A Nurse Story

It started out just like any other shift. I had 6 patients... a full load, even though many days we had to take 7 or 8, because of short staffing. Nothing major. The day was going well. I was caught up on my charting by 1:45, and had discharged a patient. I kept my fingers crossed that I would not get a new patient this late in the day, but to no avail. The charge nurse informed me that I would be geting the next admit, and he was coming from Fulton County Jail. That was really no big deal. We took care of prisoners all the time, and except for the somewhat unnerving handcuffs keeping them locked at the ankle to the foot of the bed, they were quite easy to take care of, and generally undemanding as long as you ordered double portions for their meals.

We saw the police coming down the hall, bearing the stretcher in their midst as if they were the Macy's parade, protecting the mayor's float. There were 6 of them. Six police officers to one prisoner. Don't think we even bothered whispering. We wanted to know who this guy was, and what he did that he needed six armed guards! One of the nurses found out while I was in the supply closet getting the admission kit and towels.

"Sarah. He decapitated his wife."
"He WHAT?"
"Yep. They found him sitting cross-legged on the floor with his wife's head in his lap."
"Are you lying?"
"No, that officer just told me."
Oh, Lord.
"Well, why is he here?"
"His blood sugar dropped, and while they were bringing him here, he was so combative that they had to give him Ativan. " Well, thank God for that. At least he'll be out.

It was a really long walk down that short hall. I had been a nurse for less than a year at this point, still extremely green, and very naive, though I had learned alot in the past six months. Unfortunately, not one of those valuable lessons ever involved "The Care of a Man Who Decapitated His Wife."

I arrived at the door. The police were still all in the room, and as I started to move in, slowly, like a hobbit among these tall, buff, black guards, I could tell that they wanted to clear me out of there, simply from force of habit. "I'm the nurse," I squeaked, sounding every bit as confident as I'm sure I looked, stringy blond hair, stooped shoulders and pale countenance. The forest of security parted with a guarded reverence.

On the bed I saw an asian man, short, stocky, with well groomed hair, lying there in a t-shirt and underwear. He was tied to the bed at the wrists and ankles with police tape and leather restraints. He was covered in blood.

I had a moment. "I need to clean him up." My voice had recovered it's normal low pitch, and I made eye contact with the policeman standing like the North Tower on the side of the bed, indicating to him that he would have to loosen the restraints. "Ma'am, we can't uncuff him." "Well, we've got to get him bathed and in a gown. " He shook his head, and said "Sorry. We can't uncuff him." I sighed and stood for a minute wondering how I was ever going to get this accomplished. I went back out to the nurses station for a pair of sissors, a glucometer, and some sympathetic glances from my teammates. Glances were all I got. No one volunteered to go in there.

I returned to the room, and after checking his blood sugar, which had returned to a safe level, I had to clean him up. But to get his clothes off, I needed to cut them off. I had to cut the underwear off of this dangerous criminal, while surrounded by police officers. It was a surreal moment to say the least. I managed to get him undressed, washed his upper body, and put the gown on him. His hands and feet were brown and crusty from dried blood, where he had strained against his cuffs. I cleaned him in the quiet of the room, when he whispered- "Do you have a knife?" Many, many responses banging at the door of my lips, screaming to reply. I looked up at the South Tower, my eyes wide. "No, sir." was all I said.

I moved down his legs to his feet, and still no one was saying a word. They all stood there watching me. I glanced up at his face. Unreadable. I was fascinated. "Lord, what do you really, I mean really think of this guy? Look at him. He killed his wife...no, he cut off his wife's head! He's the worst of the worst. How do you really see him?" As I glanced down at my hands, I heard the Still Small Voice.

"You are washing My feet."

An audible sob escaped my lips. I knew it was true, and yet it was so unbelieveable, and so wrong somehow! In the midst of the horror of what I'd heard, I was blinded by the revelation of His grace.

He had been this man. He took on all sin at the cross- yes, even this sin, and put it to death. There is nothing that He has not covered by His grace, by His love, by His power. There is nothing that can keep us from Him! Nothing. He loved and wanted even this one! So much so that He covered the man's sin by His own death, knowing there was nothing he could do to redeem himself. He is our Redeemer.

