Saturday, January 9, 2010

On Call Weekend

I never expect nor demand myself to get anything done when on call. Maybe laundry. Oops, excuse me while I put in that load of light stuff.

Done.

I know people who live life on call like any other day. Go to that concert, entertain guests, do the grocery shopping. Not me, not usually. On a day like this, when only a handful of people call me for simple stuff ("My child's doctor accidently put 1/10/10 on the amoxicillin Rx and the pharmacy won't fill it") it seems silly to set the bar so low. On one of those days when I can barely get through a shower or a meal without someone running out of her pain medication, I remember why I feel less than horrible for vegging at the computer, where no one will be offended at my phone conversations about someone's most recent BM. I sometimes do go out to eat, and I will go for a walk with my friend Susan, who understands, and kindly comments on how beautiful my Spanish sounds when it's called into service.

Today, here is what I did with my on-call time. 1.)Woke up late to the tune of my pager, tired because I'd had an irritating middle-of-the-night call in which the patient repeated herself 4 or 5 times about each symptom and I (gently, sort of) snapped at her for it. I can never fall back to sleep when I snap at a patient, even if they probably deserved it. I actually lie there wondering if I should call back and apologize. 2.)Went for a wimpy, middle-aged 3-mile jog which I like to refer to as a run. 3.)While still in my running clothes and sweat, was reminded by my husband at 1130 of a 12-noon reunion of people I used to work with, necessitating a hyper-speed shower/blowdryer/facepainting session, only to find very few people I knew there. 4.) Surreptitious stop at the library to check out the new books rack when I really have two or three other books I actually paid money for that I am already reading. 5.) Built a fire and made coffee. 6.) Walked over to H20 with Merlin to glean from the last of the week-old bread and pastries. 7.) Went to the NPR site to listen to a free preview of an album by Portland singer/songwriter Laura Viers. She's good! (Oh, and between 5 and 6 above visited my friend Aaron's short-story blog and left a comment.)

That's all I have to show for my day. I don't feel too guilty though, because I'm at work. Maybe I'll get ambitious tomorrow and take down the Christmas tree. Or maybe spend some time browsing the works of Elmore Leonard, Garrison Keillor, Joyce Carol Oates, Mark Strand's favorite poets, Nick Hornby, or the coffee table book of 500 Iconic Buildings, all of which I checked out at the DPL today.

Oops! Gotta go. Two pages since the end of the last paragraph.

2 comments:

  1. What are you talking about? You've had a monumental day of accomplishments. I find myself say, "if only I could get as much done as Kim..."

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  2. You are too kind. You run a theater company for crying out loud!

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