Today is lovely outside, it's really snowy and foggy. I went out three times today just to walk around and be in the white coldness. I really appreciate a day to myself now that I'm working full time. Everything you can do that isn't work seems even nicer than it did when you could do it all the time. Nice food and hot baths are most enormous pleasure after a thirteen hour shift and then I fall almost instantly into a perfect heavy sleep.
At work a few weeks ago I had my first experience of a dead body. It was strange and I was nervous about how I might react to it but it was "ok" and it was as they say "a blessing" as the patient was very ill and had been suffering from severe dementia so had very little quality of life, although what a hard thing that is to quantify. My colleague and I had to perform last offices for this patient which is the last piece of care they receive by us. It involves preparing the body for the persons family to spend some time with so we had to wash and dress the body and make her look as peaceful and comfortable as we could. I felt quite honored to be able to do this last little thing for her, it was very strange to be doing the same kinds of things of thing I was helping her with when she was alive as when she was now dead. The objects in the room like her clothes and soap and slippers almost made me sadder than the body itself, they take on such a pathetic poignancy. It was not too upsetting as I didn't know her well, it was a very interesting experience and it made me think a lot but I can only imagine the horror of gazing upon the cadaver of someone I know and love. When I saw all her family coming in to visit her I thought miserably how one day I will be in the position of her granddaughter, one day in the position of her daughter and one day in her position at the end of my life.
No, I don't think this job exactly suits my naturally morbid and ridiculously philosophical nature. But it's ok for now and I'm getting on fine with it as long as I keep reminding myself it is only temporary.
Yesterday I read The Kreutzer Sonata, a short novel by Tolstoy. It was brilliantly funny yet depressing. I was mildly concerned by the fact that I seemed to agree with everything the maniacal Pozdnyshev, who killed his wife, was talking about in his monologue about how awful love, relationships and sex were. Oh yes as you can tell I'm feeling really positive about all that nonsense of late. There is far too much excellent text to bother trying to quote some snippets but there was also a bit I liked about music, he is talking about how he hates music because "Music makes me forget myself, my true condition, it carries me off into another state of being, one that isn't my own: under the influence of music I have the illusion of feeling things I don't really feel, of understanding things I don't understand, being able to do things I'm not able to do (...) Can it really be allowable for anyone who feels like it to hypnotize another person, or many other persons, and then do what he likes with them? Particularly if the hypnotist is the first unscrupulous individual who happens to come along?" Haha that just made me laugh though I suppose that explains the reason I actually love music. Anyway anyone who is a miserable negative bastard about love like me should read this book.
I'm also reading Wind, Sand and Stars by Antoine de Saint-Exupery which is really beautiful. This part has nothing much to do with the main thread of the story but I really loved it, I see it as an explanation of the difficulty of being with someone, why it's so scary, why it can ruin you. I hope that's just because it hasn't been real love so far but that one day it will be. "The two girls reappeared as mysteriously and as silently as they had vanished. Gravely they took their places at the table. No doubt they had fed their dogs and their birds, opened their windows on to the clear night and tasted in the evening wind with the smell of the plants. Now, unfolding their napkins, they were watching me out of the corner of their eye, cautiously, wondering if they would be finding me a place among their pets. For they also had an iguana, a mongoose, a fox, a monkey and a hive of bees, all living on top of each other in a marvelous understanding and forming a new earthly paradise. The girls reigned over all the animals in creative, charming them with their little hands, feeling and watering them, and telling them tales to which, from the mongoose to the bees, all listened (...) Then some fool presents himself. For the first time those sharp eyes deceive themselves, and light him in beautiful colours. If the fool speaks in verse, he is taken for a poet. Surely he understands the pitted floor, surely he loves mongooses, surely he is gratified by the intimacy of the viper swaying around his legs beneath the table. He receives a heart which is a wild garden, he who loves only trim parklands. And the fool takes the princess away into slavery."
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I know nothing; i know this to ultimatley be the truth, according to Socrates that makes for the wisest people alive--so please allow me to give thought and opinion...
Personally, i think your job fits perfectly with the what you describe as you nature; too many people no naught of the moments value, and the things truly valuable in that moment. in most cases, to understand this at all they must stare in the mirror of their own mortality--or lose it all and be left with nothing but a pulse to build a new life on. while this sometimes enriches people beyond measure--it also kills many; whether they live through it or not.
Your job, however temporary, should be most cherished--you are the last human to care for them before angels or whatever you believe in. the Farewell Usher. Your job when combined with your outlook and nature provides and blesses you with the perspectives that usually come at great price. You have the honor of holding a truly honored position and learning most precios lesson without their usual dire cost.
love the bit about the sisters and fool too, by the way, gotta love realism liturature--try Candide.