Ramblings By Rhianna

June 30, 2007

Today I did both of my jobs…

Filed under: My Life, The writer, ER nurse — Administrator @ 4:37 pm

Some days I love my job. Yes, I tell myself that everyday, just as a reminder. And if you think about it I have two jobs. One is the day job, the one everyone tells you not to give up until you have at least three best sellers. The other is the one where I write and wait impatiently to see it published.

 

Today, almost as soon as I reached my office, the night charge nurse came in smiling and content with life. He has several new nurses on his shift and was bragging about them. (The new nurses fall under my job description.) For half an hour and within just an hour of the day shift crowd being there, it all went to hell. He had four patients suddenly going critical at the same time.

 

One was crashing as his blood pressure tried to reach zero, one having an allergic reaction that tried very hard to close off his throat, one rushing to surgery. 

 

The fourth was a young girl, who when she entered the ED was complaining of abdominal pain and missed her period a month before. Trouble was when the nurse examined her she was as near to crowning as you can get without the head popping out. (You know the scene in Knocked Up.)

 

The doctor came and did a quick exam and sent three nurses up with her to reach L&D while the doc stayed with the other patients in the ED. They called to warn L&D(labor and delievery) and rushed to get her there in time. Trouble was there was not an obstetrician on the floor. He said he could hear the page over head. Three ER nurses and a couple of L&D nurses delivered this little girl.

 

He was feeling pretty good. Saved some lives and brought a new one into the world. He was smiling as he told me that he had so wanted to simple push aside the L&D nurse and deliver the baby himself. It was a tantalizing idea to be the first to hold her as she was born. The baby was early, but not that early. The other patients all made it without complications and all was right with his world.

 

I wasn’t with them while they showed the gold. After more than 15 years in the emergency room it was a thrill to see the nurses that I helped orient and encourage, gain the knowledge and skill to shine when it all seemed dark for a time.  

 

I know how he felt. We bear witness to tragedy so much of the time in the emergency room. We see the miscarriages, not the deliveries. We see the first golden hour of traumatic events when everything you do can make a difference, not the day they walk home. We hear the death wails of family members as they are allowed in the room to watch as we try to save their husband, wife, brother or father, not the sweet remembrances.

 

It requires a very special individual to do that job. We don’t have the hours or days of getting to know our patients, instead we a short window of time save the emergent patient or diagnose and treat the less emergent. We are the way station on their way home, the hospital room upstairs or to their maker. There’s always someone else waiting for us to get to them. So this nurse would go home today weary from life, with the knowledge he and five other nurses made a difference in the lives of everyone they cared for that night. Some days at the end of your shift that feeling is not there, because you feel only the weary. It was a good day for him and I was glad.

 

So today I did both my jobs. I bore witness to his story and then I wrote about it. In my life I don’t have to come up with outrageous tales, I can just tell you about my day or one of the many I remember.  When I write I always see the happy ending, even if it is not part of the real story. That’s why I write fiction.

 

Rhianna Samuels/story teller/ER nurse

June 23, 2007

The Secret O’ Life

Filed under: My Life, The writer — Administrator @ 4:51 am

 

I don’t know all the secrets of the great writers. But I know the secret of life. James Taylor sings about it in the song the Secret of Life. What is the secret but to enjoy the moment you’re in this instant.  


You are probably thinking, just as I have, “but I’m not really enjoying this minute in my dentists’ chair.” I do know that I have spent great pieces of my life dreaming of what the future will bring, instead of living in the now. The memories I recall are those times that I was fully engaged and enjoying, or not enjoying, but I was in the moment.


I know I’m not the only one who can get home and realize I don’t remember the drive there. I was zoned out. (What does that mean?) I wasn’t paying attention. I wasn’t there. I’d tell you if I remembered.


