Thursday, December 6, 2012

A Long, Long, Time Ago....in a Nursing School Far, Far Away....

 
I can see your face,
In our secret place,
You're not just a memory,
Say goodbye to yesterday,
Those are words I'll never say....
 
("This Used to be My Playground", Madonna)
 
 

As you all know, I am facing surgery.  I don't see the plastic surgeon till Monday and I am on pins and needles about it.  I just can't think of anything else.  I'm worried about the surgeon.  And I have an unreasonable fear that they will find cancer, even though two doctors told me the contracture and scar tissue around the old implant in my left boob isn't cancer.  I'm afraid of the surgery itself.  In other words, I'm a big baby.  In my nervousness I have been obsessively knitting frilly scarves with all sorts of colors.



At least I'm done with the mamograms and ultrasounds.  As for the mammograms, I don't know why in the world they gave me a pink gown because it was on me for exactly 4 minutes till I had to take it off so that the technician could squish my boob into that torture death vice.  I might as well have walked in there stark nekkid.



So since I have nothing to say but tired, depressing medical things, I thought I would resurrect those old memories, a series of "reruns" that tell the tragic tale of our intrepid trio who attended an old fashioned, convent-run, nursing school long ago...  



But one note I've got to tell you:  

The whole tale grew out of a blog post I had intended to write about the dumb ghost story TV shows which Blaine watches.  And then, as I bitched, somehow it triggered some reminiscing of events which I had buried deep inside me.....some emerging thoughts which unwillingly rekindled memories of things I would rather not have remembered.....ever
 
But then, a cloudy picture of those fateful events began to take form and invade my brain---things which happened long ago....things which formed me into who I am.... and things which I thought I had left behind about my years at Shadyside Hospital Nursing School in Pittsburg, PA. 
 
Shadyside was a "diploma" nursing school.  In those days, a "diploma" nursing school was located at a hospital.  So you lived, breathed, and studied there. 
 
And I say it was a "tragic" story because that's exactly what it was---a tragic, sometimes horrifying story.  Yes, there are funny parts, but I spared nothing when I wrote it--- the good, the bad, and the terrible.  And it's not stories about patients.  It's simply a tale of three friends and the tragedies which befell them...
 
...and yes...there is a ghost story in there.... and it's real....

So remember, it starts out as me complaining about Blaine----and strap on your seat belts because it's going to be a bumpy ride....and so here goes.....


Sad Angels


Part One:

http://bohemianknitter.blogspot.com/2009/05/who-ya-gonna-call-part-one.html


Part Two:

http://bohemianknitter.blogspot.com/2009/06/who-ya-gonna-call-part-two.html


Part Three:

http://bohemianknitter.blogspot.com/2009/06/who-ya-gonna-call-part-three.html


Part Four:

http://bohemianknitter.blogspot.com/2009/08/who-ya-gonna-call-final-chapter-while.html

And then....I became an RN.

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2 comments:

  1. Bo, so sorry you had such a miserable experience with nuns. I work with them daily, young ones old ones, all different orders and find them wonderfully dedicated women. They can be cranky like anyone but they are also roll on the floor hilarious! I hope you meet some nice ones!!

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    1. Thank you, Sueb! For some reason ours were all mean. I entered the school as a Baptist. But most of the other students were Catholic because there is a high population of Catholics in that area of the state. I also was a practical jokester, which those nuns hated. The only thing that saved me was graduating at the top of the class. That was the only reason the nuns weren't as hard on me as they could have been. Did you read about the ghost? That was weird. In all my life I had never believed in ghosts until that happened. And I have no explanation for it! The teachers used to say they'd come to their offices in the mornings and their faucets would be on and their locked office rooms were in total disarray---furniture moved around and everything! They told me that several students had left school because of the noises! One teacher said that the phenomenon had been going on for many years and the teachers had gotten used to it. Oh well, it was a friendly ghost! (Hey, maybe THAT was why the nuns were in such bad moods, heh!)

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