That man might have never known it. I didn't tell him. I hope that someone did, or does if he is still alive. I simply did my job, got him cleaned and passed him to the next nurse. It was enough.

When you are doing it to the least of these, you are doing it to Me.

Sweet.

A Nice Day

Emma and I have had a grand day. The heat is just a bit less intense, and although the allergies have kicked in, the breathable air makes it all ok.
Had all my errands done early this morning, and had time to pop into Atlanta Bread Co. for a coffee. Emma and I split a cinnamon crunch bagel and a chocolate muffin. We sat in the "high" tables, and Emma said "Mama, doesn't this pwace wook dust beeyootiful fwom up heew?" I couldn't tell, I was too busy looking at her. Some days her eyes are just huge pools of delight. (I'm sure I stole that from George MacDonald, or Christopher Marlowe, or someone of that ilk. But they were.)
She is here kissing me and asking for a snack.

Photo taken in our kitchen mirror. (yes, I said KITCHEN mirror. I did the graffiti, because I get sick of looking at myself doing dishes.)

My latest page....

I'm loving these effer dares! Even though the last one was SOOO hard, I felt like I HAD to do it, and it was ok! The latest one was "scrap your superpower." Well, for myself, I feel like that was covered in dare #5, (you ladies know what I'm talkin' about, uh huh!) so I scrapped my family.

We are supers. We watch Incredibles, and we wish we were them. Bill was a serious comic book fan, and is raising one in Bo. I, though I preferred Archie in my younger days, have really enjoyed some of the newer shows/movies and can totally get into that hero/regular joe story. Bo has had an Alter Ego named Power Bam since he was 2 years old. Power Bam has a blue suit, a red cape, and red zip up shoes. He has more powers than you could dream of. He is one cool super hero. Emma is Ballerina Princess Spy, shortened to Princess Spy for spacial reasons, and she has many types of vision....you know....x-ray, night, heat, etc... Bo came up with Night Wolf for Bill, because (I think) he stays up so late. And he thought the name was "totally sweet." No one came up with one for me, so I adopted the one that my nephies gave me years ago. "Hello Nurse." ( Thanks dudes. I knew I could count on you. And I'll never reveal your secret identities, Zachinator and Disgustinator.)
We really got into Smallville for awhile, and decided to give each other super powers. Mine was: "You got hit with some meteor rocks, and you gained the ability to ask for help, and accept it." Bill's was: "You got hit with some meteor rocks, and you gained the ability to take no for an answer." (Don't hate, Bill. It was funny.) Cole, type yours in the comments- I can't remember, but I'm pretty sure it had something to do with "cute!"

So I guess you could say (Yes, Kip, you could say things are getting pretty serious) I really dug this dare! Thanks laydees!

I typed a big long thing here about superheros/hurricaines, and deleted it, because I don't want to get controversial....but I haven't forgotten.
Lord, the Gulf Coast.

PS (I am grateful for your indulgence regarding the overuse of the parentheses in this post.)

A Little Sunshine

Oh. My. What a week its been in America. Alot of destruction, alot of horror, and alot of finger pointing. I say: now is not the time to be pointing fingers. if you've got a finger to point, use it instead to lend a hand. That's all I've got to say about that....

Sitting here, feeling sick, reflecting on all the major and minor dramas of this past week. (so glad he's outta your life, sweets) Bo's class was sorted into groups today, and he's du-du-du! Gryfindor!! Just kidding. But he does have a Mrs. Mc for reading. Emma missed him alot today...she has a hard time after the weekend...they are very close. A. came over to play after school and it was like having teenagers around. Bo and A. trying to do homework, and Emma talking to A the entire time. The only time Bo doesn't want her around is when he wants some serious lego time, and then he slams the door to her roars of dispair. That usually happens around 7 on a Sunday morning. Very nice.

So what I really wanted to post was this. I am not uber-fond of making my children promise me things----I have a distinct memory of promising my mom when I was 14 that I would NEVER wear eyeliner on the inner part of the lid under my eye, and I hate feeling the twinge each time I break that promise. I was hugging Bo yesterday, and realized that he was growing, and I had not really been seeing him. So I asked him to promise me something. Then I told him, half-way teasing, that I wanted to write it down and have him sign it. We discussed several other topics in the course of our exchange and I heard him say "I don't really care about writing it down." I wasn't sure what that meant, until a wrinkled piece of notebook paper was slapped down in front of me on my desk. After reading it, and discussing the meaning of the word "solemn" (he could read it, he just didn't know what it meant!) he signed with alacrity.

