Uninhibited

Every so often I let my inhibitions go and tell people pretty much exactly what I think about them. It usually happens when I'm very tired which makes me moody which in turn makes me uninhibited.

For over a year now I work in a facility which has 14 ( fourteen) vice presidents, too numeous to count assistants to vice presidents ( aka managers), heck knows how many supervisors, etc.

Possibly because of this culture of glorification of status (a concept not exclusive to this facility but definitely embrased by it) this facility employs a lot of snobs who seldom respond to a greeting let alone initiate one, are not helpful to a fellow employee ( esp if s/he's a newby), refuse to share charts/desk space, and are otherwise mildly unpleasant.

After more than 1/2 year of employment I earned the honor of a returned greeting. I still happen to think it was only due to my perseverance and treating the situation as an amusing research. None the less I never know when any of now-friendly-collegues would set me up or stab me in the back while looking me in the eyes. Still, it doesn't usually bother me. As a consultant who has to come to a facility and 'fix' things I'm pretty used to people resenting, disliking, or trying to ignore me. The duration of those feelings or my assignment by this point in my life became pretty irrelevant.

Unless, I'm in a bad mood. Then those feelings are still irrelevant but I let the masses know that I'm aware of the situation.

So today, when I came into one of the conference rooms to get some coffee ( the cafeteria was already closed), I greeted the 6 people sitting there. No attention was paid to me. I poured myself some coffee and instead of just going on with my business I told the woman sitting closest to me that it seems that people only greet me when they need something. She looked at me and tried to politely dismiss my observation though I saw in her eyes a bit of discomfort. I just shrugged my shoulders and left.

A few minutes later when I came back to the conference room to retrieve a chart one of the nurses addressed me with " I have a question'. But instead of just answering her question I felt I was on a roll and told her that I just mentioned to Prem (sitting right there) that people only seem to greet me when they need something. The nurse blushes a bit. The dietician behind her raises her eyebrows all the way up to her hairline. Another nurse didn't seem to care one way or another. And the social worker ignored the whole thing: I guess no one was being discharged home from her unit this week.

A couple of hours later, when I was more awake and contend I wondered if it was necessary to shock the 'team' on that unit. I verbalized something they all knew but somehow verbalizing it during a meeting seems equivalent to cursing, saying something forbidden and obscene.

And now, when I finished typing this up and realized that it's alreayd 11:30P and I don't even remember the reason I decided to post this ( aka the moral of the story), I beging to wonder if I should sleep rather than blog.

Only time shall tell:)

5 steps...

Independently, even if a bit hurriedly were taken by my little SiM the other day! Only because of my profession I still hesitate to say 'yes, he is walking'. But as a mom, I'm even more proud of those 5 independent steps than SiM is. Way to go baby!

Of all the things I've lost...

Long long time ago my sister bought me a key chain in Sam Goody (just to show you how really long ago this way) which read " OF ALL THE THINGS I'VE LOST I MISS MY MIND THE MOST". Needless to say, I also lost the key chain.

But this entry is not about me but about my little big daughter to often comes to my bed in the middle of the night or too early in the morning and says "mommy, I lost my sossy [pacifier].' I dutifully get up, go find her sossy ( or give her a replacement) and hopefully we both go right back to sleep. Last Friday, hubby and I had to leave the house 3 hours before the arrival of the babysitter so my sister kindly agreed to watch the kids Friday morning.

When I asked my sis how did the morning go she told me that it was uneventful. As he typically does, the baby woke up first with his ' ABA!!!!!' and a few minutes after Eh woke up as well.

Eh's morning greeting was short and priceless. "Papi, I lost my mommy."

A quick update

With all the babysitting excitement and the general state of fatigue induced haze I completely neglected to write an update on my little ones progress.
SiM's been making a couple of independent steps by himself pretty much since the Independence day. Today it was more like 4 steps taken with loads of delight and pride.

He's also a happy rider of his sister's 'school bus' (though lately he's been eyeing the bycicle:))-he and the sis joyfully ride up and down the hallway. SiM on the school bus and Eh on the bike (Eh's developed a bit of a bug phobia and all her belonging have to stay home away from the bugs. Thankfully, the pool is not included in the 'curfue'.).

Eh started day camp three weeks ago-she naps through half of it but it is still a big step to being a 'big girl'. She is quite talkative and extremely entertaining. Every morning begins with 'mommy, don't go to work; I don't want to go to gan (camp) today; I don't want the babysitter to come' though eventually she lets me go to work without prolonged goodbyes.
Amusingly, for the past few nights, before going to sleep she also tells me not to go to work. I reassure her that I'm staying with her for the night. Actually, as I wrote the last sentence I realized why she started this strange request at night, but that will have to be a separate entry.

Peace out.

Chareidim and BTs

One of my friends posted this article on facebook and I was compelled to pass it on.
"Yeshiva world and BTs"

http://www.rabbihorowitz.com/PYes/ArticleDetails.cfm?Book_ID=1008&ThisGroup_ID=263&Type=Article&SID=2

Ehem or 2 stories about my observation skills

First story:

My current assignment is in a 540 bed facility which means I get to work with many coworkers of various disciplines. On the days when I'm lucky and I get to stay after the chance of shift I have the honor to work with many more peoples whose names and particulars I try to remember, just to be polite.

One of the people from the evening shift is nurse Dorothy. She's a sweet young large woman who's usually polite and helpful. And I had no problems remembering her name it is also the name of Elmo's fish. But, I digress...

