Dialysis Nurse: The Final Chapter.

I've been a dialysis nurse since 1977. When you do the same thing every day for 34 years, you can get pretty good at it. But you can also get somewhat weary of it, as I consider it to be a job for young people. There's very little-to-no sit down work there. On your feet 10 to 14 hours. Often routine, but still life-and-death stuff going on. When I first started in dialysis, the staff to patient ratio was 1:1. Now clinics have one nurse for up to 14 patients at a time, with one patient care tech for every four patients. It can get hopping. They can crash, cramp, vomit, or get diarrhea in the blink of an eye. Cardiac events are quite possible. And none of those things are written into the charge nurse's task list for the day: the mounds of paperwork sometimes have to get completed after the door's locked at night.

Occasionally they all get cramps at the same time...

This summer will be my last as a dialysis nurse, and it's shaping up to be something completely different.

 I officially retired in 2005 when we sold everything and became fulltime RVers. But within a year, we bought this property in Mexico, planning for me to work part-time 4 summers to pay it off. So I returned every April to the dialysis clinic in Minnesota that I retired from, and it's been fairly easy to tolerate. Same job, same co-workers, some of the same patients. Same = good at my age. Plus the grandbabies are nearby.

However, this summer they can't use me there, as they finally got staffed adequately and competently. (It took them a little while to replace me, mostly because it's in the middle of nowhere.) Another clinic in the cities was good enough to say they could use me some, plus I could "float" to other clinics. I hate floating: patients and other staff also prefer sameness, and The New Nurse never gets any respect.

Now add in this: diesel fuel approaching $5/gallon, Bahia Kino Mexico to Minneapolis Minnesota is 4000 miles round trip, towing our fifth wheel nets a maximum 10 miles per gallon, comes to about $2000. Just for diesel. Plus the RV park there is $500/month. Plus the floating thing...

This wasn't looking very favorable. We do OK on my husband's SS and disability, but there's never much extra. And it's fine in Mexico, we do not have a very expensive lifestyle here. But to contemplate $3500 right off the top when I only need to make $5000 to satisfy our mortgage balloon seemed wrong somehow. I began to look at other options.

 

CLICK 

I always knew about Travel Nursing, but never considered it for me because of that sameness lure. Learning new skills is no longer a thirstful quest in my life, if you get my drift. Now it looks like the answer for us. For a similar salary, plus an apartment and daily stipend, I can work a 13 week contract in Arizona. It's within a long day's drive from here, so trips "home" are possible. There should even be a small amount of sameness to mitigate, as the same company I retired from owns 3/4 of the dialysis clinics everywhere, same machines, same procedures.

Pros and cons? Sure. Ron would stay here. Good and bad, no further comment there. I'm not licensed to practice in Arizona yet, but it only takes two days to do that. We wouldn't see the grandbabies. Bad. But I'd make enough money to afford to fly us to Minnesota for a visit after the contract's over.  Plus I want to buy one of these this summer, which would be much harder after losing $3500 driving to Minnesota.

Can't you just see me in this? Cruising up the beach, over the dunes, to Ladies Who Lunch?

So this travel thing will get nailed down this week, or shelved entirely. If I'm going to take that float job in Minnesota, I need to be there by May 6th. Stay tuned.


ADDENDUM:

I GOT THE JOB, WILL BE IN SHOW LOW ARIZONA FOR 13 WEEKS STARTING NEXT WEEK. WOO-HOO!

A Great Dinner!

As an atheist, I don't buy the whole heaven concept. I do believe most strongly that after death, our soul/spirit/essence continues in a parallel plane of existence, sort of vibrating-but-just-out-of-reach. I also believe these souls sometimes drift across and contact us, often in that just falling asleep or just waking up moment of loosened consciousness. You know when you suddenly think of someone that's been gone many years, out of the blue? I believe it's because that soul just touched you.

I often think of people I've lost, wish I could get answers to unresolved questions, wonder if they have any current awareness of my thoughts and deeds. Make sure they know how much they're missed.

