Eight Ball Exegesis

I have a strange habit, when I'm feeling hopeless and in need of words from God, of turning on my iPod. I flip it to "shuffle" and sort of hope the song title that comes up answers my predicament. This isn't in place of prayer or any sort of organized religion. This particular desire hits when I'm otherwise occupied, like driving in my car or exercising.

I probably shouldn't admit that I sometimes flip open a Bible when I'm desperate for some heavenly inspiration. It's almost like I'm encouraging God to send me a word or two.

Like that time I needed inspiration and encouragement, I randomly flipped open to Deuteronomy 28:27: "May the Lord strike you with Egyptian boils and with tumors, scabs and itch for which you will find no cure."

Alrighty then! Sounds tasty and like a load of fun! Can I get that in a to-go box?

Please spare me the lecture about reading Biblical quotes in context and to apply the exegesis to accurate historical knowledge of the Jewish customs of the time. I know. I'm just playing.

Just like I consult the magic 8 ball in EVOO's office. Actually, I like to try to trick the 8 ball. I ask it questions like, "Is healthcare reform going to profit our hospital?"

It replied "Ask again later."

"Will St. Fozzie's continue its current path of progression and live to serve another 50 years in Chicago?"

"Better not tell you now."

"Will I survive this current predicament, will Jack get a job, will my house sell, and will I live happily ever after?"

"Cannot predict now."

"Fine. Will I bite the bullet and go to the gym after work?"

It replied, "Reply hazy, try again."

"Well, what good are you!?!??"

Let me tell you right here, right now. If I do end up as a hospital CEO some day, I will have two rules. One, meetings will start on time and anyone five minutes late will get locked out of the board room. Two, there will be a magic 8 ball in the center of the board room table.

Just because it's a good conversation piece. I've never seen a positive, definitive answer from the 8 ball (maybe they manufacture optimistic and pessimistic magic 8 balls?). I'm not dabbling in the occult, but I think it's funny to ask such items ridiculous questions that could never be answered in a one-word reply by a toy manufactured by Hasbro.

Then again, I'm the ridiculous one, actually carrying on a conversation with the 8 ball.

Now, about my Ipod exegesis. I hope I'm not "testing" God with this little trick. But sometimes, I ascertain a fair amount of peace from the seemingly random playlist selected by the ol' Ipod.

Tonight, I took fresh, newly wheeled and tuned-up rollerblades out on my town's walking path for a 10 mile ride. In a mood that was ripe for inspiration (I still can't fully excuse the vengeance I'm feeling toward the unethical buyer), I set my Ipod to "shuffle" and waited for God's stirring words to issue forth from my earbuds.

First song: Begin Again (Colbie Caillat)
Second song: It Stops Today (also Colbie Caillat)
Third song: Don't Stop Believing (Journey)
Fourth song: Faith (George Michael)
Fifth song: Margaritaville (Jimmy Buffet)

One, if God IS speaking to me through my Ipod, this is a pretty good message: Begin again, it stops today, don't stop believing, {have} faith, and then, well, have a margarita.

It served its purpose if only to make me laugh. Hmmm. I wonder where that mood ring is?

Quote Journal: Strength

"That which does not kill us makes us stronger."

-Friedrich Nietzsche

I'm channeling the quotes this week because I really don't know how I'm continuing to keep going every day. I will look back at this time in my life and marvel at how I survived. I will look back and call this a character-builder. I will look back and say something ridiculously-optimistic like, "Yep, that's why I'm a strong woman; it's because of experiences like that."

Pwwwwtttttthhhhhhhhh!

That's why I have abnormally-high levels of stomach acid!

Obviously, I'm not to the joking phase yet.

In short, our house sale fell through. Well, our house was perfectly fine. Our buyer is the one who finked out when we called him on his scheming, plotting ways. I could go on and on about this guy's unethical ways but I'll choose to be mature and simply call him a jerk. That's about as objective as I can be.

After a week where my stomach was eating itself, I've come to terms with this reality and I'd rather our house go to a nice, young couple who will nurture it. This guy would probably gut it and sell pieces on the black market (whoops, there I go again). So we're okay. Jack is shouldering most of this burden and once again, I'm grateful for his unending housing-related optimism.

Thank you, Jack! You're my favorite human. (No offense to the rest of y'all, really.)

