Why Princess of the Universe Is More Qualified for the Spa than Graduate School

So my darling Princess Pointful asked me to do a post for her while she was away. Of course I view this as more of a favour to me than to her, since all her readers are le fab.

Of course there’s always the dilemma of what to write about on someone else’s space. In my little world? Which is not nearly as well-written as this blog? Well, it ranges from the spa, to chocolate, to my dreams of marrying Jensen Ackles. However! My redemption here today lies in the fact that I can actually write something that borderline relates to this blog.

School. More specifically? My honours Psych thesis.

Ahh my thesis. Until very recently, it was my proudest accomplishment. And since I work in a university now, you’d better believe I talked it up in my interview last summer. That thing caused me so much pain, it better pay me back by getting me a job with a decent salary and awesome benefits. I mean I gave birth to that thing. And labour? Was a bitch.
With all that build-up, I know you’re all DYING to know what my thesis was about. So the oh-so-inspiring title: (uh hold on a sec- as if I remember something that I wrote 11 years ago) Crap. I can’t find it. It was something along the lines of: “Religiosity and Neuroticism’s Effects on Death Anxiety.”
Cool huh? I did a thesis on death. Cause I’m all deep and stuff. Yeah. Until you have every Psychologist in the place asking you very worriedly why you want to write about death, and is there anything you’d like to talk about? It was almost as great as the time that I casually mentioned how stressed I was and it was making me want to slit my wrists.
You know what you don’t say to a Psychologist? That.

I didn’t say I was a brilliant 22 year old.

Anyhow. After several well-meaning and concerned conversations, I was well on my way to studying the D-word.
But to do so? I would have to pass the dreaded 4100. Honours stats. In my defence, I did in fact pass it the first time. But only because I was curved up. And since I was an honours student and all, getting a C or D or whatever I got just wasn’t good enough.

Less in my defense? The fact that I spent the first time around composing stories in class about how I was a princess cursed by the wicked stats fairy at birth, and that was why I just didn’t get it. The second time around I did marginally better, but I suspect that it’s only because I re-copied my assignments from the previous year, and not because I learned so much more.
So after two years of that torture it was time to put it all to good use. I had finally reached the show. So I questioned poor innocent first-years all about how freaked out they were at the concept of death, and how neuroticism was the cause, and how they turned to religion for comfort. And after all that data was collected? Then I had to put that 4100 class to good use. Surely they had tutors to assist right? Oh wait. I had already tried that, to no avail. Oh well, it’s only data analysis – how hard can it really be, right?

As it turns out, not hard at all. Cause all that dos-based programming that they had been training me to do in the SPSS from the dinosaur-age the past two years? Apparently no one actually uses that. Everyone actually uses SPSS for windows. All you have to do is click “analyze” (or some other statistic-y word that I don’t remember at all anymore) and it does it for you.

??!!!??
Ahem. So anyways, after I got over that painful revelation – I carried on with the analyzing. And found that my hypothesis? Wrong. Dead wrong.

Now I know that this is still valuable information, and at least I’ve learned that the opposite of what I conjectured is true. Blah blah blah… But it’s kinda hard not to feel like a failure you know?

It didn’t matter so much by then anyhow. By that point I’d decided that the thought of getting my PhD and listening to people whine about their problems all day was more pain than it was worth. So I accepted my mediocre B+, convocated under duress (University Graduations? Le dull.) and carried on with my life.

And given the chance to do it over? I’d totally do it the same. Well…except I’d maybe pay some nerd to do my Stats homework for me. Cause taking it twice? Phenomenal waste of my valuable undergrad partying time.

Sunshine on my mind

The thing about graduate school in clinical psychology is that it feels a little never ending. There is no school's out for summer, or look, it's the weekend, so I don't need to work, or woo-hoo, classes are done, that means there is nothing left to do but watch Iron Chef reruns. It is both all encompassing and totally scattered, in that you have to switch gears between the bazillion different specializations you are supposed to master. When class is out, you are running participants. When you're done running participants, you have to analyze data. Don't forget to go to your practicum, and squeeze your regular clients in there, as well as commute to the suburbs for meetings with your case supervisors. Oh yeah, and here's a pile of essays to mark when you have that break between the workshop on clinical challenges, the lab meeting, and the training you are running for the programming software. And what do you mean you haven't published anything yet this year?

It is a go-go-go kind of life, the one where you keep spare journal articles in your purse just in case you have a moment to read them. (Seriously. I do that. People make fun of me when I go to fish out a pen and pull out a jumble of stapled together papers instead.)

Sometimes, in the middle of this rushing about, I find myself wondering why I decided that it was really so important to get my PhD as quickly as possible. Would anyone really begrudge me not being Dr. Pointful until the ripe age of 30? Was it really necessary to spend the bulk of my 20s on a university campus? And why didn't I take the time to do that generic coming of age post-college backpacking trip across Europe or Southeast Asia?

