Revelation*

*As every good theology student will tell you, the way to tell a Bible thumper amateur from a proper academic lies, among other things, in the way they refer to the Book of Revelation. As Professor A.J. Levine--Rockstar Levine, we used to call her- -once sternly admonished from the pulpit of Literature, Religion and Faith of Early Christianity (because divinity school was all about briskly denouncing naughty naughty , shame shame terms like 'New Testament' and 'Old Testament'): It's the Book of Revelation. Not Revelations."

This statement will resonate somewhat more poignantly and nostalgically (albeit with a faint echo of unpleasantness, no doubt) with those who suffered Vanderbilt Divinity School's 2001-2002 core classes (Constructive Theology, any one?). The rest of you may wonder why the hell I brought it up at all. Any way, this digression has little to do with my actual post, except in a purely tangential way, but if you ever hear anyone talking about the Book of Revelations by all means feel free to gloat, feel annoyingly superior, point fingers , nay, make rude hand gestures and loudly mock the dumbfuck who quotes from a book that doesn't actually exist in any Christian texts, anywhere, apocryphal texts included. Woe to you, dumbfuck Bible thumper! We shall vanquish thee with our superior knowledge of Christian texts.)

Alright. So, with that out of the way, let me say work yesterday was interesting. By which I mean the usual deprivation of food, water, bathroom breaks, and dinner breaks was at it's shining best. I ate nothing from 11-7p, and it took me three hours to eat a sad litttle microwave meal, because most of the time I was so busy I could only manage to eat in little bites, eg: bite--chart--bite--get up and empy foley bag--bite--bite--settle patient--bite-answer call light--bite--pass meds--chart--bite, ad naseum. Not a particularly swift or efficient method for consuming a meal, might I add.

I think the gem of the day was getting farted on by a woman I was straight cathing (inserting a catheter into the urethra so she could void, aka pee). Poor woman was certainly mortified, and I felt sorry for her. Really, I did. Because lo, I would have wished myself to die and take my flatulent essence up to heaven with me, had it happened to me, the poor dear.

I, however, have been farted on.

In the course of my normal work duties, no less.

Good fucking Gah.

What the hell am I doing here?

Really, existensial questions aside, you have to wonder who's pulling the little puppet strings up there when, while performing a mundane nursing task, you get a full blast of flatulence square in the face. Flatulence that you have to be graceful enough to pretend not to smell, gag, or otherwise give notice, and calmly go about your business of poking someone's poor urethra with a catheter.

Dude. I think Strindberg should write a play about this experience. Or maybe Ionesco. He could rewrite Le rhinoceros so that the rhinos all fart loudly as they run amuck, or something absurd. I think he'd really, really dig the idea, personally.

It was a really nutty day, to tell you the truth, but I won't go into the nuttiness, because it's the same nuttiness as always: three patients coming back from procedures all at change of shift, and all of them are mine, short staffed between the witching hours of 3-7p, and I'm on for a 11a-11p. Blah blah blah blah blah.

Any way, what I really want to talk about--can you take the stream-of-consciousness any longer?-- is The Weirdness. Which is Weirdness I haven't felt since maybe junior high, or highschool. It's the Weirdness of being an outcast, or an unpopular kid that doesn't have any friends.

It may also be a product of the musings of a paranoid delusional in-the-making, but I swear I felt like The Biggest Loser (not the horrific reality t.v. show of the same name). It was all like highschool up in there today, with everybody gossiping with their gal pals, and meanwhile, I'm getting farted on while watching pee trickle out a catheter, so then I can document the amount of urinary output (because my brain cells can only take so much excitement, after all). And then I'm sitting at my desk, frantically charting about the pee, and people are still hush-hush talking about their sex life and cool plans for Friday.

Okay, folks. Am I like, the big dork with the "She's not cool enough" sign on my back that no one told me about?

Of course, I'm a fucking nut job for even caring. Because of course people can have friends and chat, and of course I'm mature enough not to begrudge them that pleasure, because we work in an environment where shit is a literal daily commidity, so why not steal moments of friendship where they bloom?

But still.

