Hand-Picked Flower and Some Java

I sit here this morning listening to the sound of birds come through my window. The sounds of summer are full in bloom, the sun in out and shining, a slight breeze ruffles the leaves of the trees. I'm not outside, rather being lazy inside working on my online courses and keeping an eye on grams.

I look back at the past three months of my life and it's crazy. It's been consumed by a new job, learning new things every day, meeting tons of new people, grams now going through medical turbulence, online courses, and relearning how to dream. My cheery attitude is back in full swing, I am laughing from the depths of my belly again, and my excitement at life is taking over. I can't believe just how much can change in three short months!

My dreams of traveling have been re-awakened and encouraged. And I'm doing it! Portland is so close I can taste it. Hopes of San Francisco and Sacramento are on the horizon for the next few months. No maps, no plans, just traveling if I can get the time to do it!

There's also a guy, who re-awakened that. I wouldn't have thought I would even be considering taking someone's hand and saying "lets try walking through life together". Here I sit, and I am, and I'm happy, and I'm excited, and I'm content.

As he said "You know it is a very moment in life when a person can be exactly who they are and not feel the need to hide or subdue portions of their personality. It's nice that I don't feel the need to hide with you :-)"

Who knows what the future will bring, who knows where my feet will go, and who knows how long I can slide my hand into his with him by my side....but it doesn't matter, it only matters that right now I'm exactly where I feel content and myself.

I want to travel and go on adventures, and I'm very much excited at the prospect of doing it with him by my side. But one step at a time.

Stolen kisses in elevators, cups of java, and hand-picked flowers. Life is good. :-)

Up & Down The Hallways

One aspect of life: work. I'm such a lucky gal to love my job.

I'm a lucky gal period. But life is so blessed when you love your job. I'm lucky to have loved all my jobs really. But I do love my current job. And I love where I am. There's a lot to be said because that hasn't always been the case. And maybe it won't always be the case. For now, it is and I'm reveling in it.

Work isn't easy, but it's fun! My co-workers on every floor that I've worked on have been great, I've had lots of laughs and I'm getting to know more and more people.

While I don't personally think that I'm doing a fantastic job all the time, I seem to be doing something right. All the managers on the floor seem to like me and want to keep me or have me come up and float to their floors. I gotta be doing something right. Or maybe I do everything wrong but do it with a smile on my face :-)

I just spent 3 days running up and down the hallways of 9A at Denver Health. I had my own patients, I ran in circles some days but it was wonderful. I learn something new every day, something not-so-pleasant happens every day, I get to laugh with patients and co-workers every day, I walk a million miles every day, and I leave at the end of the day feeling somewhat accomplished. Not always that I've done everything I could but that I accomplished something! It's a great feeling. Even on the worst days.

I got my two first heart felt "Thank You's" this week...all for simply doing what it is that Denver Health tells me I'm supposed to do!

I'm pretty excited about what lays in front of me, if I get into nursing. Excited to see what might happen! Excited to see what the future has in store for me :-)

Now THAT'S What I Call A Day For The Books!!

Welp, you ever just have one of THOSE days?! And by those days I mean the ones where you are absolutely not winning by any means, are just so completely frazzled, yet the sun is still somehow shining out of your ass and you find yourself laughing your way through the day?!?!

Yeah?! Well that was my day!

Ok ok ok, most days are like that for me. But today was an extreme!!

I got to work expecting to be a ward clerk...because, well....because that's what my CNE (clinical nurse educator) told me I would be doing. I haven't been cross-trained as a Healthcare Tech yet (officially) and thought that was coming at a later date. But due to conflicts (basically caused by the indiscrepency in my position title and it lacking half of it as I'm the first to be fully cross-trained), it was do-or-die time.

You wanna learn?! Well jump in head first! And today I was shoved in head first...and I basically ended up belly-flopping but that's really beside the point....

So I worked the floor. I learned how to do vitals (which might I add that machine was almost the death of me today...it might be simple but it's lethal!), do the boards, do intake/output, and run in a million different directions. I learned to chart. I learned how to distribute trays, set up a room, all that jazzy shit they teach you.