Anyway, last week while I was watching The Price Is Right (my husband rarely misses it, and would be apoplectic to know I just wrote that, but he never reads my blog), they had a Showcase that seemed like I had chosen it personally, including a bass boat. This made me ponder what else I'd select to win in a perfect made-for-me Showcase. Soon I was thinking:

What if there was a Showcase where you could win a dinner anywhere you want with any 10 people in history you want? (I know, my mind goes to strange places sometimes.)

So I made my list. It wasn't easy, because there are some people I'd like to ask questions of, but certainly wouldn't want at my dinner table. Attila. The Donner Party...

Picture this group being seated at Gordon Ramsay's Restaurant in Chelsea, UK:

1.   My Dad. My Hero.
2.   Ella Fitzgerald, for sheer delight and entertainment.
3.   John Muir, the naturalist with true vision and a path.
4.   Lucy, the Australopithecan.
5.   D.B. Cooper. I just want to know.
6.   J.R.R. Tolkien, just to see how his mind works.
7.   John Belushi, funniest man who ever lived.
8.   Robin Hood, the real one, another hero.
8a. Geronimo,  a backup in case Robin Hood is fictional.
9.   Helen Keller. I understand she was a hoot!
10. Amelia Earhart. Another "I just want to know".

And here's what it would look like, with apologies to da Vinci and Christians everywhere. Click on it to enlarge:

L to R: Muir, Keller, Hood, Lucy, Tolkien, Fitzgerald, Dad, Me, Earhart, Geronimo, Belushi, Carey and Barker.

Who would you want, and where would you eat?

My Crafty Side

I figure I've entered the last 1/3 of my life, sort of a sobering thought. The first third was all just a set-up for the second third (which turned out to be CONSEQUENCES of one's actions), and now the last third has me scrambling for the punchline. Which so far seems to be "Seriously???"

In my next life, I'll know how to deal with life's punches sans alcohol, isolation, or avoidance. But in this go-round, I seem to have an inordinately high requirement for both solitude and instant gratification. I've always taken to heart my dad's most sage bit of advice: Choose a career where you'll love going to work every day. Well, that didn't happen (seriously, dialysis nurse?) but it did provoke me to find alternate sources for both solitude and instant gratification. People really should be able to make a living doing something they love. In most cases, it won't be lucrative enough and will need to be supplemented by work one doesn't love quite so much. Sucks, but it's been a reality for me and most people I know.

So, crafts. I've found men like to make fun of women who do craftwork. "It's worthless, it's a waste of time and resources, nobody wants it, it's tacky." I feel sorry for those tiny little minds. Craft-making is a hobby, and men have hobbies too. Even something as deceptively slothful as sitting in a lawnchair and observing the human condition is a hobby. I find men's hobbies are more expensive generally. DirecTV's NFL package is $335.00 (sports-watching, their main hobby), not to mention golf, fishing or hunting. So a $10 bag of yarn is nothing in the grand scheme of things...

The division of labor in our Mexican paradise is hobby-based. My husband's hobby here is beautifying the yard, but he calls it work. Therefore all the other work falls to me, because his hobby requires physical exertion and he's too tired to do the dishes or vacuum. He does do laundry, though, because the washer and clotheslines are in his domain and he can multi-task. It can take me all day to wash dishes if the bird-watching's good enough...

Ron's cactus-driftwood fence. Click to enlarge, it's great!

Ron's rock-paved walkway, partially complete

I just love creating something useful or beautiful or just delightfully quirky from something else. It's even better if someone else wants to buy it.

There's a website called  Etsy

It's a place to sell handmade stuff, and has a burgeoning viewer base, people wanting quality and uniqueness. I've had very few sales, but then I don't work at the marketing side of it. You can spend some serious money marketing your shop, which sort of defeats my purpose. But there are support groups, forums, advice, contests, and TONS of great items for sale. Best place to find one-of-a-kind gifts.

