(Okay, that title is a little long but describes the rest of the text perfectly.)
For a magical mess of a creature such as myself, the road of life is a quandary. Robert Frost waxed poetic about the Road Not Taken. Do you know how many roads I haven’t taken only to find out I should have; or how many I have only to find out I shouldn’t? And what is the road anyway? My road sometimes resembles a lane, a highway, a path, and even a ditch. Sometimes all in one trip.
Has anyone ever in the history of mankind taken a straight road? Do people really exist who know from birth what they’re going to do, are doing and have done? Because, as sure as I’m writing this, I don’t have a clue.
Growing up family would ask me the classic question for children: “What do you want to be when you grow up?” Not carrying much about the future but knowing I needed an answer that would make them proud, I would say, “A nurse, just like my mom.” Praise would be heaped upon me and I would glow in the feeling.
So, inevitably I went to nursing school when I was nineteen. Boy, was that road the wrong one. I found out, to my family’s amazement, I was not suited for life as a nurse. Throughout the first year that knowledge grew inside me until finally, while I was standing in front of a twenty-one year old man who was drop dead handsome and my supervisor informed me I would be placing a catheter in his most private region, I turned, said, “NO,” and marched myself out of the hospital and out of nursing.
My next pathway lead to telling my mom. This is where the ditch part comes in. She was incredibly understanding but did tell me I had to do something to get an education, so figure it out. A family friend was taking court reporting classes and being that I had very fast fingers, we all thought that was tailor-made for me. I started the next fall learning the code of the stenography machine. I actually shined at this as I was fast and accurate. It wasn’t until my last three months in school that I was assigned to job shadow in depositions and court.
I arrived at my first deposition with the assigned court reporter, set up my machine in a corner and waited for the first words to be spoken. I can’t for the life of me remember the subject matter for this case but it must have been a doozy because somewhere in the middle of the deposition, the lawyers became very excited to the point they stood up and faced each other on opposite sides of the conference table and started screaming.
It was the 70’s and having an ash tray on the table was the norm. This ash tray sat on the conference table and was large, round and made of marble. It was about the size of a large dinner plate and stood about two inches tall. One of the attorney’s had been using it so it was positioned in front of him. About three minutes into the scream fest that lawyer put his hand on the ash tray and pushed it forcibly across the table in the direction of the opposing lawyer and his man parts. When the marble came barreling toward him, it collided with his softest bits and he folded up like a paperclip. Then, all hell broke loose.
It was at this point my mentor motioned me to pick up my machine and leave. I never found out the conclusion to this meeting but I did learn a valuable lesson. Move the stone ash tray out of every lawyers way when you first enter the room.
My next foray was into the courtroom. Much more formal and somber than a deposition. There are many types of court: traffic court, divorce court, criminal court. All have their stories. The one you never want to find youself in is custody court. This is always sad and always adversarial. Here is where I learned an important facet of myself. I am not able to process the adversarial nature of court and come out on the other side with a soul. Another road that ended in a ditch.
At this point I was twenty-one and needed to make money. Fast fingers plus medical knowledge logically put me on the road to medical transcriptionist. Made sense to me. I applied to a radiology unit at the nearest hospital. During my interview the supervisor turned to me and said he had another job in mind. How about receptionist at the front desk? I was to later learn he liked to fill this position with the youngest, most attractive girls he could find. I said yes and learned to run the front desk in spite of myself. In the seventies sexual harassment was lover looked. During my time there I perfected the fine art of getting out of situations without calling the perpetrator down. My naivety was starting to wane.
I became acquainted with all the aspects of radiology, including, but not exclusive to, barium enemas and where that actually takes place; asking patients to put on a gown and finding out they elected to just get naked; dealing with the prison population from Rocky butte jail; and eating lunch with x-ray techs who liked to compare the output of the barium enema they just finished.
Yes, it was a road that lasted twenty plus years. It turned many corners but it was a good road, one where I met very good, long time friends. A road where I met the best friend. But, not the road that fulfilled me.
In between these twenty plus years I had a child who grew into one of the best people I know. During his childhood I was privileged to travel the road of hockey mom, home and school leader and co-owner of “Camp Hillsboro”, which is what all of my son’s friends called our house. Absolutely the best time of my life. Little did I know this was the road of all roads.
Later on I became a medical assistant in the orthopedic department. How and why I chose a pseudo-nursing position is a mystery to even me. But, I’ve been doing it for nine years and find it’s time to find a new highway.
My next path will be retirement and full time Nana. Now that’s a road I can revel in.
After all this history what have I learned? All roads give insight, experience, education, adventures and memories. All roads are not always the right ones, but that’s not necessarily a bad thing. One never knows where that rutted, muddy, miserable road might take one. So, take a trip, learn a lesson, meet new people, take the fork in the road, even occasionally do a U-turn. But, never, never just sit there idly waiting. Get up and put it in gear.
magicalmess 