So, finally, I decided to bite the proverbial bullet.

Visit Cuba??


Don't mind if I do!

After what seemed like years of paying lip service to the fact that we needed a real holiday, not an extra day tacked onto a conference excursion, and debating journeys across Chile and Ecuador that we both knew our temperamental theses would never allow, we decided to bite the proverbial bullet and escape for a week in Cuba.

(It is our duty as Canadians, after all.)

So, yes, from Monday through Monday, you can find me drinking at absurdly inappropriate times, splayed out on the beach. To cope with our odd sense of guilt over staying at a resort far classier than the likes of us, we are also taking a non-tour bus related expedition to Havana, where we are staying at a casa particular with a Cuban family and wandering the streets with delicious aimlessness. I am only bringing books with no practical bearing on my future profession, and am staying far, far away from the Internet. My purse will be full of sunscreen and pesos, not annotated journal articles.

Hijinks will not be utterly abandoned, though. I have lined up a number of wonderful guest posters during my absence, so be sure to stop by and show them plenty of love. 

Who knows? Maybe I will learn to write again while I'm gone, as it feels like stress is sapping the ease right out of my words lately. At the very least, I should be a little more tanned with some rum breath and knowing a few more words of Spanish.

Compliment of the day

Received today in an email:

"Your neuroses are of endless benefit to those of us who lack that kind of focus."

Score one for neurotics!

Putting down the pen

One of the oddest things about blogging is that it lends itself to the belief that your thoughts are especially important and need to be communicated. Before, I was happy to let the random ideas or clever scenarios merely simmer in my head before vanishing (unlike the lyrics to old TV show theme songs, which seem to be wedged in some random brain crevasses for ever more-- I bet almost every single one of you can rap the Fresh Prince of Belair theme song in your sleep). Yet now, it feels like I am cheating myself to let them escape. They somehow need to be written down, to be witnessed.

This may explain why, on the bus today, I was struggling to find a theme to connect the dots between my opinions on the pigeons living the alley by my apartment, my implicit theories about the guy who sat across me on the bus in the beat up leather jacket (I decided he shopped at used book stores and vaguely wanted to marry him), and my annoyance at my co-worker who has suddenly become a fierce vacation doppelganger and is copying every step of the holiday the Duke and I are about to depart on.

Of course, none of these thoughts matter much at all. It isn't going to alter the course of my or your life whether I decide to tell you about how I nearly trip over pigeons in the morning.

This is likely why I have not joined the Twitter masses (or is it the Twitterati?). If there's one thing I have been told on multiple occasions (other than "Wow, you really are that clumsy" or "Maybe that's enough cheese for today"), it is that I think too much. I know that if I purposely enrolled myself in a program where people presumably wanted to hear the most random of my thoughts, like how it just feels better to know my socks have polka dots on them even though no one can see them, I would probably whip myself up into a frenzy. It certainly seems that the simple act of blogging has done enough to make me more aware of the minutia of my brain... Twittering really could only make it worse. I spend enough of my brain power reacting to "Oh God, I need to remember to blog this."

It kind of reminds me of those people who get so wrapped up in taking pictures of an event or a place that they are entirely separate from the experience. They have no real memories of it, only the plastic versions of memories in their photographs. I have the tendency to start narrating the story of my day in my head before the day is even finished, rather than just being in that day.

The other night, the Duke and I were having a profound late night conversation about of topics such as mental illness and astronomy. As I slid beneath the comforter, knowing the similarities between his memory and a piece of swiss cheese, I said to him "You are getting some pretty intense ideas there. You should try to write them down." He told me that he sometimes appreciates being able to have these thoughts without feeling they need to be preserved, that he can sit with the idea in the moment and be okay with the fact that it may never come to mind again.

Perhaps I can learn a little from him about living in the moment.

I'm hopping on the TMI train...

You can find me discussing sexual mishaps here. Come visit and tell me your own embarrassing tales, so I'm not left as Umm Now What's resident pervert!

Because I was feeling self-centred today...

... I present to you some random facts about me.

I have an issue with turning down free food. I feel as though I am obliged to eat it by virtue of its lack of cost to me. I also try to pretend that this lack of cost overrides its caloric value, hence the reason I would never chow down on mini-pepperonis in my regular life, but will eat an entire bag when placed on a plate in front of me with toothpicks. This also that while I only drink one cup of coffee a day when I have to buy it, I always have a cup on the go in my workplace with its free coffee.

When I was in high school, I was known for my ever-changing hair colour- bleached blonde, jet black, orange, fire engine red. People often don't recognize me anymore when I return home with my real hair colour-- boring old dark brown. Even though I haven't coloured my hair in years, I still feel an urge whenever I walk by the cheap hair dye in the drug store. I liked being a fake red head.

