Gather 'Round, for I Have News!

Whatcha Readin'?

Daryl knows when I'm healthy and happy because I'll have two or three novels going at one time. One will be at the head of our bed, another in the back of the car for waits at the DMV or the dentist's office. A third will be sitting on the coffee table, or in the dining room where I eat my breakfast.

I devour books. Love them. Live off of them. Nom. Nom. Nom.

Sadly, right now I find myself in a bit of a novel dry spell. I'm just not that inspired by anything new I've seen out there (Jonathan Franzen and I are not good author-reader buddies, for one), and I have not yet hunted down our local library to check out what they have in store.

I've just started Jeanette Walls' Half Broke Horses, which is  beginning to be wonderful, but I want more. I am the Cookie Book Monster.

So I'm asking you: what's a good book you've read lately? Why did you like it?

Thanks to: http://scientopia.org/blogs/childsplay/2010/08/08/blind-item-cookie-monster/ for the Cookie Monster pic!

Achoo.

So it turns out I'm allergic to Nashville.

After dragging through work all week up until Thursday, feeling like I was carrying a 50-pound backpack full of sand (thanks, Biggest Loser, for that image), I finally gave in and went to the doctor. It's always a tough call when to stay home sick as a health-care worker. Granted, I'm a chaplain, so I'm not changing bandages or administering medication. Yet I do spend my days in close quarters with people who are very, very ill, and I'm supposed to stay home when I'm sick to avoid spreading germs to those with suppressed immune systems. But how sick is sick?

Health care workers are historically terrible at gauging this. When I worked at a hospital in New Jersey I actually overheard this conversation at the hospital library:

Nurse 1: Yeah, so I'm supposed to stay home today until the test results are back.
Nurse 2: Really? They're being that dumb?
Nurse 1: Yeah, they think I probably have a mild case of the swine flu.
Me: (quickly standing up and running out of library)

So my problem always is: what constitutes sick? The sniffles? I get these every few days. The flu? I get this probably once a year, but since I'm contagious the day before, should I stay home for sniffles, just in case?

Add to all of this the fact that at my place of work sick days = vacation days. That's right, for every day I'm out sick, I subtract one vacation day. This is the WORST plan ever for health care workers, who are bad at staying home even when they're SUPER sick. This policy definitely contributes to sick doctors/nurses/techs coming in declaring themselves "not that sick." And come on, if going into work with the sniffles means we can still take Christmas off to be with our families, most of us will probably do this, right? How sick is sick?

By Thursday evening, I decided I needed to get checked out. I wasn't dying. I didn't have the flu. But I certainly felt crummy. Sore throat, plugged sinuses, general malaise. My energy level was at about 24%. Walking from the office to my car felt like a mile and a half. Blech.

So I stayed home, went to bed at 8pm, and slept until 10am the next morning. Then I went in to get checked out.

The verdict, according to a very kind Nashville doctor?

I'm very allergic to Nashville.

Not uncommon, from what he said. It usually takes people a few weeks of living here before their bodies get really angry at all of the pollen/pollutants/tree offal/etc. I didn't think it was allergies because my eyes weren't itchy and my nose wasn't running. According to the doctor, my "ears were full of fluid that is draining down [my] throat." EW.

So now, doped up on antihistamines, with cough drops and nasal spray in tow, I'm doing a bit better. And the good news is that I was never in danger of getting anyone else sick, because for as miserable as an allergy attack is, at least I get to keep it to myself.

Ah, Nashville. Why so allergen-laden?

Wedding Bells and Belles

My good friend Tonia got married this weekend.

You can check out her awesome blog on greenin' up your life here.

She was pretty much my third sister growing up, so both of my sisters and I got to be in her wedding! It was so fun to be bridesmaids together, though we couldn't help continually cracking this joke:

"Oh my gosh! I can't believe we showed up in the same dress! How embarrassing!"

And then laughing like ninnies.

It was an amazing, beautiful wedding, and one we'll never forget. Here are some of the photos from the big shindig:

My awesome cake-making sister Caroline made them a Packers vs. Vikings cake. Tonia (the Packers fan) fed Mike a Packers piece and Mike (the Vikings fan) fed Tonia a Vikings piece. That's true love, that is.

Almost all of the decorations were handmade, green, and gorgeous.

Aleah was adorable and hilarious, as usual...

We danced and danced, but stopped long enough for a few photos. We don't look this good that often!

I hear that this is called "photo diving." I call it super fun!

Thanks for the party, Tonia and Mike! Many, many, many blessings on your marriage as you begin this wonderful journey together.

To Make You Laugh

I discovered this hilarious website a few days ago, and haven't been able to get enough:

Not Always Right.

It's folks in customer service who deal with customers who are... well... not always right. Occasionally there's a crass one, so my apologies if it's a little too much. It makes me giggle, so I thought I'd share.

The "no pancakes" one is my current favorite.

Sunday poems - A Song for Simeon

I'm working as a hospice chaplain these days.

It can be very, very sad.

It can also be joyful in some strange ways, helping to usher people from life to death, from this world to the next; trying to help people find comfort and peace in the living as they prepare to die.

I came across this T.S. Eliot poem the other day that speaks to the end of life in a way nothing else I've come across does. It's a reference to Simeon, the old man at the temple who spoke to Mary and Joseph and their brand-new baby, Jesus. He had waited all his life to see the Messiah, and the Messiah had come.

I know it's not Sunday, but here's the poem.

"A Song for Simeon"
by T.S. Eliot

Lord, the Roman hyacinths are blooming in bowls and
The winter sun creeps by the snow hills;
The stubborn season has made stand.
My life is light, waiting for the death wind,
Like a feather on the back of my hand.
Dust in sunlight and memory in corners
Wait for the wind that chills toward the dead land.

Grant us thy peace.
I have walked many years in this city,
Kept faith and fast, provided for the poor,
Have given and taken honour and ease.
There went never any rejected from my door.

Who shall remember my house, where shall live my children's children
When the time of sorrow is come?
They will take to the goat's path, and the fox's home,
Fleeing from foreign faces and the foreign swords.

Before the time of cords and scourges and lamentation
Grant us thy peace.
Before the stations of the mountain of desolation,
Before the certain hour of maternal sorrow,
Now at this birth season of decease,
Let the Infant, the still unspeaking and unspoken Word,
Grant Israel's consolation
To one who has eighty years and no to-morrow.

According to thy word.
They shall praise Thee and suffer in every generation
With glory and derision,
Light upon light, mounting the saints' stair.
Not for me the martyrdom, the ecstasy of thought and prayer,
Not for me the ultimate vision.
Grant me thy peace.
(And a sword shall pierce thy heart,
Thine also.)
I am tired with my own life and the lives of those after me,
I am dying in my own death and the deaths of those after me.
Let thy servant depart,
Having seen thy salvation.

Oh Tennessee...

During the past week, I've seen/heard/witnessed the following two things:

1. People crying on the nightly news. Why? Were they broken up about another flood? An accident? An approaching hurricane? Nope. They were crying because tonight is the final Brooks & Dunn concert EVER.

2. A grown man, professionally dressed, use the phrase: "Oh me oh my!"

Tennessee makes me smile. Sometimes it makes me laugh. People here don't seem to take themselves overly seriously. All of this is good. Very good.