Work, by contrast, is picking up positive steam. I had two MAJOR victories just today and times like this really buoy my spirits. First, I presented my huge operational project (yes, the one I cannot talk about) to senior hospital leadership today and it flew. It flew! It went as well as a presentation like that can go. I'm thrilled that I finally feel like I mastered executive presentations; my nerves only kicked in when I had to wait 15 minutes before I was ushered into the boardroom. And as I left the boardroom, I received three quick text messages from three individuals, telling me how well it went. I just presented the results of oh, 100+ hours of strategic analysis.

Alas, we're progressing. People tell me this will be a career-defining event for me. But I'm not supposed to talk about it. So I'll stop.

The other big win I had today was a firm staff meeting with one of my new clinical departments, a department that had never had a director to date. They've run amok and I had to draw a link in the sand...that their days of delinquencies and ignored mandatory requirements are over. I figured I'd leave that meeting battered and bruised but the staff responded well to the expectations. I couldn't help but crack a smile as I walked back to my office, having survived that two hour feat.

So work is going well and I'm receiving respect for the hours and hours (and HOURS) I'm putting in at work. I have more of the "my office is a confessional" feeling, but I'm slowly learning what I can answer and how to allay peoples' unnecessary worries.

Plus, word got out that I stock Laffy Taffy in my office. Maybe THAT's why they're visiting?

I also realized that I won't be able to control all these new areas and projects. I will seek the illusion of control and run with that.

And if this doesn't kill me, I might just become a wee bit stronger from all these trials. If the trials weren't good for me, I have absolute faith that God would remove them from me before I crackle into a pile of Dorrie dust.

...

...Well, despite everything, I'm still alive.

...And working on those 14 job descriptions, via laptop, on my deck.

...And that's about all...

Quote Journal: Happiness

"You can never get enough of what you don't need to make you happy." -Eric Hoffer

This quote really speaks to materialism and peoples' collecting (or boasting) about things to make themselves happy. I agree with Mr. Hoffer in that it doesn't work that way.

The intangibles are what make us happy. The love, laughter, trust, loyalty, and memories make us happy. And I also think that happiness is a choice. A HARD choice but nonetheless, a choice.

So I'm deciding to be happy today...Despite the fact that my house is still in limbo, I didn't get a lick of work accomplished today (or this week) at work, and I'm pretty sure I will have to fire another employee on Monday (my third). Because you know what? I'm still alive and kickin', Jack is in Chicago with me this weekend, we have plans to "just hang out," and may visit the beach nearby this weekend. Oh! And my new book on Chicago mobster history arrived today! It was $3.39 used and I cannot wait to curl up on my chaise lounger and read about mob history in the sun!

Yes, I'm a gangster history geek. Urban history interests me, too. I recently discovered that I have a slight affinity for Great Lakes shipwrecks! I'm currently reading The Great Bridge by James McCullough and it's just fascinating. Along with my $3.39 book on mob history, I also picked up another history book about the settlement of Chicago back in the mid 1800's. That book was $4.25 used. The reason why I'm posting the prices for my new books is because I just finished telling you how happiness cannot be captured by acquiring stuff!

Hypocrisy! Heresy!

In all seriousness, it still feels like I'm being torn apart by my life. But today, I'm choosing to change my attitude and rebel by joking around with Jack and reading mob history on my deck!

Worst Day Ever

The last 24 hours of my life have got to be among the worst on record.

I'm generally an optimist. I woke up this morning with my usual burst of optimistic "What can I do first?!" attitude. As I sobered up from my dreamy state, the weight of my current predicaments surrounded me with a cape of darkness. I'll be honest with you, I briefly wondered if I should even get out of bed. If I didn't get out of bed, I reasoned that things couldn't get much worse.

Alas, I got out of bed and got myself into work. I had bags under my eyes, an unengaged heart, and every step felt like I was dragging myself through quicksand.

In short, my world came crashing down in the last 24 hours. I know I'll look back on this and probably be grateful I made it through without landing in a psyche ward. Plan B was to give all my belongings to charity, raffle off my house, quit my job, grab Jack, and use our savings to buy a hut on an outer island of the Bahamas.

Yesterday, I participated in the annual St. Fozzie's Golf Classic. I volunteered to help with registration, took pictures, and rode around in a golf cart and schmoozed physicians. It was a SWAMP. We had a round of severe storms that dumped about a foot of rain on the area and the golf courses were under water. However, the course permitted us to play and I did my Miss America greeting and schmoozing in the 95+ degree humid heat. We wilted like flowers.

