the koolaid

I am 69 years old and have seen a lot of shit in my lifetime but nothing like what is happening right now with the federal government.  I am not an alarmist normally but this scares me to death.  Especially the part where the courts are being cut out of the process.  My neighbor has been hauling us around since we are carless and we have had many chances to talk about life.  He joined the Army in 1968 and served for 41 years beginning with Vietnam.  I shared that I was only 13 when that happened but was pissed off about it.  Thanked him for his service but, geez.   We grew up on this farm together not seeing each other as different races but as neighbors which continues to this day.  

I have no words or wisdom or encouragement today.  After watching church online I felt a bit of hope but not much.  But then, I began to count my blessings.  It's sort of a gratitude journal in my head.  I take ownership of the fact that I should have advanced my career much earlier in life and not let my job beat me down.  The patients appreciated it but corporate did not.  I was the blood bank supervisor during most of my tenure and got called onto the carpet in the CEOs office for asking a friend to speak about how blood transfusions saved her life.  He was nice about it and said just don't do it again.  Which I did not.  Live and learn.

Much of my career as a blood banker was spent working with our not for profit supplier in Jackson.  We ordered accordingly and had them as a backup when we couldn't figure it out.  A lot of techs were scared of transfusion service work because hey....you can kill somebody if you make a mistake.  Or make them sicker, at the very least.  We worked for years on paper and MHS bought we went to an LIS.  Which changed during each sale thereafter.  I'm glad not to be there except to visit people.  

The worst experience in my career was the night that some guy with an aortic anuersym  spent the whole night in surgery.  We went through about 60 components on this dude and totally changed his blood type because the surgeon insisted on whole blood and our pathologist backed him up.   Dude ended up dying in Memphis and their transfusion service called to ask "what the hell did y'all do up there!"

We all have stories and I think that sharing them is a big part of life.  We think we know people and then we get to talking and find out other parts than the ones that we know.  Communication always works.  It may be messy, but the end result is finding out what the issues are and mediating.  

That's my wisdom for the day ^j^