A Dog's Eye: Space Invaders

It's funny you know. I didn't plan to write at all about the only thing people want to talk about. (Even if the main topic is not COVID-19, the subtext often is.) I guess the rebel in me, the one that might be condemning me to obscurity as a writer, just wanted to swim upstream.

I must be getting old and soft as I've just given in and jumped on the bandwagon. Partly, it's common sense. If I want to be in the world, why pretend that what the world cares about is a figment of overactive imagination? It's not. It would be stupid to think so. It's real and although I don't feel anxious, I acknowledge that many do. I wouldn't be a very good human if I didn't care about that. 

The other reason I'm writing about it is because it is having an impact on me. How could it not? Who hasn't been touched by what's happening? On Friday afternoon, we closed to students and will be switching to online delivery even though we, neither teachers nor students, are ready for that. As a result of the scramble to get ready, I've been employing a lot of mental energy to think of, process and implement various solutions to the myriad of problems which keep popping up. I'm not on my Pat Malone. Many people are facing exactly the same issues, or a host of different complications. Personally and professionally, COVID19's footprint is significant.

I don't recall ever spending so much time thinking about work as I have this week. I'm very good at switching off. I don't bring work home because I don't have to. I don't feel any obligation to complete work outside of the hours I'm paid for, nor to invest time and energy in solving work problems when I'm not at work. Of course, it happens sometimes, but as a rule, when I leave my office I leave my office behind.

This week has been different. I'm acutely aware I'm operating at a much higher level than normal. Those spaces reserved for non work related thinking are being invaded. Last night, I went to bed early and slept soundly. I told my wife, my brain was exhausted, but I was exaggerating...a little. If I was operating under my own strength, I wouldn't be able to maintain this intensity. However, my God is my strength and my song, and he gives me a fresh start each day. This morning I woke up good to go. Thankfully, I have two days at home before resuming the battle.

My prayer for everyone is that we become stronger through this trial. That we care more, love more and give more. That we value things we have taken for granted, and that we figure out what really matters and live out that belief instead of just paying lip service to it.

Celebrate the small things: Life's little pleasures

I work late on Fridays because I have so much marking to do, and I also need to prepare for the following week's class. When I finish work, I head into town for my Friday grocery shop, and I return via the bottle shop, here in Parap, where I purchase my reward.

Life is full of little pleasures, little treats: a rest, a break, a reward. I am not even close to being a workaholic. Work has never been my priority. I enjoy work, and I am not lazy, but I work to live, not vice-verca. The beer and the nuts reward is just one of the many ways I chill in order to keep as calm and relaxed as possible. 

Chilled is not my normative state. I'm inclined to be a worrier, and a stress head, but as I sipped my Boag's draught from the beer stein my son bought for me when he was in Germany, and chewed on those crunchy, salty nuts, I was thinking about nothing except the pleasure those things were giving me.

Shout out to Nurses

Even though nurses are undervalued economically, I don't believe they are undervalued socially. I reckon most people know, either personally or courtesy of time spent as a patient, that nurses are terrific. I'm speaking generally here because I know that there are dodgey operators in all professions but nurses do work which makes non nurses say, 'I could never do that!' and they do it in a way that fills us with admiration.

Over the past three years, I have come to appreciate how hard it is, not only to practice nursing, but even to become qualified as a nurse. The Bachelor of Nursing strikes me as a very intense course which makes some other academic degrees look like puzzles from That's Life magazine.These men and women have to learn a lot in a very short space of time, and they have to begin to practice and, in the case of young nursing students fresh out of high school, be confronted with some very full on, challenging and at times disturbing facets of human nature. Emotionally, spiritually and physically, this is hard yakka we are talking about here.

Last night, nursing graduands from the University of Wollongong celebrated their wonderful achievement with a fancy ball at the Fraternity Club. I was there and what I saw was relief and satisfaction. There was loads of laughter, and beautifully clad, happy faced, if somewhat inebriated people, burned up the dance floor to booming pumping duff duff music. They were letting their hair down to rejoice in a hard fought achievement. Those crazy dance moves shouted victory.

I just want to congratulate them and their partners and families for making it to the end of what at times looked like a black hole of eternal stress and late night study sessions. Well done, girls and guys.