On Monday, I lingered til the evening shift took over ( which since the change in my babysitting guard occured has been happening more often than not) and there I was again sitting at a nurse's station together with Dorothy. On the left of the station was one of slightly annoying chatty recreation workers ( who deserves an entry of her own). This time she was doing her 1:1 with one of the residents and chatting with Dorothy. She asked Dorothy some question to which she replied something like 'september", ' very soon'. To brighten up the end of my working day I decided to join the conversation ( though joining in usually means completing my work in 1.3-1.5 usual time and it cramps my style). So I asked Dorothy to repeat what's going to happen in September. She just said "my baby" and for the second time in a month I felt that I could've been knocked down with an 'F'.

I looked at Dorothy with eyes so wide she started laughing. She said sweetly that she knew she's a big girl but she thought that her situation was apparent by now and proceeded to comfort me by saying that her brothers only found out the day before and only because her sister told them.
And while I congratulated her and apologized for my delayed response the blessed rec worker continued with her preachy voice to say something about 'the baby'. AGGGGGR. But then again, she askes me about my babies, too so I have to take the bad with the good.

And as I left the station I glanced at Dorothy again and darn it ( though she WAS sitting), she just looked her usual chubby self.

Second story:
Yesterday early in the AM, as I was on my way to work I got a text from one of my lost friends that she had a baby girl. I was delighted on many levels and exchanged texts with her for an hour or so. Btw, this is her 3rd girl, b'H.

Another one of my friends had his 3rd boy last week. Naturally, while I was sitting in the morning report (where people take themselves so seriously it's hard to stay awake), I decided to text the 3rd boy friend and inform him of the recent good news (these 2 know/knew of each other). And the easiest way to do it was to reply to one of his text with "so and so just had her 3rd girl'.

Naturally I was taken aback when the new again mom sent me a message saying that she is in a girl business. It took a few seconds to realize to whose text I replied with the good news and thank Gd that my text was short, sweet, and to the point.

WHERE DID MY OBSERVATION SKILLS GO? Should I hope they will return or should I start getting used to the new me!?

Happy Birthday, America!

This is one of my favorite holidays!

Jerusalem today

On my way to work today, I heard that there was a terrorist act in Jerusalem. I said a little prayer for the dead and the wounded, got angry that the terrorist was counted with the dead, and quickly forgot about it (since I came to work very late and had lots of catching up to do).

Then, thanks to all the TVs that beg me to watch them on every unit, while I was on my way to do some routine assessment, I saw some Israeli guy talking on Fox news and I realized it was about earlier events in Jerusalem. He described the event in all its brutal detail -where the terrorist galantly let a female driver go ahead of him only to plow her seconds later, that one of the dead was a woman who managed to throw her infant out of the car before she was crushed. He appealed to the people of the world to try to imagine what the Israelis have to live through every day- that this attack is equivalent of a madman plowing through crowds on 5th Avenue, or on champs elysees...while the footage of the Israeli soldier shotting the terrorist was displayed in the background.

I felt tears welling in my eyes. I had a hard time concentrating on my work for the next few minutes. The general public (to whom the Israeli on TV appealed) around me seemed to be going about their business as usual. One kind man asked me if I was ok but when I explained what happened, he for some reason couldn't find words of comfort for me.

שהם give peace to Israel and ישוע to the the whole klal.

May I help you please?

It's been a few months since I've been bestowed (if that's the expression I'm looking fore) with the honor and the pleasure of putting my daughter to sleep. As time went by, the ritual has become more complex rather than simplified ( which one would hope for since my baby's turned 2 and 1/2 today- yippy).

Anyhow, it involves reading book(s), +/- telling stories, +/- singing Eh's song, moma's songs, abba's songs, baby's songs, +/- singing stories, etc, etc, etc. I've recently discovered that if I park in my daughter's bed, I may not necessarily speed up the going to sleep process but I typically make it more comfortable for myself ( and take a nap as a bonus). To do this, I get into my lounge clothes.

Tonight, after about 45 minutes dedicated to the ritual I finally came to the kitchen to eat dinner. After being snuggled under a blanket for a while, airconditioned kitchen felt like a walk in fridge so I quickly put on the first available cover up which came to view. It happened to be my freshly washed labcoat with my name and rank on each side of the chest and my beeper, pens, and other miscellaneous goods in pockets.

I barely got a chance to sit down and eat when there was a long buzz. Silently cursing at a realization that I again forgot to put the sign "do not ring bell after 7 PM" I asked who's at the door. The voice replied "your neighbor, Connie Green." I thought I heard wrong because I couldn't remember any neighbors with that name combo plus I expected the usual mumbling for charity. So I asked again who's there and got the same answer. So I asked my neighbor to wait one minute, quickly looked for a buck and went to the door.

When I opened the door I'm not at all sure which one of us was more taken aback- me who saw my 'neighbor' or the neighbor who stuttered a bit with her (i'm sure much repeated) speech upon seeing me at the door.

I'm not sure whom my neighbor expected to see at the door, but I'm almost sure it didn't include a woman in a green headscarf, orange tshirt, brown skirt, betty boop fluffy slippers and a bit weathered white lab coat buttoned all the way down with a $ bill appearing ouf of one of the overstuffed pockets.

I wonder if it would scare her off from ringing strangers' doorbells after 9 pm?