I may one day murder a person for the most banal of offences. I am the type to forgive tremendous interpersonal slights, but remain irritated about the smallest rude acts. I blame it on growing up in a small town, where someone would chase you for five blocks to return the dollar that you dropped. I am affected at way too deep a level by the incourtesies of the city-- people slamming the door in your face, almost hitting you in their car, not giving up their seats for elderly women, walking in to you. A few days ago, a man in the train station ran head on into me, full tilt (and I'm a pretty small lady), then dashed off without even stopping to check on me or apologize. Fifteen minutes later, I arrived home, and the Duke asked me how I was doing. I said "I'm going to start killing bitches." Oddly enough, I can still be at the same party as people who have betrayed me in far more substantial manner, like the girl who told my boyfriend how much sex they would have had had they ever dated... I need to start getting my temper's priorities straight.

I can usually tell when something I write is going to get little response within the first hour after I post it. I then have to sit on my hands for the next several hours after that to make sure I do not impulsively delete it, deeming it no good because it isn't eliciting a response. This is the danger of having a brief stint of comment popularity. When no one read me, I judged my writing on its own merits. I'm working on getting back to that.

I sleep talk like a mofo. Usually, it is indiscriminant mumbles. However, there have been occasions when my unconscious has betrayed me. For instance, after a party, I was sharing a bed with a friend. Unknown to that friend, I had a mad crush on her ex-boyfriend. Well... at least it was unknown to her until I called out his name in my sleep.

I have seen 49 of the artists on my iPod in concert, the majority of them in the past three years. I am a bit of a concert whore. As cliched as it may be, Radiohead still stands out as the ultimate-- even though I was in the midst of a torrential downfall as I sang along to Karma Police.

My arachniphobia is totally illogical. I know it is not out of the ordinary to be afraid of spiders, but I have no problem at all with most bugs. In fact, once I was checking out this weird bug with a friend, and it was only when my face was inches away that I noticed its extra pair of legs and started to panic.

I know all the lyrics to Ain't No Fun by Snoop Dogg and co, aka. the foulest song on the planet. I'm not even comfortable quoting it here. If you are lucky enough to get me drunk, I will most likely rap it to you. It is one hell of a show.

When I was 12, all my friend were drooling over Eddie Furlong and Jonathan Brandis, while I had a crush on Charlie Sheen. Even at that age, I knew this was wrong, so I told no one. Now he creeps the hell out of me.

For a brief time this year, I was the #5 ranked contestant, and one point away from 1st place, in the CBC Hockey Pool, which has over 50 thousand contesants. I figure this scores me bragging rights for life.

I make the Duke feel my abs almost every day after I work out. I pretend he is impressed each time, but, really, I think it bores him.

I could survive off dill pickles, salt water taffy, whipped cream and cheese if I had the choice. I would probably not want to make the Duke feel my abs if I ever actually did this, though.

I get really uncomfortable when people fall asleep on public transit beside me. I also feel strangely vulnerable falling asleep in public places, like on airplanes. The idea of strangers watching me sleep is really bothersome.

I was a vegetarian from around the age of 10 through 20. I drove meat eaters crazy when they tried to feed me, as I was a vegetarian who despised multiple vegetable, including onions, peppers, mushrooms, olives, broccoli and cauliflower. I even went through a brief period where I disliked lettuce. I know that makes no sense.

I don't have a birthmark. My mom claims that my dimple, located near the top of my left cheek, is my birthmark. This dimple also guarantees that for the entirety of my life the primary adjective to describe me is "cute".

These are the aggravations in my neighbourhood

When the Duke and I moved in together last spring, we wanted to live in an area with a little action in it. It could be that three years spent in the suburbs when I first moved to BigCity had spoiled my appetite for pastel houses and strip malls. It could also be that I adored the apartment I was leaving, a little basement suite too small for two just off a main strip where I could wander a block or two for Thai take-out, blackberries, crepes, or a latte. As such, when we finally found a secret hardwood floored roomy top story apartment hidden out in an inconspicuous stucco building just a few blocks away from one of the busiest intersections in the city, we grabbed onto it and didn't let go. It may have helped that it wasn't owned by a racist, had a kitchen bigger than one square foot, and didn't have three colours of mold in the bathroom, like some of our other rental possibilities.

For the most past, I love it here. The apartment itself is wonderful. It is central, with buses to nearly every corner of the city a block or two away. My hair salon is half a block away, and I can browse for shoes in my pyjamas if I wanted to (not saying that I have, of course). I am only a bridge away from downtown, but with the luxury of less noise. Entertaining people hang out in my back alley, like the guy who sings reggae, or the latest wanderer, a woman with a love for showtunes. (Believe me, it is a vast improvement on Angry Guy at my old place!)

However, sometimes this neighbourhood utterly infuriates me. 

