Category Archives: Random acts

I think I mentioned here before that I would be losing my job. I learned in April that the work that I do (along with 15 or 20 co-workers), would be outsourced to a different newspaper sometime next year. Or the work might stay here, but we would all be laid off and have to re-apply. I am lucky enough to work part-time, and I knew that only full-time positions would be left.

I felt OK about losing my job though because we were getting ready for Genevieve’s arrival. I planned to stay home with her for a few months and then begin the job search when I felt ready. We know how that turned out. I couldn’t really see any way to justify my staying home when I still had a job waiting for me, so I returned to work. But I have lost interest. I think the problem is partly all of the cost-cutting going on in the news world and partly that my priorities are different.

Sunday will be my last day at work. What next?

I plan to stay home with Eleanor for a couple of months, soaking up all of her 2-year-old-ness while I can. Part of me wants to stay home with her until she starts kindergarten. She is becoming increasingly social though, and I know that she gets bored being home with me so much. Soon there will be preschool and other activities taking her out into the world, and I will have less and less to do at home.

So I plan to return to school. To be a nurse. I think.

I have always regretted that I didn’t become a doctor. If I could go back to age 18 with the knowledge I have now, I think that’s what I would do. But I’m not 18, and I have a family that I want to spend time with, so I’m choosing this path.

Most people want to get out of the hospital as quickly as they can. But every time I’m in the hospital, I think about how I wish I worked there. (Those people wear scrubs to work every day!) And when I try to make sense of Genevieve’s death, which of course will never truly make sense, I always come back to nursing. I can help other people going through a crisis because I know now. I know.

I am scared at the many years of school ahead of me, but school won’t be nearly as scary as what I’ve already been through. And I want Eleanor to see that she can always start again, that we have our entire lives to grow.

Happy anniversary, Greg.

For better or worse. Now I know we meant those words when we said them.

Or worse. Or worse. I thought it again and again on the day Genevieve died. I didn’t know what those words would hold on the day we wed. I thought you might end up in a wheelchair in a few decades. Or I might develop cancer in my later years. But not this.

Even stuck under this cloud, I know that I am a lucky, lucky woman. Thank you for always having a handkerchief in your pocket, Greg, and for these eight years. Maybe you should carry around a little bottle of champagne instead. Let’s get to the “for better” part.

Ten years ago today, a group of college students gathered at a friend’s apartment to play cards. The games lasted late into the night, so as we finished, I asked the host — a guy who I had a crush on — to walk me home.

He said that he didn’t want to go outside because the night was so cold and that I would be fine on my own.

A friend of his offered to go with me instead.

Thanks for walking me home, Greg.