Sticky, grossly disgusting, with grass sticking to my legs, I headed for home. On the way home, I noticed a text from my realtor. It said, "Call me as soon as you can." I'm no rocket scientist, but that is never a good thing. Of course, it was the worst possible news, that our house sale is being postponed or worse, canceled. To make a long (and dirty and scandalous) story short, I'll leave it at this...our buyer appears to be a weasel. A strategic weasel.

Mysteriously, our nice, well-kept, well-maintained house appraised $15,000 below the neighbor's house next door that has none of the updates, no basement, and is just cruddy. We were stiffed between $15-20,000 on the appraisal that obviously makes the sales price no good. The contract is null and void. Jack and I are in a state of limbo and we have no clue what the next few days will bring. We were supposed to close on the house tomorrow morning. That's off and the buyer isn't even divulging whether he's walking or negotiating. It doesn't sound that bad in written form here, but we've had nothing but problems with this guy. Just yesterday morning, I was driving to working thinking, "Yes! Closing is 48 hours away, we made it!"

Nope. It's all up in the air. I hate bring in limbo. It makes a pretty good argument for wanting to avoid Purgatory. Can you even imagine being stuck in Purgatory, twiddling your thumbs, not sure of God's judgment for your eternity? That would be awful.

Then the storms hit. I'm not good with tornadoes when I'm home alone and have no basement. I should've drugged myself with benedryl so I slept through it! I was just sick about the house, trying to will the bile back down to my stomach. The storms just served to upset me more...and I didn't realize I couldn't follow the storms online when I lost power for about an hour. True panic set it because my Chicagoland address was in the path of the supposed rain-wrapped tornadoes.

However, I went to bed, determined to not let the butthead buyer get to me. Upon waking, I realized that I was still devastated and apparently my psyche was even worried about me. I had a nightmare that I had a heart attack and ended up in the St. Fozzie's cardiac intensive care unit.

As I stated above, I overcame the drama, sadness, and fury and went to work.

Why, I'm not exactly sure.

I had a round of one-on-one meetings with my direct reports. One meeting was good, one was challenging. Then I had a meeting with HR (a standing meeting to discuss HR issues as I reorganize my departments). After discussing the one employee who is taking up huge chunks of time (multiple write-up's), I talked shop with the VP.

She revealed a HOST of problems about my position. I won't go into great detail here, but apparently, she's getting an earful about me. It's not *me* people have a problem with, but the fact that I am perceived to be the golden child, the favored one. People think I am favored because I have a swanky office in Admin (big whoop, the location is nice only because I have easy access to Nurse Jackie and EVOO), am allowed in senior administrator meetings to present results on projects given to me by Elvis and EVOO, and even though I'm "only" a director, get asked to join dozens of committees. People are envious, the envy becomes jealousy, and the jealousy becomes anger.

I'm doing my best to let it roll off my back. Yes, I probably am favored. But darnit, I don't see anyone else there at the hospital at 8pm at night or on Saturday afternoons. Everything I have, I've earned. I hate it when people want to snap their fingers and want to be granted the same benefits you are, just because they want to nit-pick at something.

The HR rep let if fly and told me everything everyone's been saying, just so I can be on guard. I choked back the emotions until I left the campus and had 15 minutes in my car traveling to the other campus. It's fine, I'm glad she told me (it just confirmed my suspicions). However, it also confirmed my other suspicion, that I have to work THREE times as hard as everyone else, just to "earn" my way. I have to give a 100% extra percent because I'm a young woman and another 100% above that because people think I've been GIVEN this job without having earned it. It sucks.

I somehow steered through my afternoon meeting schedule, ignoring the fact that my house is now most likely back on the market, some of my trusted colleagues are judging me harshly, and that Jack and I are in complete limbo about the state of our future.

It's great. Really. Now, where is that phone number to the hut on the outer banks of that island in the Bahamas?

Bless Me Father, I Have Salted

Some days I wish I had a Roman Catholic collar and could grant absolution.

Then again, that would require that I take vows of poverty, obedience, and celibacy (*cough, cough*). Plus, you know, I'd have to be a man. Small technicality.