For one, some of the people are insufferably snobby. I've never lived in an apartment building where people are so disinterested in knowing their neighbours. When you pass them on their stairs, they will do anything to avoid eye contact, including pretended fixation with the patterns on the art deco style purple rug. I recall one time flinging open the back door at the same time as a fellow was trying to enter, and gasping with surprise. "Oh, I'm sorry! You scared me!" I proclaimed. He merely stared at me with disdain, and slipped on by me with nary a word.

The Duke has even overheard our next door neighbour, the one who we used to only hear when she was yelling at her boyfriend, declare pointedly during one of these blowouts that she was too smart for the people in this building. This amused me for two reasons. One, who even thinks to make those comparisons? I don't think I've ever one thought about the traits of the people one floor down in the northwest apartment and how they relate to my own. Two, we've never even met this woman. Is she aware that she is arguing this point next to what may be the world's nerdiest grad school couple?

But, really, the qualities of my neighbours don't matter that much. I have other friends residing nearby. Not to mention, the last time I made friends with someone in my apartment building, he ended up having a secret cocaine habit, and asked me if he could offer up his mind for me to "practice" my therapeutic psychology skills on. I declined this gracious offer.

What bothers me even more is that, perhaps because so many people come to browse and have dinner here on a sunny day, someone has forgotten the practicalities of actual living in this neighbourhood. The bulk of the nearby streets are filled with low-rise apartments with little to no parking, suggesting that this is an area for those of us with no cars (also, note the fact that it is a major transit centre). When we first moved it, though we were a little disappointed at the lack of fresh fruit and veggie markets, more than one overrated pub or a major grocery store, a half block away from us was a bakery, a butcher shop, and a mini grocery store with all of your staples. 

All three of which they promptly closed down two months after we moved in, despite the businesses being there for 20+ years. And have yet to fill with anything, though the other vacancies in the neighbourhood have been filled not with anything practical, but rather a Calvin Klein underwear store (just underwear. And there are already three lingerie stores on this ten block strip.) and a Pottery Barn Kids (I could go on an entire rant about why this store is even allowed to exist. Kids don't care about design and/or pottery). 

And now, despite the fact that I can get my nails done in ten different places, go see a play, have foie gras and find a prom dress, I can't get any damn groceries. This means that I have to go on an epic voyage to the nearest grocery store, and either break my back hauling food home on the bus, or take a taxi. Did I mention that almost every other neighbour in this city has an overabundance of grocery stores?

Okay, okay. I lied a little. There is a grocery store four blocks up the street-- though I use the term loosely. It is one of those dreaded "gourmet" grocery stores, with an entire aisle dedicated to balsamic vinegars, but no ground chicken and never any green beans. Caviar at the deli counter, but no roast beef. If you are lucky enough to find a standard product, like Miracle Whip or Sunrype juice, you are probably paying two dollars more for the luxury of purchasing it amidst the organic local ginseng infused juices adorning the shelves. I once dashed there to grab a jar of pesto, and found that they all ranged in price from $8 to $30. Thirty dollars for basil and olive oil. I bought the $8 one and it tasted like air. My $4 generic grocery store brand kicked its ass. I can't get a loaf of bread for less than $5 and it always goes moldy in two days. There is something to be said for preservatives.

The aisles are narrow and precariously stacked with exotic teas and grains, and it is always full of oblivious people blocking the aisles with their carts as they make sure that their cous cous is truly lead-free. The customers seem like they come straight from my building, harassing the deli workers that their ahi tuna should be cut just so, and where exactly did that pork loin come from? And did I mention they have paintbrushes beside the cash register? Not gum and chocolate bars, like normal grocery stores, but truffles and special exotic animal paintbrushes?

I never knew I would find shopping for cheese at 7-Eleven so appealing.

The story of Yoda and how you can help

No, I haven't morphed into a Star Wars fanatic.
(Though I did once date one. When the films came back into the theatres, he sat in the front row of the cinema, with his wookie action figure in tow. True story.)

Instead, I am referring to one of my oldest bloggie buddies-- Yoda, who writes at And Nothing Else Matters.

Yoda, who, in addition to being delightfully funny and smarmy, is also ridiculously intelligent. This is why you could more accurately refer to him as Dr. Yoda, as he received his computer science and engineering PhD in 2007 from an American university. After becoming Dr. Yoda, he moved to New York, where he started working for a prestigious company. He also met a lovely lady while he was there, who he moved in with last year.

Sounds like he may have the dream life, right? Unfortunately, there's been a hitch.

Yoda is from India, and since going to visit his family there in December, he has been unable to return to the U.S. Not because he is being deported or doesn't have the paperwork-- but, rather, because he works in a high tech field, and is therefore a potential security risk. On top of that, he was told that it would only be a matter of week-- yet has now been stuck waiting for 3 months to go home, with not a single update on his status. No monetary compensation, no information, nothing. And it turns out he is one of countless people who is going through this ordeal.