When I write it requires that I be fully engaged in the process, even if the moment is surreal, as if I am plugged into some other place. I remember writing SOTD in long hand. My sister had surgery and I was there with her for the several days she spent in the hospital. For two days straight she couldn’t stand the light in her room. So I sat in a chair next to her bed with only one tiny sliver of light. I maneuvered until it let me see what I was writing. The story was ready to fall out of my brain and through the pen. In the first four or five days I wrote the majority of that book. I can remember being confined, and yet completely attentive to the story. (And my sister)


And what of reading? Is it a false moment?  I have read books that will stay in my memories until I die. Novels with characters and stories so real that are told to us in words as opposed to events to which we bear witness. In reading a book are we neglecting life. Am I not engaged in my life because I am engaged in a world between two covers?


I don’t know the absolute answer to that, because it is a question for each individual. I was talking to a friend at work today, who was telling me about not being able to read anything until summer was over. She said it took her a long time to read a book, because she only had time while the laundry was in the dryer. It seemed so odd to me, because I can read a book in a few short or long hours, depending on the length. The idea of waiting weeks or even months to know the end of the story was a foreign thought for me, not if the ending id at the end of the pages I have in my hand.  


Is she totally engaged in her life and I am a poor pathetic creature who lives vicariously through words on a page?  Probably. I also enjoy many things in my life. I think I finally grew up when I could enjoy the silence and being alone without feeling like I needed someone else there to share the experience.  She is totally involved in the lives of her young children, she is engaged as a parent. I hope when her children are older, that she finds the time to enjoy a book, and the silence.


I like to take the time to savor the coffee, scent the rain filled air and feel the rug between my toes. And if I can have a good conversation with someone I love in the process then I am very happy and content. I enjoy reading and writing. I am in the moment, whatever I am doing in that particular moment.

Tell me being in your moments.


Rhianna


 
 
 
 
 

 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 

 
 
 
 
 

 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 

June 15, 2007

As if I know what I’m doing.

Filed under: The writer — Administrator @ 2:34 am

I am a panster, and though I always have a beginning, middle and end, the story can take a different face from when I initially conceived the idea. As it grows up and comes into its own, there is a chance that it has a sense of humor or a mean streak. When I am writing my story it is my baby. All newborns are beautiful, but like all growing things, they can have some awkward periods, especially those terrible two’s when everything is
“No No”. That’s the point at which I want to bang my head against the computer. We nurture and feed our words with ideas. There are special times when it begins to stand on its own two feet or speak in full sentences and hopefully become logical with dreams of its own.

There are some characters I only have a passing relationship with, a brief sentence or two of description in my own mind. The quirks or details unfold as the character comes to life on the page. I’m a big believer in character rehabilitation. The characters are the story teller and there are times I have to rewire their minds and actions, a little like a 12 step program. Plastic surgery is helpful, think deviated septum. Surgery can heal many an ailment. I am big on romance and my characters are fully capable of making me fall in love with them. I hate that when it happens, because then it is hard to let them go when their story is over. (I suppose that is why I immediately wrote two sequels to SOTD.) I will always be comparing the next hero or heroine to them.

But the one thing I am an absolute stickler about is maintaining the mythology of the worlds in which my characters live. In Shaking Off The Dust, one of the three main characters is a ghost. The story was in my head, but once the rules of the ghost were laid down it placed restrictions on what my characters were able to do in relation to Tom’s character. Those rules are not like the usual ones that have been generally applied to ghosts. The mythology of the characters or world creates the reality of your story. Without rules it is difficult for the reader to be pulled into the story you are telling. In SOTD is a big story, but it starts with the small details. And Like a baby that has grown up now, you have to let it go and see if it can stand up to the world, though it will always be your baby.

June 12, 2007

The fine line between staying young and being immature

Filed under: My Life — Administrator @ 1:49 am

+ In some ways I haven’t changed the way I see the world. Well, yes, of course I have aged and seen too many things up close. I don’t refer to my time in the nursing field, working an emergency room, but I mean living. I spent much of my twenties as that person who always thought it would be better somewhere else, hoping I would find what I was looking for in another city. Trouble was I never knew what I was looking for, without that I could never find it. After literally going from one coast to coast, living six months to years in a multitude of states and cities I made the discovery that a town or city is what you make it.