That doesn't stop me from being on the receiving end of a whole lot of hospital-related verbal vomit. Because of my lucky position straddling operations and strategy, I know a lot of what happens at St. Fozzie's. I don't know anything, but EVOO and Nurse Jackie are kind enough to share details with me, ask my opinion, and continue to foster my administrative growth. As a result, I get to have my hands in a lot of projects.

It's becoming commonplace for me to get stopped 2 or 3 times en route to a meeting. I ask people how they are, how their new areas are going, how their growth plans are, etc., and they share the inner-most details of their departments, insecurities, or successes. It was unnerving. I'm slowly beginning to take this as a compliment (they must trust me, right?), but there are days where I feel like I need a Sham-wow or a squeegee to mop the verbal vomit off me. They tell me everything!

Actually, rather than comparing myself to a man of the cloth, I'll compare myself to a grilling secret: the herb rub. Sometimes the comments, rumors, situations, problems, and opportunities are flung my way so fast and furiously that they are akin to flecks of salt. By the end of the day, I feel like a salt-lick, sometimes weighted down by the sheer number of comments and items people bring to my attention. I end up with dozens of post-it notes that I must eventually address.

I've recently discovered that I often must shower when I get home from work. It's not that I get dirty from a day at the hospital. It's not that I'm a germophobe fearing bio-contamination (although, a small part of me does). It's just that I have to wash the salt-encrusted herb rub off me before I can begin to relax.

Jack whips up a wicked herb rub and can turn a run-of-the-mill sirloin into a phenomenal steak that Bobbie Flay would love. All this talk about salt-licks and herb rubs is making me crave Jack's specialty ribeye!

The Meteorologist of Azkaban

Tonight's post is a random mish-mash of anecdotal fodder from my day. I don't have much to talk about because I'm currently editing and proof-reading the job descriptions I asked all my managers to update (or create). I have 14 of them sitting in my lap and I couldn't be more excited (not even kidding). Plus, I'm sitting on my deck, laptop in action, watching the swirling clouds. My head tinges with sudden bursts of pain (as I imagine Harry Potter's head hurts when Voldemort approaches) as my sinuses predict the next wave of tornadic activity. What is with these constant storms? Did a butterfly flap its wings in India again? My sinuses detect the smallest fluctuation in barometric pressure and I should have been a meteorologist.

Usually, I like storms and delight at their arrival. I'm retracting that delight because I don't want Ellie to get hurt.

Ellie is my new Toyota and she's PRETTY. SO not a big deal, but I'm irked that yet another hailstorm is approaching and I'm not sure how to shelter the car. Shouldn't you get at least 500 miles on a car before you have to take it in to repair hail damage? Sigh. Maybe I could flatten out a few packing boxes and duct tape them to the car? Maybe I can wrap the whole she-bang in bubble wrap? I know, I know, I shouldn't have a new car so I didn't have to concern myself with this worry!

In other news, today was the first day I didn't feel like my head was under water at work. I had the slightest inkling that I'm doing well and might just survive this whole management gig. Yes, that's newsworthy, stop judging me!

I'll leave you with one more anecdote from Saturday's cross-timezone move. My mom was helping me gather up the loose odds and ends in the living room. Of the weird stuff left over was my think tank 4x3 foot newsprint pad from work and a lightbulb. She asked me what the newsprint was for and I explained that I often draw out my ideas at work (us geeks are strange like that) and plaster my office walls with graffiti and other operational plans. Then she asked if the lightbulb was for when I had a good idea and could hold it over my head!

So now, I'm taking a lightbulb to work and keeping it on my desk for when those great ideas strike!

Denial

You know that song, "Respect?" R-E-S-P-E-C-T? Yes, I've been chanting a similar sentiment: "D-E-N-I-A-L!"

(I also have a deja vu feeling that I've blogged that before. Denial? Me? Naaaaah!)

So we moved out of SB yesterday. It took about five hours, two boxes of donuts, several Powerades, and six strapping men (and a mom). With a 16 foot truck loaded to the gills with our belongings (seriously, there wasn't even air left to take a deep breath in that truck) and three cars similarly stuffed, we drove way from our home of seven years and hit the highway.

I didn't feel much of anything. It was either because I had already grieved this particular moment (in the preceding 62 times...yes, I made that drive 62 times). Maybe it was because I finally ripped the bandaid off and found some sort of subconscious closure to the move. Maybe it was because I'm ready for this move and the inherent transition.

Or maybe I'm just in denial.

