Tis the Season

Merry Christmas, Happy Channukah, Fabulous Kwanza, Spectacular Solstice

...and a wonderful New Year to all!

Regardless of your religious affiliation this is the time for rebirth. No matter what happened in the past now is the time to look forward to what can happen in the future. Maybe its this time of year but I have been very emotional and slightly nostalgic for the past week or so. It all started when I realized that my little nephew was going to be 13 years old...I didn't meet my nephew until he was 3 years old and I fell in love with him instantly. Its not that now that he is older I will love him any less, its just different.

Today's Quote

When you come to the end of all the light you know, and it’s time to step into the darkness of the unknown, faith is knowing that one of two things shall happen: Either you will be given something solid to stand on or you will be taught to fly.

-Edward Teller

I think what I am afraid of is loss. As I look back over the year there are so many things that were lost this year. I have never been a fan of change....just when I get things how I like them something goes and screws it up. As I look around at the things that remain in my life I realize how desperately I want to hold on to them forever and I realize that I can't. For example, I am very grateful to still have my grandmother with us but I can't help but think forward to a time when she will not be here. Thats when the panic sets in. I begin to think "what if this is the year where I lose everything?" I am 27 years old and can't take care of myself....what am I going to do?

I have always known how to take care of other people but for the life of me I can't figure out how to motivate myself to take care of myself. I am the type of person who lives for others and if there is nobody around to take care of what will I do? Will I just wither up and disappear?

Anyway, this post was not meant to be a sappy whiny rant, it was supposed to be something inspirational that would bring anyone reading into the New Year ready to take positive steps towards enacting change in their lives and the lives of those around them. Then "With Arms Wide Open" by Creed started playing and I lost control. Maybe its for the best. In searching the Internet today I found the following tidbit of information on E-Media Wire:

Survey finds that only 9% of Americans are serious about achieving their goals. 51% don’t have New Year’s Resolutions and of those that do, 79% don’t have a plan to achieve them.

With that knowledge and my dad's advice paraphrased "life and happiness are what you make of your circumstances" I am going to try to come up with a plan to move forward. I thought I was doing well with this but you know how it goes....one step forward and two steps back. I think I just need to go back to work to keep my mind occupied, how sick is that??? :-)

And in the musical spirit of the season I am going to share with you they lyrics to one of the songs off of the new Bon Jovi album I got for Christmas. ..

"Welcome to Wherever You Are"

Maybe we're all different but we're still the same
We all got the blood of Eden running through our veins
I know sometimes it's hard for you to see
You're caught between just who you are and who you want to be
Remember every new beginning is some beginning's end

Welcome to wherever you are
This is your life; you made it this far
Welcome, you got to believe
That right here, right now
You're exactly where you're supposed to be
Welcome to wherever you are

When everybody's in and you're left out
And you feel you're drowning in a shadow of a doubt
Everyone's a miracle in their own way
Just listen to yourself, not what other people say
When it seems you're lost, alone, and feelin' down
Remember, everybody's different; just take a look around

Welcome to wherever you are
This is your life; you made it this far
Welcome, you got to believe
That right here, right now
You're exactly where you're supposed to be
Welcome to wherever you are

Be who you want to be
Be who you are
Everyone's a hero
Everyone's a star
When you want to give up and your heart's about to break
Remember that you're perfect; God makes no mistakes

Welcome to wherever you are
This is your life; you made it this far
Welcome, you got to believe
That right here, right now
You're exactly where you're supposed to be
I say welcome...
I say welcome...
Welcome...

Regardless of where your faith lies, I hope you find it somewhere this holiday season

HATE MY JOB DAY:

I have been having some of these lately. Don't get me wrong, its really not that hard of a job it is just VERY draining and I kind of feel like a traitor to my values. I spend my days (10 hour days mind you) working for the man delivering mostly bad news and going against every principle that I have for equality in healthcare. I try to tell myself that I need to know the inner workings of the system so that I know how to fix it. I was cleaning out my e-mail box and found the following e-mail. It made me smile despite the fact that I will be getting up at the buttcrack of dawn and speaking to some VERY cranky people about all the money they are going to have to pay after the holidays. Hope you enjoy it as well.

When you have an "I Hate My Job" day, try this:

On your way home from work, stop at your local pharmacy and go to the thermometer section and purchase a Rectal Thermometer made by Johnson and Johnson. Be very sure you get this brand.

When you get home, lock your doors, draw the curtains and disconnect the phone and the TV so you will not be disturbed.

Change into very comfortable clothing and sit in your favorite chair. Then, open the package and remove the thermometer. Now, carefully place it on a table or a surface so that it will not become chipped or broken.

