spring

wow, when portland blooms it f*ing blooms! it is gorgeous out here. i am truly overwhelmed with all of the colors i see when i walk/drive/ride down the streets of this city. people take such pride in their yards and keeping things alive and flowering. it's inspiring.

all of that said, i think the week preceeding today was one of the shittiest i've experienced here in portland. i hate to write bitchy recountings but this week was one for the books. i suppose monday started well enough. i did aerobics, had sushi with e,k and d and then danced my ass off with March Fourth. i swear, that's a great time at a great price. so, anyway, there is no specific event that characterizes the rest of the week as "shitty" but it was feeling shared by most i've spoken to. particulary horrible was thursday. EVERY ONE i spoke to was in some sort of bitchy mood/crisis/sad state just whatever. i hate to ever include work in that category because it is almost always like that but that specific day was AW-FUL.

thursday. i arrive at work about fifteen minutes late, as i've taken to doing. work on thursdays is usually a bitch because first we have a half hour staff meeting. then i'm doing screenings for potential new clients for the next three hours and then at 3pm we have another TWO HOUR staff meeting. well on this thursday we had a special hour long meeting after the first staff meeting. the purpose was for our team to 'debrief and process' with two "workplace trauma" staff. we have had a number of clients die recently and the toll on us was showing. after a death at our clinic, the client's case manager is required to gather a number of personnel together in order to go over the client's case. the "idea" is to administratively review how the case was handled with "no judgement". in reality, it's a scrutiny of our work. "what did you do?" "what could you have done better?" this does not feel good and truthfully, as the case manager you walk out with a sense of failure and immense guilt. sucks. so anyway, back to thursday, we were given the opportunity (sans supervisors) to talk about our feelings about the deaths and whatever else we felt was traumatizing us. sigh. long story short, nearly everyone wept with fatigue, guilt, anger and plain ol' burnout. these were all noted and told that they would be kept confidential. whatever. after it was over, one of them went to our supervisor and basically spelled out what happened. when it was my turn to speak, i spoke my mind. i said i hate, ABSOLUTELY HATE, being told i am responsible for someone's life to the extent that if they decide to jump off of a building - I am held accountable. it's a HORRIBLE feeling and i'm sick of it. i also opened up about the time i had to sit in one of those reviews because one of my client's was found dead in his apartment. i was pretty grilled, as was the person who prescribed his meds, and i said that i walked out of that meeting thinking, "wow, i'm glad i documented my outreach attempts". i told the group that i couldn't believe that the death of this man produced that thought! i said i couldn't believe how cold and callous i had become and this happened only two months after i was hired! so, we all broke down and slept walked through the rest of the day. that itself being another complaint i voiced: our clients get so much lip service from everyone else in the world, i feel bad that i can barely be present for them in my interactions with them, yet, that's the only way i've survived. i give my 75%. so during our last staff meeting, all of the sudden, someone needed to go assess someone to send them to the hospital. i'll spare the detail, but to say that this is a LONG process that essentially takes away someone's civil rights and sends them off to the hospital for further treatment. well i had the misfortune of having driven to work so i was volunteered. i entered the most DISGUSTING apartment you could imagine. broken glass on the floor; clothes everywhere; feces smeared on the floor...it was disturbing to say the least. anyway, we called the cops and then escorted her to the hospital and me and her case manager followed...oh yeah! it wasn't even my client! so i was done after that. i thought (stupidly) i'd try some retail therapy. i went to lloyd center. ugh. i bought an earpiece for my cell though -i've apparently been breaking the law using the phone w/my hands while driving. i didn't know! so then i go over to goodwill to see if i can score. i did! cute shirt, i go to the counter reach for my debit card and OOPS! i left it in the mall. i said fuck and shit so many times...i go back to the store and the guy luckily had it. i go back to goodwill because it really was a cute shirt and i'm DONE. i decided to take myself to dinner - sushi- but i did NOT want to go anywhere the least bit crowded so i headed to division. well it wasn't crowded but it took half an hour to get two rolls. why.did.i.even.think.that.this.would.have.been.a.good.idea.? i don't know - i've been called stupid a couple of times. so i decided to just call it a day and come home. i knew i wouldn't speak to my boy because he was working til 10pm and i was TIRED so i just called and left a message wishing him a good night. well he called and woke me an hour later. in hindsight, answering the phone was a bad idea. oh and did i mention when i got home i spent about 45 minutes speaking to my roommate, who was in tears, about her horrible day? i just should've known "the most horrible day of the year"would have extended to j also. he was PISSED. he was at work an hour and a half past his quitting time and had lost several important items for his job. he spent the entire 3 minute conversation huffing and swearing. this is odd for j so i just shut up and let him vent. i did make the mistake of trying to backtrack with him...sigh....he was all, "no, i don't even want to talk about it. i'm ANNOYED!" i almost said, "well, why the hell did you call me then?" i never call people when i'm in the bitchiest mood i've ever experienced! so as i was formulating that thought, he said, "i just wanted to call because i had to tell you good night". he saved his ass with sweetness. i just felt right back to sleep, glad that the day was actually over. good riddance.

luckily, yesterday was a lot better but i'll have to write about that later. i'm off to play scrabble! yes!