What will happen when we come back in town on Friday to sign the papers and hand over the keys? What will happen when we return to visit our parents and accidentally turn down our old street? Will that happen? Will we forget that we don't live there? Yeah, I'm putting my money on denial!

Several folks came to see us off yesterday. Several helped us move and without being asked, picked up boxes, brooms, vacuums, and helped it all come together. My mom made a huge cooler of sandwiches and fed the soldiers amidst the truck-stuffing. All in all, apart from the raging residual headache I sported from the previous day's bow echo storms, the SB portion went well.

We all left SB and later arrived at my Chicagoland pad. I mean, our Chicagoland pad. We chose to live at my, ahem, our pad until we know what is going on with Jack's job. Plus, even if he scores a phat job, we'd like to stay here and pay off all our debt. Selling the house got us back into the black, but we'd really like to be debt-free. So we're going to swallow our desires for a new condo and hole up in our pad for a while. It's clean, safe, and in a great neighborhood. I just wish it had two bathrooms! I'm not used to living with a boy!

Anyway, before collapsing in a heap, we had to make one final stop: the storage unit. We packed half a house in a 10x10 unit. Stuff is stacked up to the ceiling and so help me if we need something from the bottom boxes (they're stacked 8 boxes high). Regardless, it feels like we're paying rent on a basement that we don't have to clean and is located 4 miles away.

So after another quick stop at the pad to freshen up, we took everyone to BW3's, to thank them for pitching in. We feasted (in the Biblical sense of the word...no fishes or loaves, though) on half the BW3 menu and with full bellies and tired arms/legs, the crew departed my house (darnit! our house!) for SB.

And that was that. We were home. Our first act in OUR home was to set up the lounge chairs on the deck and toast the next chapter of our lives.

Our second act was to get showers and collapse in a heap!

It's the Eve

I have this random habit of wishing people a "Happy Friday Eve" on Thursday's.

Jack and I move tomorrow, so today is "Moving Eve!"

Hurray! We made it! Well, I will feel a lot better about this when it's Sunday afternoon and I'm laying in bed, watching movies all day!!

The Ladder

The tables have turned and I suddenly became the mentor.

I spend so much of my time, soaking up others' experiences and advice. When I was asked to let a grad student from the U of Illinois shadow me, I was a bit taken aback. What do I possibly have to teach her?

She looked to me as the seasoned executive (yeah, I about snorted my coffee when I heard that) and had a lot of questions about what she should take in school and how one breaks into administration. Everyone's out for a job these days…but one of the huge lessons I've learned is that women need to pull each other up. That was my complaint of the few scant female execs I met before Nurse Jackie. They were too worried about retaining their own positions that they never made time to mentor other women. They didn't want to lose their jobs. They just didn't make it a priority. Nurse Jackie is the first female exec to pull me up, to teach me the ropes, and to baptize me with administrative lava. You can only learn so much by studying and talking about it. Eventually, you have to jump in and JUST DO IT.

EVOO challenged me to become like Nurse Jackie. He encouraged me to "pass it on" and to mentor as many young women as I can. While I've just started climbing the ladder (and the top of the ladder disappears into the clouds while I’m about 3 feet off the ground), these women are still standing on the ground, not sure which ladder to start climbing. They're not sure if the rungs are greased or if women are even allowed on the first rung.

So I gratefully accepted the student who wanted to shadow me. I toured her around the hospital, introducing her to all the nurse managers, RN's, techs, and even a few of the housekeeping staff. By doing that, it raised my own confidence that I can now (comfortably) go to any nursing unit and know most of the folks by name. I can walk into the ER and ignore the feelings of faintness I feel when I see a gunshot victim who took a bullet to his chest. I can go up into surgery and know which areas require scrub and which do not. The student had the Deer in Headlights expression but I'm starting to see that it's my job to help other women wipe the Deer off of their faces!

Quote Journal: Adversity

"Adversity causes some people to break; others to break records. "

-William Arthur Ward


I saw this quote on one of my employee's bulletin boards as I visited the Wound Clinic yesterday. It was one of those days today where I powered through the quagmire of quicksand and every time I blinked my eyes, I saw a quick vision of my bed. If I stopped to listen hard, I could actually hear my bed calling. It was saying, "Lay on me! Let me envelope you in my feathery goodness! Let me blissfully whisk you away to restful sleep!"