When Yoda came to do his PhD work in 2002, there were few problems getting his student Visa. After he was hired at his post-PhD workplace, he was approved for a H1B petition issued by US Customs and Immigrations, which allows him to remain in the US for three years, and is extendable to six years. The plan is, for most people in his place, to complete the paperwork for a Green Card during this period, and he was able to work and pay taxes in the US with this approval.

However, once someone with an H1B leaves the U.S., they require an actual Visa stamp to re-enter, which is administered by the Department of State. When he went to his interview in order to obtain this stamp, Yoda was informed by the security officer that everything checked out, and his visa has been approved. However, the Department of State is asking those employed in "high tech" backgrounds to undergo an extra background check, which involved sending in his CV and a questionnaire about the nature of his research. He was told it will only take a couple of weeks (interestingly enough, which is also what the Department of State representative for Visa services told Congress last year).

Three months later, it is evident that this isn't the case. He has not received a single update on the status of his security check. In fact, the rules explicitly state that updates are not to be given. Rather, those undergoing the check just have to wait until it has officially been passed, without any indication as how they are supposed to plan their lives back in the U.S., where they are officially taxpayers and workers in some of the most important high tech fields. The one thing he does find out, though, is that he is hardly the exception-- he has encountered numerous people sitting in the same bureaucratic limbo as himself. 

These are people who the U.S. government is happy to take taxes and tuition fees from. They are also more than okay with having them do some of incredibly important work on behalf of this nation that is supposedly opening its doors to them. These are people who have followed the rules to a tee. And, now, here they are, stranded, with no word as to when their lives as normal are allowed to resume. Many of them have families back in the U.S. who are anxiously awaiting their return. They have jobs that they have to hope will wait an indeterminate amount of time for their return, which is questionable at best given the current economic crisis. They have mortgages, bills, loans, and no money coming in. If they are lucky, they have family to stay with while they are waiting.

Yoda has been doing his best to do his work remotely, from India, and narrowly survived a round of layoffs-- lucky, considering he is not there to fight his case. He, like many of these people in limbo, would lose his right to be in the U.S., period, would his employer been tired of waiting, and laid him off. His own research is at a standstill, which puts him far behind in a rapidly progressing field. His girlfriend, who was expecting to merely spend the holidays apart, has been faced with nearly four months away from him. Thankfully, she has been able to come to India for a visit now, since it has become clear that Yoda may not be returning anytime soon.

And so he waits.

When talking to Yoda about this piece, he said there was three things that him and those working to draw attention to this issue wanted to emphasize:

#1- These people have already lived in the U.S. for 6 or more years, and have been approved by the U.S. to stay for another six years. When exactly did they become an urgent security risk?

#2- If these folks were such a security risk, why was no check completed on them when they were applying for their work permits? Why could this check have not been completed, at least in part, while they were going about their regular lives in the U.S.?

#3- How are any scientists or high tech professionals supposed to want to come to the U.S. if leaving the country is so treacherous for them? How are they supposed to plan their lives without any transparency in this process? 

Want more info?

Obama Should Ease Security on Science, Panel Says- January 8, 2009(Reuters)

US Visa Problems Hitting Science Post-Docs and Students- March 4, 2009 (Science Careers Blog)

Scientists Fear Visa Trouble Will Drive Foreign Students Away- March 3, 2009 (New York Times)

And, more importantly, what can you do?

For one, to show your support, you can join the Facebook group dedicated to publicizing this issue, entitled 21g/ Visa Mantis/ Technology Alert List or TAL check

You can also send a copy of this petition to anyone who could plausibly be of help-- local politicians, news media, etc.

But, most crucially, you can write to the people who have a role in making these decisions-- both the House Committee on Science and Technology and your congressperson.

Thanks!!

And then the nurse said "That's why I'm a vegetarian".

Saturday night.

The Duke, his brother and I are crammed around a two person table at the new English pub that has opened about 15 blocks away from us.

The Duke has just received his steak and chips for the second time. They were cold the first time, so he reluctantly sent them back. His brother and I set to eating our fish and chips with more fervour, now that we all have been fed. 

The Duke takes a bite of his steak, and then pauses.

"Damn, that thing is happening again, where when I have my first bite of steak, it feels like it is wedged in my throat."

A moment later, "It is really stuck. I think I have to go to the washroom and try to cough it out."

He is in the washroom for five minutes, at which point he emerges out, saying that the staff have been knocking on the door of the single stalled washroom, perceiving him to be intoxicated and vomiting. To avoid being kicked out, he tells us he is going to go outside to try to rid himself of this errant piece of meat.

Another five minutes pass. He calls, says he isn't doing well, and asks if we can get his food to go. I run out to the parking lot where he is frantically and unsuccessfully coughing. He says we'd better skip the party we'd planned to go to. I agree, and hand him the car keys, while I rush back to pay the bill.