Now the fun part begins:-

Take out the literature and read it carefully. You will notice that in
very small print there is the following statement, "Every rectal thermometer made by Johnson and Johnson is personally tested."

Now, close your eyes and repeat out loud five times, "I am so glad I do not work for quality control at Johnson and Johnson."


HAVE A NICE DAY AND REMEMBER, THERE IS ALWAYS SOMEONE ELSE WITH A JOB THAT IS WORSE THAN YOURS

You Know You're A Nurse When..

To All My Friends Who Are Nurses .... or anyone you know who is a Nurse.

You know you are a Nurse if............

Did you hear about the nurse who died and went straight to hell?? It took
her two weeks to realize she wasn't at work!

You know you're a nurse if.....

You would like to meet the inventor of the call light some night in a dark
alley.

Your sense of humor gets more warped each year.

Almost everything can seem humorous....eventually.

You know the smell of different diarrhea to identify it.

You can tell the pharmacist more about the medication they are dispensing
than they know.

You check the caller id on your day off to see if anyone from the
hospital is trying to call and ask you to work.

You've been telling stories in a restaurant and made someone at another
table throw up.

You notice that you are using more 4 letter words than you did before you
started nursing.

Everytime someone asks you for a pen you can find at least 4 of them on you.

You live by the motto "to be right is only half the battle, to convince the
doctor is more difficult"

You've told a confused patient that your name was that of your coworker
and to holler if they
need help.

Your bladder can expand to the size of a winnebago's water tank.

You find yourself checking out other customers veins in grocery waiting
lines.

You avoid unhealthy looking shoppers in the mall for fear that they will
drop near you and
you'll have to do CPR on your day off.

Your finger has gone places you never thought possible.

You have seen more penises than any prostitute.

If you are not a nurse and have been sent this by a friend who is, its just
to help you understand our mindset and questionable mental status/sanity.

Most of the time we function in spite of this sick sense of humor, fairly
normally and very responsibly. Believe me, this is how we think, ALL THE
TIME. Scary huh??

How many doilies does it take to cover your butt?

There is only one corner of the universe you can be certain of improving, and that's your own self.

- Aldous Huxley


EUREKA! She's got it!

Ok! I knew it was only a matter of time before it would hit me and it finally has. INSPIRATION! And a little bit more I think. Intrigued? Read on...

I have a dirty little secret and I'm going to let y'all in on it. I am addicted to model shows Yes I'm actually referring to television programs such as "Top Model", "Project Runway", and the Runway fashion show specials such as the Victoria's Secret one that was on last night. Now, it is not for the "normal" reason that a woman in our society might tune in to watch the spectacle that these waifish women put on display...or maybe in some ways it is. It is not that I long to be a part of that world in the slightest way, in fact you would be hard pressed to get me to a live fashion show. I am simply fascinated by the lengths people will put themselves through for social acceptance. Don't get me wrong, I do this in my own life, I just enjoy knowing that I'm not alone I guess. Despite the many objections of family and friends asking "how can you watch this crap" I find myself tuning in week to see the "trials and tribulations" of these supposedly "perfect" people who turn out to be human in some cases. So that I'm not misunderstood I want to clarify, I am not saying that these are GOOD human beings in most cases, but the fact remains that they are human and are not impervious to the demands that our society puts on people to be perfect. I hesitate to say that these unrealistic expectations are solely put on women (even though it has historically been more blatant and obvious in the case of women) as there are many men who experience the similar issues.

In some ways I watch in wonder at the tragic scene unfolds before me on the television set with a certain amount of awe and amazement. I think to myself, how they can make such fools out of themselves, or what are they thinking everybody knows better than that. If I'm really feeling honest with myself I admit that I have been there done that. In an effort to make a change I have decided to confront it head on and live by example.

If you are still with me I will go further and explain what prompted this rant. I was puttering around my room last night half watching television half cleaning my room after watching my favorite reality television show (The Amazing Race...go Linzes!) Anyway, as some of you probably can guess, the Victoria's Secret Fashion show came on and as I wasn't really paying much attention anyway I left it on as background noise. At one point I came back into the room just in time to hear them interviewing some of the models about how they feel about doing a lingerie runway show. I'm telling you people, they interviewed 4 of the skinniest malnourished looking models in the show and each and every one of them said that one of their biggest concerns were with their body because a.) they didn’t think they looked good enough (ie: they were too fat or untoned) or b.) had other self esteem issues that make it difficult for them to walk around half naked on television. I was floored!! OH MI GOD. How can these people say this with a straight face? These are the women that our little girls are being taught to emulate at all costs, the women who are “supposedly” the pinnacle of beauty (not that I or any random group of people would come to a consensus on this fact since aesthetic beauty is purely subjective). That's when I suddenly had the realization that this was the point. We are all mentally f&$*ed. I'm guilty of the same thing. I look in the mirror and see only the imperfections and the things I hate about myself so why shouldn't these women to (they are only human...see above). This is only a symptom of a bigger problem that isn't going to be corrected on our own. The only way that we are ever going to get past all of this self inflicted agony is to accept the fact that we are imperfect and that is ok. The way I see it we have two choices, we can be miserable and hate ourselves dreaming of being different when in reality that will not make us any happier OR we can embrace the wonderful aspects of ourselves and try to minimize the damage done to our psyche by society at large.