I hate foggy Monday's. They make you feel like you're living in a dreamscape. So I blasted my new XM satelite radio and listened to Radio Margaritaville on the interstate. Yes, the visions of palm trees helped shake me into reality.

Adversity is never a thing to be wasted. You can grow from tough experiences, quicker than you would have grown without them.

Right Place, Right Time

Life hasn't been ALL that bad lately.

Last week was 100 mph, especially Thursday and Friday. On Thursday, I received an unexpected invitation to half the big corporate execs meeting at St. Fozzie's. This surprised me because, while I eventually want to end up in that room, I didn't think I would be allowed in just yet. EVOO fought for my admission and it was a tremendous brain-stretching morning. Then I ran to two of my departments and explained the strategic plan to all the employees. It is Administration's dream (and goal) to have all employees able to recite (or at least understand) the strategic plan.

Thursday night turned into me walking five miles and collapsing in a heap.

Then bright and early on Friday morning, I attended the biweekly Service Excellence meeting and during that meeting, decided to cancel my big afternoon throughput brainstorm I had planned. Half the attendees were out or leaving early. I asked one of the attendees if he minded if I canceled and he said, "No, I don't mind; I have to leave early anyway. I'm going to the Crosstown Classic."

I gave him a hard time and told him I'm deeply pitying him.

He then said, "I have an extra ticket...can you leave within the next hour?"

I'm a total Wrigley virgin and had no idea how to get there, how much time I needed to traverse midtown traffic with the Blackhawks parade in full swing, the opening day of the Jazz Fest, AND the Crosstown. I didn't have a jersey. I didn't have a clue.

As it turns out, I still haven't been in Wrigley Field. Our seats were on one of the Sheffield Rooftops. Apparently, these are enviable tickets (sorry, Edge) and while they afforded us great views, they also included all you can eat and drink:

This was taken from the front row of the rooftop box. Now, this was before the broiling sun came out....as the game started, it was a balmy 86 degrees that made a Floridian summer seem light. As the sun peeked out in the 3rd inning, the heat rivaled Hell itself and I felt myself wilting into a Caribbean sweat in the Sox jersey EVOO picked up for me on his way out to the game. It was HOT but in a sea of Cubs fans, my friend A-Rod, EVOO, and I found a few south siders and the White Sox fans united for a win.

It was a terrific day to be in Chicago. I love this city.

Well, That's Ironic

THREE of you actually emailed me to make sure I was okay and well, hadn't dropped off into the deep end. Thank you for your concern. That concern means the world to me. In all honesty, things aren't going all too well in SB as we prepare to leave the house. My family seems irked that we're leaving SB and have withdrawn their fiduciary responsibility to assist progressive generations advance toward excellence.

That means they're not helping us pack.

It's been *TIRING* and we spend all weekend rushing around, boxing things for St. Vincent de Paul, boxing things for Chicago, boxing things for storage, boxing things for the garage sale, boxing things for SkyBlue, etc. I need an air traffic controller over there.

Sigh. Just keep breathing. Last Monday and Tuesday, I was so sore from having packed a whole bunch and hoped to not repeat that same mistake this weekend. Needless to say, I'm already sore, so I surpassed that point already. I might as well go on an Advil drip!

It's been tough. On one hand, all of this, ahem, solo packing is making it much easier to leave SB. There's no fanfare, no celebratory cook-out's, nothing like that. No one stopping by with sub sandwiches or leftover chicken. We're flying under the radar.

I guess I'm okay with that. It just gets lonely.

Only six more days until we're no longer SB residents. Not that I'm counting!

Time to Replenish

I heard a story once about a mother who gave all her food away to the needy. She gave and gave and when it was time to feed herself, had nothing left in the kitchen. It's a great metaphor for the overachievers in the world (or the really generous mothers) who give until the tank is empty. Good one, eh?

I realized that you cannot keep giving and giving and giving without (every now and then) stopping to replenish the cupboards. Or, you give away all the good coffee, soups, spices, and snacks and all you're left with is seven year-old sugar free jello boxes and decaf coffee that no one has touched since the Easter of '05.

Yes, it's time to replenish the proverbial cupboards. This chica is down to food coloring and cherry pie filling. There is nothing good left to give anyone.