Don’t get me wrong, I had a blast in the process. After changing my major more often than a prom queen changes her clothing, I finally dropped out. I waited tables and then bartended for a long time. I could go from one place to another and always find work. I even had insurance most of the time. I met thousands of people in my travels, almost as many as I have met working in the same emergency room for over 15 years. Hell, I walk through the mall nowadays and everyone looks familiar.

I have had roommates galore and my share of love interests.  I learned to live alone and enjoy that time, without feeling like I had to have someone entertain me.   My only child was stillborn at full term. That makes me a mom, but not. I finally went back to school and took my degree in nursing. Even as an ICU nurse I traveled.

My head feels young.  My head thinks even the young boys are cute. I love to learn the most current slang, I have to laugh, because I almost said cant. (I’m working on a historical romance.) I love music of all kinds and I usually end up lending out my music to my nephews and nieces.  My head is full of ideas and thoughts that are young and I don’t understand how anyone can think I’m older, even when I’m putting on my hair color to cover the gray.

I tell my friends that the way to stay young is to be immature. When someone tries to pin you down; when they define you to the point that they can put you in the proverbial box and label it, then you have been aged. My foundation is rock solid, but my views change with life and every new experience.  I am still open to fresh ideas and my POV can change if you are very compelling in you argument.

What keeps me young?  Interacting with the real world can age you or keep you young. Reading keeps me young. I can be as young or as old as I want. Sure I want books about people my age, but I love books about women in their twenties and thirties too. I love being on board space ships or sparring words with Were creatures. I love to read. I love to write. I am never embarrassed by what I read. As an adult I have responsibilities to many people. I have a responsibility to be me, and keeping my mind in the now and new keeps me young. In my own head anyway.

What keeps you young?

June 8, 2007

Decontaminating Snot

Filed under: Uncategorized — Administrator @ 1:05 am

In order to keep a hospital and emergency department prepared for the event of a biologic or chemical disaster, it must be drilled, until like any new skill set, you become proficient.  And as part of the group that helps set up these drills, I can attest to the fact that it is not done by magic and must be set up with all contingencies addressed.

 

The last drill was completed recently and I can give you the short comic version of our set up and the results.  Two of my colleagues coach soccer teams and these stellar 12 year old athletes were asked to participate in our drill as volunteers. They were told that they would go down on a soccer field, be bused to the emergency department, be scrubbed down in a decontamination tent and then passed through the emergency department.  The reward for this was a lovely certificate of participation in community service, (part of my duties) doughnuts, and chocolate milk. I have no idea if they jumped for joy, but I think they were intrigued. So with signed parental consents in hand our planning began.

 

We drilled continuously at all manner of hour, day or night, in donning and doffing different level of hazard gear. And the large decontamination tent was also popped up and down to within an inch of its portable life. Infection control built chemical terrorist scenarios and soon it was only days away. 

 

I sat in my office working as my colleague who shares our office and is one of those soccer coaches, plotted over the phone with our best moulage nurse on how to prepare realistic snot and vomit. (KY and pea soup, if you were wondering).

 

She went with the team to the soccer field and came on board the bus, apparently waiting until only blocks from the hospital before smearing KY on thier faces so that it would not dry up too soon, grossing out all the girls and most of the boys. I stood by at the hospital and when the mock 911 call came in, set about pulling out the suits and hooded respiratory equipment and supervised the donning of bodily equipment.

 

All proceeded as you would expect. After going through the decon tent our swim suited and shivering victims were taken to an exam area, given warm blankets and then allowed to dress. They devoured their doughnuts, filled out an evaluation, got their certificate and were picked up to go home, the adventure completed.

 

So what helpful things did they write on the evaluation forms?

·         Lack of actual soap in their scrub down. They used the blankets to clean off the fake snot.

·         Not enough hot nurses.