I am well aware that this is all rhetoric that is easy to say but hard to enact, however, I have committed to myself (at least for the time being) to take a step towards self love instead of self loathe. I am sure you are all aware by this point that I have REALLY low self esteem. I am not as bad as some people I know, but I am still pretty bad. As a baby step forward I am going to post a picture of myself (I think I look bad in person but I think I look 100X worse in pictures) and proclaim to anyone reading this that I AM A BEAUTIFUL PERSON! My imperfections do not matter, my soul does.

I want to also say that I am not posting this to get a whole bunch of affirmative comments saying yes you are beautiful. It is nice to hear but honestly I am the one who has to believe it and trust me I have heard it before but still do not fully believe. I know my regular readers are wonderful but I would also like to note that if you have taken the time to read this whole thing and get to the picture only to think stop deluding yourself your ugly I don't need to hear that either. I have heard that before as well and the whole point of this ramble is that I am trying not to validate myself based on others opinions. I know my strengths and weaknesses. I know what kind of person I am and the kind of person I hope to be and your pettiness and misery is inconsequential to me achieving my results. I wish you the best of luck in resolving the demons that make you surf the web to find people you think you are better than.

That being said, I would not give any amount of money to trade places with any of these women. I can't imagine being seen as "perfect" and still not loving myself. It is probably a very lonely prison. Also, have you seen some of the guys these "super models" get married to. I am sorry if any of you are a Seal fan but in my opinion YUCK! Wouldn't you think that Heidi Klum could do a bit better than that? ;-) Ok...now that I have completely invalidated the point of my entire blog with that last sentence I would like to thank anyone who managed to get through this monstrous post. If I have inspired you to comment in some other way as always feel free to do so, I love to read others take on the random nonsense rolling around in my brain.

That's all for now...Tootles!

Its either frickin hot or frickin wet!

The picture doesn't really do it justice but it was beautiful the other day with the fog hanging over the fields and the lake on the way home. Just thought I would share :-)

Who says that I need wisdom...not the dentist thats for sure!

Ok...in search for a little bit of wisdom in my life I have managed to take a few steps backward. Four steps to be specific. Thats right, I finally had my wisdom teeth pulled. It was not nearly as bad as I thought it would be but I have been way out of it and tired. I got some well needed rest laced with vicodin dreams and am getting ready to return back to work tomorrow. My jaw is a little sore but you can't keep me down. Cjristie is still amazed that I can already get three fingers stacked on top of each other in my mouth. I was never one to keep my mouth shut for long though. What I can't believe it is already almost Christmas, and the end of another school semester. I have three finals next weekend and I've been dragging my feet with registering for my next semester's classes. I did take the time to pick up my nursing application which isn't due until February so hopefully I won't procrastinate until the last minute as I usually do.

Other than that there really hasn't been much exciting going on. I hung out in Stockton with all the usual suspects a couple weeks ago. I had a good time and cleared the air. It was a very small world kind of weekend. I ran into a friend I used to work with and her husband. Where did I run into them you ask? Well they were hanging out with the group of people I know at the local hole in the wall karaoke bar. I am really trying to get my butt in gear so that I don't stay stuck in my rut as I have in the past but its hard. I mean, I LOVE the weather being cooler and rainy but it does seem to be effecting me a little more than usual this year.

On another note I am actually doing christmas cards this year. I have found most of my addresses but I don't think I have them all so if you don't get one and you haven't personally given me your address don't be offended. If you are just dying to get a card from me (I am sure there is a line of you already forming!) feel free to e-mail me your address.

I leave you with an inspirational quote for the day and urge you all to be contribute to the fight against mental illness by becoming more generous to your fellow man year round :-)

Inspirational thought of the day

Money-giving is a good criterion of a person’s mental health. Generous people are rarely mentally ill people.

- Dr. Karl Menninger