager Kim, ward clerks Bahia and Dee, the happy janitor who always wears a black headband, and the Latino mopper who can sing praises for hours about his dust mop that incredibly "works better than a Swiffer".

I love them all.

On the days I work, I wash my breakfast bowl in the sink and look outside the window that faces east. At the precise moment I pour some Lemon Joy onto the blue sponge, the sun tranforms the city's outline ablaze with gold. At night, as I travel home over the Bay Bridge, I see the last moments of the day off to my right. Alcatraz, the Marin Headlands, and the other hills and ridges I have yet to explore -- they bathe in soft, peaceful blues and exotic shades of orange. It's too good to considered a commute. It's communion.

I feel gifted and reborn.

Today, a friend told me about a very big struggle that they have been going through over the past four years. It was devastating news to hear about how much they have been suffering. When I learned of the shame and isolation they have felt, I hung my head and cried. I felt physically exhausted after they left and I slept for a couple of hours.

This evening, I'm rediscovering one of my old pastimes; I skateboarded to my new gym. It feels weird to wear some of the same gear I wore back when I was in Portland. The same ripped pants, same shoes, same studded belt. A different me?