This post is a bit malaise, so if you're in your 'happy place' I suggest you carry on and come back to it later, if you choose.
A friend/co-worker has been in the hospital the past week. Recent complications last night got her in the OR in an emergency situation and is laying in ICU today. She's intubated, sedated (I'm told for the next few days) and has 3 I.V poles each with 3 bags hanging. Dude.. that's not normal. Her BP is also very low. It's one thing to see this as hospital staff; after time you create a skin for it and it doesn't affect you 'as' easily. When it's someone you know, though, that's different. First shock, then re-assessment, then slight shock again, then acceptance of what is. It's like your brain does this funny processing thing to understand what it sees. I was reassured by one of the nurses when I went to go sit with her that she's safe - it was the first thing he told me. That was nice. I carry a chaplet on me and I prayed the Rosary. I don't know how I feel about how she'll come out of this; my gut's not telling me anything.
Did a lot of thinking on my walk home. A mutual friend of ours and I were talking (a nurse-friend) before I left and we discussed wills and how we don't think she has one (though the responsible type, she is quite young - mid-20's). Well that always gets you thinking. The last time I was faced with mortality was when my dad was diagnosed with cancer. I thought about it then, but hell I thought, who am I going to give my stuff to? Who would WANT it? I suppose I should smarten up and think about these things. I'm not getting any younger.
I came home a bit worn out and changed out of my scrubs, looked around my room and instantly felt detached from every single item that was there. None of it mattered. No single material item in my apartment held any value. As a side tangent, when I once studied Buddhism, I learned then about attachment to earthly things - and promptly got rid of a lot of stuff. Right now I just wish I had nothing. I don't even want to LOOK at these items I've placed in my apartment. Instead, I find myself thinking about my relationships with certain people (and not the ones I suspect I would at first) and the true life desires I have right now.
I'm going to end this before it gets too involved. I just had to let off a bit of steam, but thanks for the ear.
4 comments:
I hope your friend will be all right... I have a copy of Huxley's The Way of Non-Attachment (I think that's the title; I must find it). I often wish I could just walk out and leave this heavy burden of goods, all representing an enormous waste of money, and set myself down in a simple log cabin by a lake, with just a bed and a stove. Oh, and a guitar. Bliss!
Ahh.. I have the same dream; a cabin in a clearing of woods, in a valley surrounded by mountains. I have a stream nearby for a water source and some animals (some to provide food). Except I wouldn't have a guitar, I would have.. um.. well that's a good question. I always see myself with my husband there, should there be one, but I don't know what one earthly thing I would take with me.
Now, where were we?
I think things/animals/companions would naturally find you.
It's funny you say that; I believe animals choose us, we don't choose them. But I've never thought to associate people and/or things with that theory.
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