The waiter is unnecessarily inquisitive. The Duke's brother tells me that he was asking where the Duke had disappeared off to a second time, seeming a little perturbed that he had only eaten a single bite of his re-ordered meal. Rather than explaining that there is meat stuck in his esophagus, Brother tells him that he got an important call from his boss. Waiter asks him what the Duke does. Brother says he is a very important researcher at the nearby university (which, granted, isn't entirely a lie).

When I go to pay the bill, Waiter asks me more about the Duke's whereabouts. I amaze myself at my ability to lie on my feet, telling him that March is the end of the fiscal year at the university, so there had been some major grant deadlines lately. I further elaborate, saying that his boss had called about a mistake on a very major grant proposal. Waiter seems satisfied. I leave him a big tip out of guilt for my dishonesty.

We meet the Duke in the parking lot. As we drive home, his breathing is laboured, and he intermittently mutters "Oh fuck".

We get home. He tries to drink a glass of water. It comes up in a matter of seconds. He retreats to the washroom as I consult the mighty Google for advice. I become convinced that we should go to the ER. He is reluctant, asking for an extra twenty minutes to try his best to dislodge it. It is only after we consult with his parents, who have worked as nurses, that he agrees to go.

We walk the six blocks to the local hospital, as he says that sitting hurts too much for us to take a cab. We enter the emergency room, which looks reasonably quiet and free of blood and screams. We wait in line at admissions, rolling our eyes at the people before and after us, who clearly don't understand the notion of the term emergency, complaining of diarrhea and sore ribs. 

After we check in, we are sent to the waiting room, where the Duke takes a turn for the worse. He is feeling faint, saying he can't feel his arms, and is grasping my hand with a cool, squeezing grip. It is now that I am slipping out of automatic mode, and begin to feel my heart throbbing away. I ask him if he is okay, and he squeaks out a "no".

We go back to the admissions desk. The attendant nurse acts as though the Duke is merely hysterical and working himself up, and tells him to "calm down", take '"slow deep breaths", and, of course, that his turn will be soon. Thankfully, our turn is actually soon, and almost immediately after the Duke informs them he is on the verge of passing out and has numb extremities, he is placed on a bed and rolled on through.

It is hectic. Nurses dashing in and out. IVs, xrays, blood tests, EKGs. His shirt and shoes are removed. His monitor beeps. He swears when the needles pierce his skin. He looks around, confusedly, searching for me amidst this chaos. "I'm right here with you," I proclaim over the series of questions about the amount of alcohol he has consumed and medical history.

The IV helps, as does the stability of the bed. Although still in pain, and coughing up the saliva that can't flow through, he seems more grounded. One of the various medical professionals who enters the curtained cubicle looks at me familiarly. It turns out he is one of my clients from my first therapy practicum. This is the first time I've had such an unexpected reunion, and I am momentarily tickled pink that I was important enough for him to remember me years later.

Time passes. I phone the Duke's parents, who are rife with questions, and tell me to relay their love back to him. I move the chair to beside his bed so I can hold his hand. The flimsy pastel curtains provide little muffling to the sounds around us, so we are treated to the soundtrack of the ER. 

The man to our left has had a stroke. He doesn't speak English, so the translator is attempting to pull out a description of his symptoms and medical history. 

To our right is a man who has drunkenly fallen down some stairs. He is in unbearable pain. I cringe every time he screams "My back fucking hurts!", as well as when the nurses tell him to watch his profanities. It feels voyeuristic, as he shrieks as they turn him over, and as the doctor informs him that he will be "putting a finger up your bum, which you have to squeeze for us to determine whether you have spinal damage." He cannot do so, and yells in frustration. He is moved to trauma, and replaced by a peculiar man with a laceration on his chin. This man speaks in a slow, determined fashion, and precedes a his requests with "I know I am acting crazy, but..." He quizzes each of the nurses and doctors on their qualifications, asks to speak to his mother, and mutters to whoever will listen about some sort of conspiracy and mistrust of the hospital.

The white-coated doctor arrives. He suggests that the Duke drink some soda, as carbonation often helps to displace stuck food. The nurses laugh at the banality of this suggestion. I am sent to the waiting room with handful of change, and return with a Pepsi. The Duke takes a sip, then another, then cough desperately, the Pepsi spewing out in nearly projectile fashion. "That really hurts!" he proclaims. The doctor dashes out, as though ashamed. He returns with Gravol and morphine, stating that they should help him relax enough for the steak to become unwedged.  I ask the Duke how he is feeling a few minutes later, and he says "Heavy", later describing himself as feeling "morphiney".

Though he is certainly more relaxed, the painful lump stuck in his chest remains, and around half an hour later, a new machine arrives. This one is apparently meant to deliver a smooth muscle relaxant over the period of an hour. We are told that this should make his esophagus relax, so the meat will merely drop down into his stomach. If this doesn't work, though, it appears that some sort of manual extraction may be the next step.  