June 4, 2007

Thoughts on writing

Filed under: My Life, The writer — Administrator @ 2:03 am

Thoughts on writing

You can read blogs, essays and whole books on writing, from the craft to the inspiration of ideas, but it will never write the story for you. That task is as individual as our fingerprints. Writing is a craft that you learn by doing. You begin with an idea, whether it is a simple or complex story. But it doesn’t make you a writer unless it consumes you until the need to see it realized forces your hands to the metaphoric pen. That task is often laborious and can’t be completed unless that story in your head takes on its own life.

When you consider that in today’s market, a best seller is seldom a book everyone has read. What a reader wants from a book is as different as the fingerprints on that story. The books that tell you how to write, offer tried and true formula’s that have worked in the most recent market. I try to follow the rule of the first five pages. Bring in the reader and hook them in the first five pages. But that was not the way books were written for the last few centuries. It is a manifestation of our action movie, instant gratification mentality. As times and publishing changes, so do the advice on how to grab the attention of the editor. And as Samhain says, it’s all in the story. The first five pages don’t mean squat if the story anchored to it doesn’t pull you into that world.

Hey, don’t get me wrong, I have succumbed to that need to be sucked into the story quickly through action or a character that is so quirky and interesting that I want to read on to see if it can be maintained throughout the book. But, it’s not a two hour movie, (much as I’d love to see my book turned into one.) When I read a book, I want it to give me many hours of enjoyment. In fact I have become disgusted with paying out hard cover prices for short books. But that is a personal preference. If it’s not at least 85,000 words… well let’s move on.
When I was at the RT convention, I listened to a large group of authors discussing a best selling writer and praising her books. But the constant theme was that her books just keep getting better and better. Her earlier books were good, but they improved as she grew as a writer.
As a writer who has her first novel coming out in 2008, I feel presumptuous discussing writing as if it were something I have already mastered. I have not, nor do I expect to be able to ever say that I have. But there is a point at which you have to just put it all out there. The story that crawled out of your head and onto paper must be a story that you believe the reader will enjoy, and it is a story that you are willing to take criticism and high brow rude comments over. Putting it out there means having to be willing to chisel and rewrite until you find that shiny jewel that started out in your head. And I keep in mind that we have very different taste in our jewelry, as well as our reading. You have to believe in your story and that you can bring hours of enjoyment to the reader.
One of the docs that I worked with used to make the comment right before he was ready to write a prescription for a patient that he was “writing a potion to cure their ails.” (He’s a Kentucky boy). Writing is a potion that will cast a spell over that reader. It takes them away from their ailments and routine and places them somewhere that you have created. That is magic. The writers that have made magic come alive for me are many. I can’t imagine that they did not learn to cast their spells without working very hard in the process.
So, I will continue to read the blogs, essays and books on writing, but mostly I will write those stories that are vying for their turn on paper. I will send my secret positive statements about having a massive audience of readers who will love my books out into the universe. But I’ll also send up a prayer that I am bringing someone hours of enjoyment that they might not have known except through what I write. I also don’t want to be judged for the rest of my life on the first book published. I want to be judged on the tenth or twentieth book.

My web page blog is about life, my life. It is my POV about what I see and do, and writing is an important portion of my life. I love to read, but I love to write even more, they both can improve the quality of my personal world. As I go through this process of being published I hope to share the interesting bits, or at least the bits that seem interesting to me. But, I also hesitate blogging about writing. I can tell you my thoughts and angst with great gusto, but I place a disclaimer here and now that I am no expert, and I am often told that I am FOS (full of —-.) However, that doesn’t mean I don’t have days when I want to talk about writing, personal insights, a plot point or realizing a character to their full potential (and unlike the real world I can make that happen with a few chapters.)

I suppose my question to all writers, whether they are published or trying very hard to be published is when do you get good enough to write with authority about writing? Does listening to our epiphanies and lessons learned help you, or is it just helping you learn more about me as a person?
Rhianna Samuels
Rhiannasamuels.com

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