Ride This Wave


I've been spending all morning drinking Diet Coke, sipping coffee, and reading Time Magazine. This week, they're dedicating the issue to the topic of happiness. I read a few articles on what makes people feel happy. They say money and income contributes only a tiny amount to people's happiness. They recommend keeping a gratitude journal if you want to be happier.

"Write down three things everyday that you are thankful for," they say "and you will be happier."

1. Caffeine

2. Real Audio

3. Money for travel

I'm done reading Time and I'm on to washing dishes. NPR's this American Life always makes housework less of a chore. A twenty year Army veteran describes what it has been like coming back home to Arkansas after being discharged for a slipped vetebral disc.

"They think I'm a deserter, a coward. A few of them come home on leave and they don't bother to call or keep in touch -- not even the first sergeant. It's hard to even go to my kid's basketball games. It's a small town and I know people are talking about me."

My phone rings. The disco ring is barely audible over my computer's speakers.

"Hello."

"Hi, Christian? This is --"

Patti.

My boss. She was diagnosed with breast cancer two months ago. She's been trying the least invasive method of treating it by taking Tamoxifen. But now she's getting severe endometriosis. Her female reproductive organs are bleeding, swelling, and literally exploding. It can be unbelievably painful. She spent Christmas in the ER with a ruptured ovary. She's in really bad health. Doctors want to remove her breasts and her uterus within the month.

After she was diagnosed, Patti underplayed her diagnosis. "I'm just going in for a boob job and a tummy tuck," she told people.

The same week she announced her diagnosis to us all, she counseled me on my work performance. She listed three things I needed to work on:

1. Professionalism (No dancing or wrestling with Karl at work.)

2. Organization (Take better notes.)

3. Become more detail oriented (Perform tasks to the exact second.)

She asked me if research nursing was the right place for me. I told her I thought so and I asked her to give me another chance to improve. She said she would give me weekly performance appraisals (She gave me just one in two months). Then I asked her how she was doing, how she was coping with the holidays and her new diagnosis. She talked to me for nearly a half hour about how she was doing. I listened intently and almost cried. I told her that her crisis was our unit's crisis. When we were both done talking, I stood up and felt dazed from the experience. I hugged her briefly and we left the room.


"Hi Patti," I say. "Just a second, I have to turn down my radio."

I can't find the mute button on my computer. I focus for a second on the fact that I called my computer a radio. I cover up the receiver on the phone, then finally resolve to walk down the hallway where it's quieter.

"Okay. I'm back Patti."

"Christian," she says quietly and clearly "I have to release you. You're still on your new hire six month probation. You've improved in your professionalism and organization, but you are still missing details."

I think of Patti's staff meeting minutes posted on the bathroom wall:

Research nurses are detailed orientated.

Someone has anonymously scratched out the -ed in "detailed" and the -at- in "orientated".

I smile every time I read it.

On the phone, I tell her I love my job about twenty times. How I'm improving. How I may not be perfect for research nursing, but I don't want to be excluded from the entire University system.

Suddenly, the absudity...

"You're firing me on the phone?" I ask. "Don't I deserve an exit interview or something?"

I once heard that on an episode of Sex and the City someone broke up with a character via a Post-it note.

"You will be paid for the remaining hours worked. I'll send a letter in the mail tomorrow, but I do suppose we could set up a final meeting," she states with a hint of shaky embarrassment in her voice.

This isn't happening. This is happening. This isn't happening.

When I get off the phone I think of three things I am grateful for. I say them out loud.

1. I am grateful for my health.

2. I am grateful for my friends.

3. I am grateful for Amy.

I smile. I can't believe I am smiling. I feel there is a plan in all this. My family and home hasn't been swept away by waves. I will not end up homeless, hungry, or maimed. My life is pretty good.

It certainly isn't boring. I feel more alive than I have in months. For a long moment, I think about traveling back to SE Asia and giving my skills and time there. Moments later, that plan fades. I consider the idea God is sending me a message -- a message sent long ago and never carried out, perhaps never taken one hundred percent seriously.

First things first.

I need to go back to church.



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