Another half an hour, and he starts coughing. Heavy, thick coughs. The conspiracy man shouts "The man beside me needs help!" A few bits of red come up. I am unsure if they are blood or meat. Suddenly, a piece of steak falls from his mouth. It is huge, easily two inches around. I may have pumped my fist in the air in triumph, shouting "It's out!" in celebration.

Before we are allowed to leave, at least three people lecture him on the virtue of chewing adequately. 

1:30am Sunday morning, we leave, pondering how odd it is to be merely strolling away from the ER. We stop at a 24 hour coffee shop for him to have some soup, and I begin laughing uncontrollably the absurdity of the entire night.

He still has suction cup marks on his chest today. And I am going to throw out the steak and chips leftovers.

Sticky pages

Whenever I go to pick up a package or buy some stamps at the closest post office to my apartment, located in a magazine store, I am always awed by the sheer number of issues dedicated to the most obscure of topics. Belgian photography magazines, Spanish architecture, Chihuahuas Monthly...
However, what always entertains me the most is the sheer volume of pornographic magazines.

Am I the only one who is surprised that the porno mag is still thriving?

I guess growing up in a small town, with the bulk of our magazine selection taking up a half shelf at 7-Eleven (as a side note, my town's 7-Eleven was not open 24 hours, which is exceedingly lame. It is a sad day when one can't get a burrito at 3am). The only exception was the small selection of plastic covered magazines behind the clerk-- Playboy, Hustler, and perhaps one more specialty magazine-- allowing for very little discretion for the dirty magazine connoisseur.
This also allowed for very little underaged consumption of such magazines, meaning that my teenaged males friends would hang on to their acquired issues with utter fervour. I would then discover these very crinkled and bent magazines stuffed in the corners of my guy friend's rooms, that I might flip through when they weren't looking out of curiosity. Perhaps due to the lack of such readily available material-- and the overtness of the "back room" in the one video store in town with dirty movies-- I busted more than one guy friend staring with consummate focus at the blurry and jumbled screen of the Playboy channel we didn't subscribe to in my basement, hoping perhaps to see a boob somewhere amidst the gray haze.

Of course, then there was the internet, and everything changed. Boobs were no longer the mysterious creatures to be glimpsed on late night television, but were available in full force via the magic of Google. Not only that, but there was selection-- if you had a think for Portuguese women in bear costumes, they were only a click away! And I guess I just kind of imagined that, outside of the few cultural staples, like Playboy, the dirty magazine was soon to be obsolete.

But the magazine store has proven me wrong. There are, in fact, more dirty magazines than I ever dreamed existed. I don't know if this was always the case, and I just led a sheltered small town life, or if they have upped their variety to compete with the internet. There are quite literally more than a hundred of these glossy issues, with glaring slogans, like "Hot Housewives" and (my personal favourite) "A Bear's Life". I feel the need to peruse through the aisle out of morbid curiosity, just to discover what titles have been able to keep a market over the years.

Perhaps also because of the clandestine nature of purchasing these magazines in a small town, I also feel the urge to watch the people browsing the aisles as I wait in line for my parcel. Some walk in with a purpose, grab their glossy of choice, and stride out. Others browse like they are at a museum, slowly pacing, stopping occasionally to fish a magazine from the back, and then contemplate its cover. I giggled like a school girl when a man dressed like a sea captain, in a giant yellow rain slicker with matching hat, held up his potential purchase to the light, and I could see what must have been triple Gs proudly displayed on the back cover from metres away.

Then comes marriage...

I am beginning to wonder how my friends became so cliched.

It certainly couldn't be by simple virtue of the diamond rings displayed on their ring fingers. It is not as though they are the first of my friends to get married, many of whom who have managed the transition from girlfriend to wife with relative ease. 

This week, six of us sat at my kitchen table, empty plates before us from our weekly meet-up. As I began collecting the plates, the regular dose of matrimonial talk began. You see, three of the six are getting married, one this spring, one this summer, one next summer. While I don't mind talk of the larger themes, such as bachelorette plans, dresses, caterers, or of their general excitement about an admittedly huge day in their lives, lately it has progressed to the downright banal. This time, they began chattering about their three's trip to the mall to pick out wedding bands, which began with an anecdote of how the jewelry store worker made a joking remark about the big rings on each of their fingers, and ended with a detailed dissection of which shape of wedding band best complemented their fingers. 

I counted floorboards.

I also wondered when they had all gotten so oblivious. Not just oblivious to the fact that I was counting floorboards, but also to the fact that J is single and not necessarily thrilled about it, or that M has been with her boyfriend for longer than some of them have been with their fiances, and is still barely able to get him to utter the word "commitment". Oblivious to the fact that their constant talk might not just bore some people, but may actually be a tinge hurtful.

