Last night, I got an email from my job. It was addressed to all the per diem workers on my unit, reminding us of our education and scheduling requirements to stay in the hospital’s good graces. There was no due date in the email for the education compliance.
Failure to comply, it concluded, may result in termination.
I set my laptop aside after reading the email and tried to figure out what about the email had bothered me. I remember a similar from one last year. When I read it, I freaked out – Was I behind on my education? Was I working enough weekend hours? (Everything was fine.)
This year, I have been so mentally bogged down by family life, homeschool life, and the pandemic that I actually HAVEN’T done my education, at least not all of it. So maybe the email WAS for me.
I made a fairy tale cloak. I’m still hoping to go to a forest and take some magical pictures out in nature, but real life dictates backyard photo shoots for now.
I was standing in our dining room with one of my older daughters. We were having a conversation when we heard a loud noise. The door of our china cabinet, inches away from our elbows, flew open. A cascade of china fell to the floor at our feet.
While we were standing very close to it, neither of us had been touching the cabinet. My having seen what happened with my own eyes took away the anxiety I usually experience when I find something broken. I knew no one was at fault, so I was able to skip the Who Is To Blame step of dealing with brokenness.
If I hadn’t been in the room the moment the accident happened, I would have spent serious bandwidth trying to figure out how an accident like that could have happened without human interaction. Yet it clearly had.
As we continue to do the work on antiracism, we’re going to make mistakes even while trying to get it right.
If you don’t want to drive yourself crazy, you have to accept that there will be times when perhaps you should have spoken up and didn’t, or should have stayed quiet, but didn’t, and instead said something idiotic. Or worse, said something that might have been idiotic, but you can’t be sure.
There’s something almost universally appealing to readers about having a comfy chair near a window with a cozy blanket, in a quiet room with a good book.
If you can picture yourself there, I want to suggest a title for the book you’re holding in your hands. So much the better if it’s a rapidly darkening November afternoon, with the window open and a cool, damp breeze flowing in.