SO what am I doing? I'm taking a night off work tomorrow night, going out with new friends in the city, and getting my mind off work. Then, when the hoopla of moving is over in two weeks, I will breathe a sigh of relief that my husband and all my material belongings are in the same time zone. Last, if Jack lets me have my way, I will soon be booking our November vacation. We have it narrowed down to Puerto Rico or the Bahamas. THAT, in itself, will provide a significant source of fuel for my tank.

So what's the weirdest thing left in your cupboard when you're about to run dry? When do you KNOW you must finally break down and go shopping? When do you KNOW you must finally break down and take care of yourself?

My Shoes Are Loose

Remember a whole year ago when I started my job at St. Fozzie's? I had the DIHL expression a lot and felt like I was playing dress up when I donned my suit and heels every day? I couldn't wait until I could "own" my position and really cultivate some confidence in my job and Chicagoan life.

Yep, I'm back there again. When St. Fozzie's offered me this promotion, I traded in my newbie administrator shoes (broken-in, just starting to feel comfortable) for big, heavy, platform shoes that might as well be a men's size 14. They're huge shoes to fill and everyone is expecting me to fill them gracefully, happily, and quickly.

They're administrator shoes.

So I'm clomping around in my new administrator shoes, trying to walk forward in shoes that are still too big for me. However, I cannot let on that the shoes are too big. It's a sad but true fact, that women who ask for administrator shoes need to be able to walk in them. They're almost always men's shoes and if you can't walk in them, you need to fake it until you can!

Okay, enough about shoes. In short, I just want to die. Then I will get to rest. Just kidding. Well, sort of. Last week kicked my a$$ and I managed to fit 80 hours' worth of work into a week with an observed holiday in it!

I could spell out a litany of what I'm doing but I will probably bore all of us to sleep. I'll keep it short...the eight departments I'm managing haven't been tended to (managerially) in years. The managers of those areas have specific questions, HR concerns, and compliance issues on which I have no idea where to start. I have to figure out their departments and then how to assist them in their issues. I might as well wear the firefighter hat for a while because that's what I'm doing. I also intend to grow these areas and their services and that requires a lot of physician interaction. Oh, and I need to hire two Diabetes-Certified RN's and a hyperbaric chamber technician. Know any of those? Yeah, I don't either.

Another full-time job I have is the physician recruitment and strategic planning side of things. We're in the midst of recruiting a few new primary care physicians and the schmoozing is incredible. And I helped run a strategic planning retreat on Thursday; it was three hours of productive, interactive discussion. But I had to have Jack help me organize the notes on the 13 pages of newsprint generated at the retreat! Now we need to execute the awesome ideas generated from the hospital leadership team.

Finally, I have my huge operational and Lean Six Sigma projects that I carried over from the previous position. I'm still in charge of them and need to see them through to completion.

I feel like I have three full-time jobs. Again, though, I am not complaining. I asked for this and want to continue on this "jack of all trades" path I'm on. So I will slip on my size 14 men's administrator shoes and clomping through another week.

It'll get easier. It *has* to get easier.

Uprooting the Roots

Uprooting your roots is tough. Have you ever weeded a garden and come across a weed whose roots are so deep that you have to brace yourself and give the weed a second muscle-filled pull to free the tangle of roots?

I’ve never tried to uproot a huge oak tree or anything 31 years old…but essentially, that’s what I’m doing right now. With the exception of one year in Ireland and one year in Chicagoland, I’ve lived in SB my entire life. Those roots run deep. So while uprooting, I find myself occasionally numb. Sometimes I’m fine. Sometimes I’m excited. Sometimes I have slight panic attacks when I realize what I'm doing and that, in two weeks, I'll no longer own that piece of real estate.

It’s just bizarre.

Jack and I spent the entire weekend packing in preparation for the big move. While packing, we found some weird things from our seven years in this house (or even weirder items from the nine years of our marriage. One, Jack was packing up the cedar chest. I’ll admit that I have a robust cedar chest, saving a lot of things that have even a remote semblance of sentimentality. Yet while wading through the greeting cards, graduation tassels, and pictures we made for our mommies, he found two sticks. Like, from trees out back. We could not (for the life of us) remember what the sticks were supposed to represent. The tornado that whipped through my parents’ back yard in 2003, devastating seven full-grown trees, and somehow sparing the brand-new pool? Were they from our first campfire at our house? Were they relegated to the cedar chest after the fireplace rejected them? Whatever the case, we couldn’t remember the story and relegated them to our current fire pit!