So to satisfy my creative urges, I go hole up in the RV (Craft Central) for long blocks of time, designing, assembling, and photographing what I hope to be saleable items. I also am now able to crochet, wet-felt, and watch TV at the same time. Multi-tasker, that's me. Some day I'll be discovered. All it would take is for Angelina Jolie or Katie Holmes to buy a pair of my baby booties

or for Project Runway to want my seashell-and-pottery-shard necklaces.

I also make things for Dylan and Nora (smallest grandbabies, at 3 and 5 young enough they might forget me in my long winter absences), things that they'll see daily and think "My Gramma Barb made me this!"

Nora's Mutant Bunny Slippers

Dylan's Fish Slippers

So when my attention span's long enough, I can execute a project or two daily and feel fulfilled. I can go back to Minnesota and work summers in dialysis as long as I have crafts and grandbabies to come home to. (This is my last year of that, can I have a heartfelt HOO-RAH!)

So back to dishwashing and vacuuOH! I HEAR ORIOLES!

Creature Discomforts

I have Entomophobia, a fear of insects. It may stem from the time I was stung over 50 times as a child. I was at Day Camp, and we were sliding on our backsides down a steep dirt hill. It was WAY fun, until I veered a bit and knocked the beehive off and they stung me all the way down. Now bee stings are life-threatening to me, and I carry Epi-Pens wherever I go. They're stashed in the truck, bathroom, my purse, and one is always present on the kitchen table.

Epi-Pen

Minnesota's actually sort of low on my insect radar, despite the mosquito-filled air, black fly clouds, and bee swarms, because of my friend 100% DEET. They'll hover an inch away, but won't land. I also stash DEET everywhere. It even sort of blends with my favorite fragrance, Avon's Skin-So-Soft.

Mexico's all the way up there, though, on my anxiety scale for insects. Mexican insects appear to really like DEET, plus they have insects I've never had to worry about much in Minnesota.

There are these:

No-See-Ums

(Get it? No-See-Ums?) They're called Jejenes here, and they come in the summer and early autumn. And here's what they do to my husband: tiny red dots that he says don't even itch.

With me, each bite becomes a nickel-sized, raised, raging, burning, maddening itch, lasts 5 days, and I spend the whole Jejene season shut inside the air conditioned RV. The casita's not air conditioned, and those little fiends come right through the screens. Only ammonia dabbed on the bites eases the itch, and then only for 20 minutes.

Then there are these:

Bees

I probably wouldn't have as many bees if I didn't fill the birdbath and water the garden. They seem to like water. Hence all the Epi-Pens.

I've not seen mosquitos here, nor biting flies, but then I've not been here during the summer. Yet... In any event, maybe they'll respond to DEET.

The garden has these sometimes on the fruit trees. I'm sure they aren't a threat for biting or stinging, the basis for most insect phobias, but they are SO ugly and creepy-looking. This one actually reared up and audibly hissed at me:

Caterpillar

But to accelerate my phobia, Mexico goes the distance. We've found 6 or 8 of these inside the casita to date:

Scorpion

Yesterday there was one behind the canister of the vacuum cleaner when I removed it for emptying. Until then, all the ones I'd seen were either high up on the wall or dead in the sink, and I've been able to get my husband to dispose of them. Yesterday he wasn't around, so I carried the vacuum out to the deck, waited until it crawled out, and smashed it into an oozy wet spot with his walking stick. I could not believe how high the ICK factor got with that scorpion! My heart was pounding, I was sweating and breathing rapidly. And I felt zero remorse after killing it. I can't even kill spiders normally.