BUT I learned it while learning how to ungracefully drop a tray, how to run into walls, how to run around in circles (quite literally, I mean that sincerely), how to ask a sheriff where to find shampoo, and most importantly, how to lock myself in a correctional care room.

However, I did it all with a smile on my face. For realz, laughter is the only thing that gets me through. I laugh at any and every thing. I laugh when I make mistakes, I laugh when people tell jokes, I laugh at myself, I sing, I dance, I make corny jokes, and put in ridiculous movie lines/song lyrics when necessary. And it pays off!! I had everyone in my unit in a good mood...despite my many many mistakes today. I was frazzled beyond belief but hey it's all good!!

And let's just not forget the most memorable part of my day. Well we had this new admit. We knew he'd be a "sitter" patient and that he was all sorts of coo-koo ca-choo. He came in and did not fail to deliver! He came down in 4-pt cuff restraints from the ED. After unhooking him he leaped to the other bed and next thing I know, all sorts of stuff starts happening and five sheriff's are on top of him. Apparently he started pulling out his IV, then tried to bite it, then tried to bite one of the sheriff's, then started fighting, and, like whoa!! Crazy, scary and thrilling all at once! And what was my reaction?! Oh you guessed it, I laughed.

Then I had to help insert a foley. A catheter. Into his penis. There's a first for everything. Oh and then he peed so much!! He peed 900mL in the catheter but there was so much coming out an additional 300mL came out around the catheter!! So we had to clean him up, change his bed...hmmm, what glorious fun!! And what did I do?! Sang a ridiculous song and laughed!

Doc: What's up?!
Me: the ceiling

Never gets old! Such a smartass.

But I will say, the power of please and thank you and asked nicely, so totally amazing!! The sheriff's love me because of my attitude and my joking demeanor and my corny jokes. And I think my staff all does too. I can joke with most all of them, pretty easily. Tis quite glorious!!

Welp, that was definitely a day for the books. Bet tomorrow will be too. An adventure is in store I'm sure. Which means I need some sleep to prepare for it.

Off to Never Never Land I go. Tout a'leure and sweet dreams :-)

NOH8: Light Through the Darkness

We threw our second NOH8 party...this year's theme was The Light Through the Darkness. We incorporated Born This Way and the It Gets Better Project as well. Love celebrating LOVE!!

Here are a couple photos...more to come soon :-)

This first one is meant to be controversial. It's supposed to be ironic. And it's supposed to stop and make you think "Wait, aren't they supposed to be promoting love and acceptance?!" Well we are, but if this little gesture can make one go up in arms and feel offended, imagine how much our words (something that holds SO much more power and meaning) can affect how you make someone else feel...and we are so less careful about what comes out of our mouths and how those words are portrayed to others. So stop and think the next time you open your mouth!! It's also one of Dan and our's sayings "fuck it!" It's just how we feel about what others think of our own 'labels'.


Last year Dan and I didn't get a photo together, despite being the co-hosts/co-creators of this party! So this year we made sure we had one :-)

Love Love Love, Me

These past couple weeks have been CRAZY!!

Wow, so I totally forgot how demanding school can be! Either that or these online classes are abnormally demanding. I'm pretty positive it's the former more than the latter but eh, ya never know!! Either way I'm loving my classes. Well, I'm absolutely loving my Philosophy of Religion class. I love how it pushes me to think in a way I haven't been pushed for awhile. It bites at some controversial issues and I can't even tell you just how MUCH I missed those hard conversations and people pushing my beliefs and opinions. Totally flourishing in it. The other class is nothing but a bunch of Christians talking about western religions from their sheltered point of view but the readings are extraordinary! I'm loving being back in some sort of education setting, even if it is from my computer.

I submitted my nursing application (albeit, PUSHING THE LIMITS) and send for my transcripts. Now I'm sitting here figuratively biting my nails and literally watching the NursingCAS website to see if my last transcript gets in by tomorrow. Oh how I hope I didn't shoot myself in the foot. Procrastination, though art just awful and I need to get rid of you, you awful dirty habit!!