The other weird thing we kept finding was thermometers. We have no less than seven thermometers. Why would two adults (without children) have that many thermometers? And why were these things multiplying like bunnies? I distinctly remember having Jack buy a thermometer when I had my first illness of our married lives (a wicked, wicked flu thing in 2001) and cannot remember buying a thermometer ever since?

Packing has been a purging, yet nostalgic experience. Boxing up the photographs and photo albums took a couple hours because I had to flip through all the photos (what was with my hair in the late 90’s? Hadn’t I received the memo that poofy bangs were NOT in?). The most nostalgic part of the day was the wedding dress experience. Shoved in the furthest-most recesses of the coat closet was my wedding dress. I hadn’t pulled it out since, well, the day after my wedding. I had studiously put it back in its plastic bag, packaged up my veil and wrap, and stowed it until it went to the cleaners to be professionally preserved. That was nine years ago.

Anxious to see if my obscene stress has taken its toll on my body, I slipped into the dress. To my great relief, it fit the same as on my wedding day. Jack stood there like the kid he was when we got married and I posed for a few obligatory pictures in my dress (with dirty hair, I might add!). After ten minutes, I happily stepped back out of the dress….I had forgotten that the heap of satin weighs nearly 40 pounds! What a fun experience, though, to slip into that dress for the first time in nine years. And after that ten minutes as the blushing (but a little more experienced!) bride, I zipped the dress and veil back up into its bag. Jack promised me he will have the dress professionally preserved…I wonder if that will take another nine years?!?

As I drove back to Chicagoland this evening, with a car full of boxes, I realized that I'm living the song lyrics from the newest Lifehouse song...I'm "halfway gone."

Can I Have a Hand?

I saw this picture on another website and thought it was a bit like a trainwreck. I can't stop looking at it. Why does this fish have hands and why isn't BP being prosecuted yet?

It's called a handfish and apparently, there are nine versions of them. That's, like, 36 hands.

This week is killing me (I kind of wish I had this guy's extra hands). Anything worth the prize is always worth the fight. The fight's been worth it, but I need to go to bed. Details coming this weekend!

Closer Than it Appears

Do you remember that scene in Jurassic Park, where the T-Rex is running full-speed to chase down a car full of people (to eat them)? The camera pans to the driver's side mirror, at the bottom of which is etched "objects may be closer than they appear." The T-Rex is gaining speed and from the view in the driver's side mirror, if he's really closer than he appears, well, you're dead meat.

I feel the same way about my future. Let me explain.

First, I've taken up a strange obsession with cloudscapes. I've started traveling with my camera and because I spend so much time on the road these days, I catch some interesting cloudscapes. All three here are from my travels and all seem very apropos. So the picture above, will be titled, "Future may be closer than it appears." For the future is coming at me whether I'm ready or not!

When I crested a hill and saw this weather situation, I instantly started humming the Wicked Witch of the West theme (where she's on her bike, riding by the window of the flying house). I thought, "what am I getting myself INTO?" Or maybe it was "Holy schnike, now that's a good way to illustrate the calm before the storm!" It was a great cloud formation, but I couldn't resist the temptation to scan the horizon for a funnel cloud or two. Hence, this photo will be titled, "Driving forward, no matter how scary or irrational it seems."

This particular shot reminded me of the view looking UP through a cresting wave (as though you're laying on the bottom of the ocean). No, I don't spend a lot of time laying on the bottom of lakes, pools, or oceans, but I've done enough underwater handstands to know what the underside of the water's surface looks like. Plus, all those surfing movies have cameras in the water and you're able to see huge waves breaking and rolling over the coral reefs.

Even though I was trying to outrun a severe thunderstorm here, I couldn't stop thinking of that "underside of the water" angle. In my job, I'm still such a newbie and have so much to learn...I feel like I'm looking up at the underside of the water. Yes, that's code for, I'm in over my head. But at least I know it. Getting over the denial is the first step toward healing, right? This photo will be called "I'm looking up through the water but at least I have air in my lungs and I'm propelling myself upward to the surface."

And yes, I outran that thunderstorm. All was well in the end (and I didn't get pulled over for speeding). Despite the life interpretations I find paralleled in cloud formations, I'm in a good place. I still have air in my lungs and I'm propelling myself upward.

C'est Finis!

The stroke program is up and running and it's DONE. As the French would say, C'est finis!

THAT's another monkey off my back!