While they may be unaware of how their words may sting, they also are also painfully incognizant of the fact that not everyone is necessarily wanting their lives right now. As it has now become obvious that M and her boyfriend are not getting engaged anytime soon, attention has turned to me as the next on the list. My non-committal or general responses to "do you think he's going to propose soon?" or "do you know what kind of ring you want?" fall over deaf ears. It seems that "I'm sure it will happen, but not anytime soon" is not satisfying enough, so they keep on pressing. 

That same night, as I excitedly tell them that the Duke and I are finally booking our sunshine holiday, S coos "Oh, I bet he has something in store for you there", and winks condescendingly. And even though I know it is only because she wants for me what she thinks I want for myself, I can't help but get annoyed. Why isn't it good enough that we are having our first big holiday together? Why does it need to be that I am providing him with a cliched scenario to ask for my hand in marriage? Why does everyone act like I am just suppressing my frantic need for a wedding, rather than accepting that him and I are just happy in the moments we're in now? 

I guess it is just starting to depress me that these women I know are genuinely ambitious, driven, feisty, independent present themselves like something out of a bad sitcom, when all we talk about are calories and relationships. As I walked home today, I realized that I knew reams more about their theme colours, the necklines of their bridesmaid's dresses and their fiances' idiosyncracies than they did about my dissertation or my job. And it made me feel a little lonely.

Apologetic stream of consciousness

I know the better choice would be to stop apologizing.

But to stop apologizing means to stop feeling guilty, and I don't know if that is really in my constitution.

I recently joked on my Facebook status update that I was on the verge of developing rickets (my favourite vitamin deficiency) by virtue of the increasing amount of my life spent in windowless offices. Granted, there may be little sunlight out there this time of year, but what little there is has to be better than all the staring at concrete walls (and, of course, computer screens) I've been doing lately.

The other day, the Duke joked that it felt like we had a long distance relationship due to my penchant for getting up at the crack of dawn for a day full of assorted attempts at productivity, combined with my ill-timed and scattered efforts to maintain a social life and keep physically active.

I am happy to report I took this Tuesday night off, and we napped together, which is very possibly my new favourite thing in life.

So, yes, same old story as always. I'm busy. It is a tedious thing to repeat, yet I feel I have to do so anyways. 

I don't relish feeling so cut off from this side of my life. I was thinking the other day of how important writing has become in my life, as a way of sorting through my thoughts, of reflecting, of engaged in catharsis without the real life consequences. I feel a little scattered when I don't get my moment to excise these words from my busy little brain. I also feel like I sometimes lose my touch a little in these period of non-writing limbo.

On top of that, I can't help feeling like a bit of a jerk for ignoring everyone else here. In truth, I'm sure I am totally overemphasizing my importance to all of you. I know I understand when someone else stops writing and interacting for a period of time, as we can all empathize with life getting in the way. But I still don't like it when I discover that, marinating in my reader, is a tale of someone I care about going through a hard time or a tragedy or even a tremendous success. I wish I had the time so I wouldn't miss that. Silly enough, the words of all of you have come to mean something to me, and I feel like a bit of a bad friend when I can't even find the time in a month to read them and say hello. 

So, that is the story of my life right now. No comments today, for the first time, because I just want you all to read at face value without the need to reassure or challenge my ridiculous sense of guilt or say any of those wonderful things you tend to say.

And the world continues to shrink

Saturday afternoon, I am standing at the corner of a busy intersection with the Duke and two friends, debating where to go for lunch. My eyes flit over to the flow of people crossing the pavement, and I make eye contact with a tall man. He is evidently walking towards me, with sure, direct steps, and I am perplexed. Was my eye contact somehow unintentionally inviting?

He strides up, and reaches out his hand. "Hi, I'm *insert name here*." I reached out to take his hand, bemused, when suddenly the light bulb beams on.

I've had my first random blogger encounter, for this is S'Mat, who I have emailed and Facebooked on occasion, but never encountered through anything but the glow of a computer screen. And, again supporting my conjecture that the world is a bit of a tangled interwoven spiderweb, with random lines connecting you in ways you never predicted, he has ended up not only in my city over the weekend, but dining across the street from where I stood and chattered. And he was able to generalize that profile picture snapshot to the in living colour version of me in my winter jacket on a weekend afternoon.

Feeling as though I have been standing, agape, for several minutes, I let him know that I have figured out the connection, then shout out "I haven't seen you in so long!" for the benefit of my perplexed friends. He nods wittingly at my charade. I turn to introduce him to my boyfriend, and S'mat knowingly states "This must be the Duke." The Duke is understandably bewildered to hear his former blogging moniker tossed about, but I murmur to him softly that he is another blogger. S'mat puts his finger up to his lips in recognition of our shared secret.

We talk for another few quick moments, before we both veer off to our respective groups. With the increasing overlap between my "real" life and my blogging life, I am getting eerily apt at lying on the spot, and I tell my other friends that S'Mat was an old friend from my undergraduate days. They smile and nod, then turn to the menu, as I contemplate what a very small world it is after all.