The little baby-whiner-insecure-new-nurse living inside me (n.b. NOT a real fetus/baby, I mean "baby" in the strictest metaphorical sense possible) was not a happy tyke today. Nosiree bob. I was sad and missing my friends and family, all which are scattered across the fricking country/planet.

And then I finally realized, "Jesus, Jamie, you don't have to stay here. The only reason you're here is for a stupid job." Jobs in my profession are, reportedly, quite plentiful everywhere in the continguous United States. I don't have family here, and the few close friends I have are all smart enough to be graduating from Ivy League Nursing School of Doom (my moniker, note) this May and shall be henceforth scattered to the four winds.

I mean, everyone at work has a family here, like, you know, roots; they've lived here all their lives. Yankeeland is their home. And I feel like the biggest outsider, because Yankeeland has neverbecome home for me (maybe it's the unwelcome random car burglaries, or maybe it's the fact that it's cold 6 f-ing months of the year). I feel all lonely and sad and detached. (Uh oh. Psych Nurse Jamie says: Warning! warning! Feelings of depersonalization alert!)

Work, ergo, becomes this symbolic depressing reminder of my plight in life, kind of like those lit-up directory signs in the mall that say, "You are here." (When I was about five, I actually thought the directoy was a sentient being, or something, because I distinctly remember asking my mother, "How does it know we're here, mom?" I also insisted that "M" was "W" turned upside down at age one--well it is, if you think about it--so I imagine my poor mother had her hands full with me and my budding genius/dyslexia.)

And that plight is: I hate it here. It sucks. I don't like the weather, the people are mean and nasty (not my coworkers, but everyone I meet here in public seems to be dour, put out, and slightly skanky. ) It seems to me that girls around here all have these pasty white complexions and bad hair color jobs with way too much gel slicking back their ratty ponytail, and the stretch jeans and baby tees don't quite cover the pallid rolls of flesh, either. ECK. Likewise, the young guys around here are all pseudo-ghetto with those ridiculous jeans ten sizes too big hanging off their asses. Like, get a job and buy decent pants, man. No one wants to look at your crack. Especially when you spend your work day getting farted on.

I don't get the driving around here, either. It's like traffic lights and signs aren't law, they're just there for "suggestions" as to the proper way to procede through an intersection, or merge onto a highway, or whatnot. I almost got T-boned by a speeding car tonight, barrelling right though a red light when I had a green. That's probably only the eight hundredth time that's happened since I moved up here, and I've had it.

Sadly, my Xanadu-did-Kubla-Khan-a-stately-pleasure-dome-decree (Nashville, in other words) must wait. Free will is an ickle thing, hampered as it is by practical matters, like money, and cash, and greenbacks. Not to mention a real plan. I'd love to just pick up my stuff and move to Nashville, but I doubt my landlords would be happy to find I've abandoned their property.

Still, I think my Nor'eastern days are numbered. Thank God. I think it's honest, and not just an exercise in pointless negativity, to finally say, "I hate this place, and it's long since used up its usefulness. I'm getting out, some day soon." Ah, vagueries. The saviors of a die-hard procrastinator like myself.

Also, I didn't sleep last night, so if my writing sounds like someone on a manic spree wrote it, well.. I kind of fear a psychotic break at this point. I mean, how much worse can work get when you get... well, you know already.

P.S. Am thinking of shaving my head, but can't. Wish I would have done it in college, when there was less social/professional obligations, but I didn't want to be one of those New College girls. You know, the ones that spell women "womyn" and date girls until graduation and such. Still, I should have done it (shave my head, I mean, not date women or spell the word using nonstandardized English. I mean, I get the point and all of the spelling, but when you live in the real world, it's funny how those types of consideration are... ummm... meaningless. Plus people will laugh at you. Openly, at any rate.) Guess I'll have to wait until I'm retired and eighty years old to shave my head, so they can just attribute it to my new-onset dementia, or something.

Any way, am thinking of getting it cut very short, because it would look horrendous, and I like to martyr myself that way. No, just kidding. But seriously, it would be nice not to bother with hair, wouldn't it?

I'll stop. I've really babbled long enough. I'm beginning to scare myself with this prolific yet bizarre post, actually. Must. get. sleep.