Boy, have I been a slacker! I have about 5 blog entries that I started and I have not finished. Most of my time recently has been dedicated to tanning and going to the gym. Sorry, I guess I just had to add some humor. While I was able to do those things while I was working day shift, I am not able to do those on nite shift. My time has been dedicated to wedding planning and working. Working nite shift has kind of cut back on my productivity. There is just no way that I can justify doing laundry at 3 a.m. I always say that I am going to do it, but it never pans out. I find most of my days, ahem, nites lounging on the couch attempting to cross things off my to-do list. But I find myself doing more internet surfing, mahjongg playing, and Penelope the Possum watching. Sam has been doing a good job of hiding his disappointment of the piles of dishes increasing in the sink, the towers of papers growing on the kitchen table and the mounds of clean clothes taking over the top of the refrigerator. No, no, you did not read that incorrectly. There is a mound of clean clothes on top of the fridge. Sam thought it would be a brilliant idea to put a mini-fridge in our bedroom. I tried to explain to him that it would be yet one more thing for crap to pile up on. I hate to say I told you so. But.....well, just read the previous sentence.
As for the new chapters in my life. I have my dream job. I work at a wonderful children's hospital in Atlanta. I work with predominantly cystic fibrosis, respiratory, GI, and diabetes patients. Thanks to Sam, I would like to think that I might know at least the basics of cystic fibrosis so that makes that aspect of my job a little easier. My school prepared me rather well for what I would face at my new job, but there are so many things that just kind of creep up on you. Changing a diaper for example. Changed plenty of pee pee diapers on my niece, but if there was anything else in it, she was handed off to Mimi or my sister. Perhaps it did not look very good when, on my first day at work, I had to change my first poopy diaper. Let's just say it kind of came back to bite me in the butt. Things also don't always go as planned in the nursing world. Normally, you put the blood pressure cuff on and you hit the little button and VOILA you have your bp. Yeah, not quite the case when you have a child squirming and screaming and kicking. You see, the machine does not actually pick up the reading. In nursing school, they teach you how to deal with children on their level. To get a child to let you do whatever it is that you need to do simply requires demonstrating on their teddy bear. According to my text books, they stop crying when you do this and they allow you to do whatever nursing task that needs to be completed. Yeah, so not the case. Sometimes, it makes them scream even louder. So much louder that one's nose starts to bleed! As time goes on, I know that all of this will get easier and it will become second nature to me. This is my dream - staying up all nite really is a small sacrifice in comparison to the fact that I have the initials RN after my name. I mean, you have to be getting accustomed to the nursing world when you are trying to fall asleep at 9:30 am after working the whole nite and all you hear are birds chirping and the repetitive sound of an IV pump beeping ingrained in your head, right?
On to the wedding planning! Thanks to the help of my mom, dad, and sister, as well as Sam for putting up with 50,000 phone calls, the major wedding planning was done in 3 days. The venue, florist, bridal party dresses, limos, photographer, my dress, mom's dress and shoes, and church were all booked. I guess working at the Cystic Fibrosis Foundation paid off! I may be lacking talent in some areas, but apparently wedding planning comes rather naturally to me. The invitations were ordered from the printer last week and our en route to our house as of May 13th. The guest list is complete, the flower arrangements are designed, and we are meeting with the priest next weekend in NY. While most of the items we wanted to register for are just that - registered for - we still have a few more items to add. We have yet to pick out a wedding song, but there are 4 that we are trying to choose between. We still have not picked out favors yet - the last thing I want to do is get something that is going to be a dust collector is some one's house. Some ideas have been tossed around, but nothing even close to being final. It is rather funny because we have been engaged for almost 15 months now and I have repeatedly said - Oh, I don't need to rush, it is so far away. Not so much so! In 5 months, I will be taking that long stroll down the aisle arm in arm with my dad. In those 5 short months, we have quite a bit to learn about each other. For the past 4 years, we have gotten to know each other quite a bit, but there are still some things that we don't know about each other. For example - we were sitting on the couch after dinner and Sam and I were discussing our timeline. Needless to say, he ended up telling me that the alarm to by biological clock was ready to start blaring. Thankfully, we will be meeting with a sponsor couple and they will help us get to know each other a little better. Plus, upon completion of the meetings with the sponsor couple, we will be given a compatibility test. Hmmmmmm. Now wouldn't that stink if we failed!
In all seriousness, I am at a place in my life that I did not know if I would ever get to. I am currently in a career that I love and I am about to marry the man of my dreams. He has been so supportive of me both financially and emotionally during nursing school, while studying for the NCLEX, and while looking for a job. He was my shoulder to cry on when I was convinced that I failed every test including the NCLEX. He took joy in telling me "I told you so" when I ended up passing all those tests, including the NCLEX. He was my tissue dispenser when I cried because I thought I did not get my dream job. He treated me to dinner the day I found out that I actually did get my dream job. He makes sure the room is dark and the dog is walked when I get home from working the nite shift so that I can sleep soundly without disturbances. He has faith in me when others don't always have faith in me. He is my confidence booster on days when my hair is a little poofy and my under eye circles are a little too dark. But most importantly, he loves me for who I am. He is someone that I spent years of dreaming about, but didn't know existed. And how many people can say that they wear leopard print shoes and a shirt with jungle animals all over it and not be thrilled?
“For it was not into my ear you whispered, but into my heart. It was not my lips you kissed, but my soul.” - Judy Garland
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