Different views on an ordinary life.
So Mercury is in retrograde, plus Venus is in the fifth house, and there’s a blood moon spewing its lunar crazy all over the world. Though it may be scientifically not totally proven, this makes the emergency department full of bat shit crazy, as evidenced by my glorious shift on Wednesday night. I went from having my hand stuffed in a bleeding-out-guy’s butt crack while calmly requesting URGENT THINGS to the people in the room with me, to a Russian-only-speaking hypotensive anemic lady with dementia to complicate things, to dealing with a (not uncommon) teenage girl fake emergency emergency, to keeping a kid with a wavy broken arm calm and still, to a reality-distorting close talking assaulter who brought his victim to me and then proceeded to very creepily attach himself to both me and her to the point that I felt slightly hostage-taken, in the middle of a busy ER. Yeah it was fucked up. Think secret whispers in the bathroom as I fake helped her get a urine sample, only to open the door to find him standing. Right. There. Demanding to know what we were talking about, insisting that he had to know he didn’t do anything he rescued her he puts out CDs as a rapper. Fortunately I used cunning and wiles to get him away from the both of us, but then I found out that he is a Known Unstable Person who stalked a cop for a year after their own weird interaction. That’s great. Really, so pleased to have been placed in his path.
Though I feel that iambic pentameter is the better meter for the criminally insane, I’m not up for that so haiku it is.
You’re standing too close
Eyes are shifty like a horse
You beat her up, though
Pouring blood from butt
Seems like a problem I’d say
You ruined your car
Your face is sideways
You are snorting and anxious
Gum doesn’t cause that
That arm is z-shaped
Football and crashing and bones
Lockhart’s not here though
Hair is so fancy
Conjunctiva pale, not red
Some blood for you, then
I feel better now. Sometimes you have to debrief, or decompress, or whatever. This was one of those times.
I don’t even know which one of these posts to comment on, so I’m picking this one. I’m so happy to hear your voice again–it’s so funny, and so astute. A couple times, it was reminiscent of Grandma’s voice (though she’d never, ever be quite so indelicate, which is part of why I love your work). Thanks so much for starting again.
Aw, Grandma’s voice? That’s so cool! It is my dream to someday start letters with the greeting, “Precious Progeny”. I think Grandma has a little something to do with the paths all of us have taken–she was a distinctive individual, indeed. Glad you’re reading!
Oh, there’s no question she has something to do with our writing skills (and a few other things). “Distinctive” is a great word for her. It was the spot where you talk about falling over in the chair, just so you know–that was so Grandma to me. And the haiku! Phenomenal. Your cousin Kjell replied to an e-mail (between me, Mom, and him) with a haiku every day for a month. A month. Haiku must be genetic, too (also so nice and easy!).
That’s awesome, the haiku month. We are a unique bunch!
Lord, aren’t we unique? But that’s good! Here’s Kjell’s haiku for today (and I read yours to my creative writing class last night, BTW. They loved them. They are impressed with our family’s uniqueness, maybe in a good way and maybe in a run-fast-hurry-go-she-scares-me kind of way):
OWLS ARE FUN, THOUGH ONE
SYLLABLE – THEN YOU’VE GOT CATS;
NOT INFALLIBLE.
Two thumbs up! Yes, it’s a combo of haha and ohgodrun.