Which brings me to today. 3AM, I enter the casita, flashlight in hand, put the light on, and catch a movement out of the corner of my eye. There, on the sofa, was this:

Tarantula

I think I peed a little. Uttered a couple of those words my Ex-Marine husband taught me. Even a normal spider in the shower or ceiling paralyzes me, but Holy Crap, there was a frickin' TARANTULA on my frickin' SOFA! And it wasn't sleeping, it was moving back and forth, kinda fast, looking at me. I think it was stalking me. All I could think of was corralling it so I knew where it was until my Tarantula-Wrangler woke up. So I did this:

He doesn't get up as early as I do. Nobody does. (I once stood on my coffee table for 45 minutes until my husband came inside to get rid of a scorpion on the wall.) I tried to sit here at the computer, except I had to keep looking at my 4 pound casserole dish to see if it was moving. But I couldn't hang: my heart was pounding, I was sweating and breathing rapidly. Had to go back over to the RV, flashlight in hand (flashlight always because of these, found on the RV pad back in November):

Rattler

So I tried to be quiet, working on some of my jewelry-making, but my Tarantula Wrangler soon woke up. I told him of the situation next door and, after scoffing at my fear (why do men have to do that?), he dutifully went over and removed it unharmed outside in the bushes. I think I'll have to put him on retainer.

When I looked up the word for insect phobia (Entomophobia, first sentence), I also found the steps for desensitization for this phobia, something about drawing pictures of them, then looking at photos of them, ramping up exposure etc.  Which would be beneficial, I guess, to mitigate the heart-pounding, blahblah, but it sure wouldn't keep me from avoiding them.

It's now 5 hours later, and I'm still a bit queasy and anxious from the tarantula. Can't imagine where it got in, if there are more, just very nervous. One of the few areas where Minnesota's better than our Mexican Paradise...

Ara and Spirit, I LOVE THESE GUYS!

Many bloggers have a list of other bloggers blogs that they follow, often daily. While perusing those blogs, I often discover more blogs on their blogrolls, and so the list grows. I've followed this one off and on for a few years now, and wanted to share.

The Oasis Of My Soul

A motorcycle and sidecar, a man and his pitbull. 

What's not to like?

© 2011 Ara Gureghian www.theoasisofmysoul.com

Ara Gureghian is a nomad, along with Spirit, his friend the pitbull. His base camp is a piece of land with a very large tent near Big Bend State Park in Texas. When they go on the road, the tent goes in a big metal storage container.

© 2011 Ara Gureghian www.theoasisofmysoul.com

 His online journal is prolific, and has something for everyone: excellent photography, mystical ramblings and soulful insight. Even recipes, as he's a classically-trained chef. But to me, the best part of his whole experience is the dog. Ara's constant concern for his dog's well-being is an underlying theme throughout his writing. There are actually heated garments and blankets so that Spirit is safe and comfortable in the wind's teeth.

© 2011 Ara Gureghian www.theoasisofmysoul.com

While there are over four years of archived entries, reading them all could take weeks. I will try to extract the major catalysts in his forward journey for you.

Ara is Armenian, raised in France, culinary training in Switzerland, definitely nomadic genetically and historically. He and Spirit saunter around the country by motorcycle and sidecar and share the journey with us through stunning photography and commentary. It was a strange shock when I recently realized (Duh!) he must have an accent, as his written English grammar and sentence structure are slightly and charmingly non-native-language-speaker construction. Just slightly.

Ara's beloved 26 year old son Lance passed away from liver cancer in 2004, and this journey grew from Ara's need to accept, understand, and find a way to go on. Spirit, a much abused Pit rescued from a shelter, has been a major part of his healing, just as Ara's love and bonding have helped heal Spirit.

The website navigates easily. You can quickly check out say, all his photos of Utah. Or Yosemite. Or copy his recipe for Mango Salsa. While there are apparently subsidizing sponsors for his trips, you'll find a request for donations at the end of every entry in his journal. Ara once compared it to people lining up at Barnes and Noble and demanding free books.

The photographs alone are worth your time, but the story of this traveler and his dog will make you smile.

© 2011 Ara Gureghian www.theoasisofmysoul.com

The Calendar

Sal and Al

 
Al and Sal live one street down from us, have been here forever, and while definitely seniors, are bubblier and more spry than all the rest of us combined. One day, Al and a few of his friends were in the hardware store. Al asked off-handedly if the proprietor had their new calendars yet. Apparently last year's calendar (scantily-clad beauties) he'd insisted on displaying prominently in their RV, much to Sal's dismay. Alas, no calendars this year, he was told.