Ain't I the lucky one?
When Mom heard the story she gave a glance at the small girl skitting around the room in efforts to stall our departure from their house and said "I think that's the one you'd better be getting the promise from!"

All in good time, dear, all in good time.

The Scene at LSU'S Campus

On the way back to the PMAC in a cart, it looked like the scene in the movie Outbreak. FEMA officials, U.S. Marshalls, National Guard, and of course the survivors. Black Hawks were carrying in victims who were stranded on roofs. Buses rolled in from N.O. with other survivors. As Michael and I rode back to the PMAC, a lady fell out of her wheelchair and we scrambled to help her up.We met Coach Miles and Coach Moffiit in the PMAC to see all the survivors and it was the view of a hospital. Stretchers rolled in constantly and for the first time in my life I saw someone die right in front of me. A man rolled in from New Orleans and was badly injured on his head. 5 minutes later he was dead. And that was the scene all night. What did we do, we started hauling in supplies. And thousands of boxes of supplies. The CDC from Atlanta arrived directing us what to do. One of the U.S. Marshalls was on hand so the supplies could not become loot. I asked him what his primary job was. He serves on the committee of counter terrorism, but once he saw of the disaster, he donated his forces to come help. He said the death toll could be nearing 10,000. It was sickening to hear that. After unloading supplies, I started putting together baby cribs and then IV poles. Several of our fball players and Big Baby and Tasmin Mitchell helped us. At the same time, families and people strolled in. Mothers were giving birth in the locker rooms. The auxiliary gym "Dungeon" was being used as a morgue. I couldn't take myself down there to see it. I worked from 8 pm until 2:45 am. Before I left three more buses rolled in and they were almost out of room. People were standing outside, the lowest of the low from NO. The smells, the sights were hard to take.

A man lying down on a cot asked me to come see him. He said,"I just need someone to talk to, to tell my story because I have nobody and nothing left. He turned out to be a retired military veteran. His story was what everybody was saying. He thought he survived the worst, woke up this morning and the levees broke. Within minutes water rushed into his house. He climbed to the attic, smashed his way through the roof and sat there for hours. He was completely sunburned and exhausted. Nearly 12 hours later a chopper rescued him and here he was.

We finished the night hauling boxes of body bags and more were on the way. As we left, a man was strolled in on a stretcher and scarily enough he suffered gunshots. The paramedic said he was shot several times because a looter or a convict needed his boat and he wouldn't give it to him. Another man with him said it was "an uncivilized society no better than Iraq down there right now." A few minutes later he was unconcious and later pronounced dead. I then left as they were strolling a 3 year old kid in on a stretcher. I couldn't take it anymore. That was the scene at the PMAC and it gives me a new perspective on things. For those of you who I haven't been able to get in touch with because of phone service, I pray you are safe. Send me an email to let me know. God bless.
Bill Martin
LSU Sports Information--

Katrina

Bill and I are glued this evening to the disaster in Louisiana and Mississippi. Natural Disasters usually don't rate very high on the emotion scale for me, not that I'm uncaring, just that I never can comprehend the impact on a place I've never seen. 9-11 was an entirely different story. In this case, however, I have been there. I have family in Baton Rouge who are without power, and who have felt some minor effects of this disaster. I imagine myself in the situations some of these poor folks have found themselves in, and my heart aches for them. The parents in the Super Dome trying to explain to their children why they haven't eaten, the folks wondering if there will be a home left that's worth salvaging, the old and sick being carried out in helicopters, people stuck in attics and on roofs, people trying to hitchhike a ride out, as cars pass already loaded down with the desperate.

Lord, come to their aid.

Thought I'd post a few pics of our happy day in New Orleans, in rememberance of a beautiful city, and in hopes that the water will soon recede and the city will be restored.
Towns and Adria at Cafe du Monde
Bill and Bo gazing at the Mighty Mississip'
Emma and Honey strolling in the French Quarter
Cousins on a happy day.