With that, I hope that in 4-6 weeks I am getting an offer to come in for an interview so I can prove myself. Fingers crossed, hardcore crossed, white-knuckling crossed almost. AH!!!

Work is great. I'm FINALLY down on my home unit, the Correcitonal Care Unit. It's scary and fun and exciting. Trying to learn how to fit in and really hoping I'm doing well. It's a small unit, a small family. I'm new to it so it's sort of like starting from square one (yet again). And in a couple weeks I will be doing my healthcare tech training! Which will also be a square one spot again. And I might have my nurse educator send me up on another floor at the end of that sometime, so I can get a taste of another floor. Which will again be scary but WOWEE!! Talk about a long time of being out of my comfort zone! So good for me though. I've enjoyed getting to know everything and being on the edge of my seat. Sometimes it's so exhausting but great character building that's for sure :-)

Grams is back in the hospital as of this morning. COPD - Liver Failure - Retaining lots of water - Hit her head - Disoriented - Hiatal Hernia - Epigastritis - Gastritis - Colon polyps - Precancerous Tumor. The list goes on and on. Grams fell down and hit her head at some point last night and didn't even recognize us this morning. Just kept trying to go potty (though she didn't have to go). So she's back in the hospital and will be admitted into a nursing home probably, because she needs 24-hour care.

I hate to say it but that's a good thing. My mom has been stressing so hardcore trying to take care of my grams, even with everyone else's help. It will be good for us to not have to worry about changing every aspect of our lives as my grams' care needs are just SO high demanding right now. Not to mention, my mom is petrified of coming home to find grams dead so it will be good for that not to even be a possibility for her right now.

Just so crazy, and so stressful.

Other than that, just trying to plan a trip to San Fran & Portland. And also trying to plan a couple 14ers!! Hopefully the first one will be at the end of June :-)

Hakuna Matata!!

[Film on the Rocks watching Footloose with one of the besties!!]

Love, City

I spent the day downtown today with one of my best and oldest friends.

We went and had tea at The House of Commons, which is a beautiful tea house. Then we walked around Denver, hitting up the 16th Street Mall and the People's Fair. Live Music. Sandals and sunglasses. Amazing crafts.

Was a beautiful day full of people, sun and deep breaths.

I need more of those :-)

Wish I didn't have to come back to Brighton. Wish I lived in Denver. Wish I had roommates. Wish I had more reasons to breath easy.

Wish I could be given a chance...by several people.

I wish I could get to know N*** better. I want to be opened up and blossomed. I want someone to make me laugh more. He is the kind of guy I have looked for. Calm, relaxed, joyous, fun, young at heart, loves to travel, loves life. Just want to be given a chance. Even just to be friends.

Can't wait to travel. Can't wait to see the world. Can't wait to live more!

Need to stop wishing and start living.

Ha, welcome to conversations in my head!

Great day to be alive :-) No complaints. Just sun :-)

My goal for this summer: to get out as much as possible on my days off!!

Well between online classes and taking care of grams.

Grams has been sick, and it's been crazy...definitely stressful on the whole family having to take care of her, with her not being able to take care of herself.

My goal: one 14er per month for the next four months. Think I can make it happen?! I think I can and I think I will!!

I need to keep busy this summer, keep my body active, and keep my mind off men. Especially one that I'm getting in dangerous territory with currently. This guy could open up a world I crave...the only catch is I don't know how serious he is about ME. So should I take the chance or just keep myself closed off?! But the more I keep myself closed off will it make it harder in the long run to open myself up to someone?! Who knows. Stop overthinking things. Just because others have hurt you in the past doesn't mean he will Nicole.

I really want to live in Denver. I have the itch to move so bad. I want a place of my own. But I can't afford it. I want to be near something with things to do and people to see and places to go. Tired of the suburbs, tired of this old B-town. Ready for something more my age, more my style...but am I really?!

So many questions, so many desires!

I wanna travel. I wanna go, I wanna do, I wanna be. Why does everything rely on money and time?! Even know that I might have a little time, I don't have the money...like normal!

Mind racing...need to find an outlet for it....