Some time later, Sal and a few of her friends were in the drug store and spied a new calendar similar to the one in her RV. This was preceded by lunch with cocktails, mind you. They hatched a plot: Al's birthday was coming up, and wouldn't it be fun to give him a calendar of scantily-clad beauties that had OUR faces Photoshopped in?

They bought the calendar. We scheduled a photo session for our head shots, also with cocktails. I spent 2 days swapping faces, trying to match skin tones, carefully (pixel-by-pixel) blending edges. Then Joan added text, added the calendar grids, and shopped around to find a binder.

We presented the calendar to Al at the clubhouse Happy Hour, and he loves it. Now we're taking orders to sell them, 150 pesos. Email me to place your order...barbilou2@hughes.net

Here are the Ladies of Kino Bay!

Bette

Sal

Karen

Joan

Maggie

Jan

Delfie

Suzanne

Danielle

Pat

Jill

 Me

Add caption

We're planning one for us ladies next year, using the spouses of this year's ladies. Maybe a Firemen Calendar?

It's Going Too Fast

CLICK TO ENLARGE PHOTOS

Tomorrow's March already! We leave for Minnesota April 20, give-or-take, and it doesn't seem possible that we've been here 4 months. I'm not ready. While I miss my grandbabies' faces and voices achingly and constantly, I know I'll miss my sea and desert almost as much.

Nora and Dylan at Lake Mille Lacs

Ruby and Eli

Garden, sunrise hits Tiburon Island.

I have to work this summer, the LAST summer, then I'll be forever truly retired and indolent. At only 58 years old, I feel beaten down by my life's work and struggles, and am entirely prepared to never again have to bow in humility to the corporate monsters. Maybe I'll even learn to sleep past 3 AM.

Our last couple of weeks here haven't been very eventful or even memorable, but in review, they've been more productive than I would have predicted. Ron has been busily improving our landscaping. He's transplanted scores of desert cacti and trees, and humped rocks for outlining gardens and walkways.

Path to garage, baby cacti both sides, rock border. It'll be "paved" with flat cobblestones.

More rocks and cacti.

More rocks and cacti.

He also spent a few days sitting in his Man Cave, sanding and crafting an ironwood walking stick. It's gorgeous.

Master Carver

I've been churning out an expanded line of eclectic shell/leather/beaded jewelry for my Etsy shop, reading some very good books, and enjoying lunches out.

Etsy-bound jewelry

Lunch at Jorge's, Delfie's birthday. Those red beers are Micheladas, dark beer with clamato juice, chili-lime, and salted rims. Mmmmm!

We did do a couple of local explorative trips, poking through the remains of a couple of old haciendas, and a bit of beachcombing/clamming. Hectic pace, eh?


On the way home one afternoon, I saw an odd flash of white to my left and hollered "STOP!" And Ron stood the truck on it's nose. (A friend said her husband would have just said "For WHAT?") There were two Desert Bighorn Rams, full-curls, not 100 yards away. Only a couple of miles from our casita. And can you believe we had BOTH the camera and the camcorder at the ready? That never happens.

Desert Bighorn Sheep

Most of this winter I've been experiencing digestive urgencies. I still don't know what's occurred this year to cause this, but it's not been debilitating. Just a nuisance, and I have needed to stay near my friend-the-toilet a lot. If it remains an issue (Get it? Issue?) when I get back to Minnesota, the VA will sort it out.

Mi Amigo

Tomorrow is payday and my monthly trip to The City for resupply. This trip will include buying a mattress at WalMart. Two friends and I are going to make a day of it, have a good lunch somewhere, and manage to fill our truck to overflow capacity.

Then on Thursday, some more of "The Girls" and I plan to shop the segundas in Calle Doce, where I intend to assemble every metal bedframe there until I find one that fits my new mattress. Danny's Segunda has at least 75 of them.

This Saturday there's a craft sale at another RV park in the village, and I'm taking a table to try to raise a bit of cash selling the felted wool stuff and the new jewelry. Wish me luck.