Gratitude beyond measure

As I received yet another floral arrangement the other day, I did a quick calculation and figured that my friends, family, and coworkers (current and former coworkers) have spent at least $300 on flowers for me during this recent illness.

Um, thanks, and I don't mean to be ungrateful, but I sort of wish people had saved their money. The flowers really did help when I was in the hospital, but once I got home I felt so happy and comfortable that the flowers seemed extraneous.

Today a group of former coworkers decided to be a little more practical, and floored me with their generosity.

Somebody announced, "TBH is in the hospital!" and took up a collection. The result?

An E-gift certificate to Amazon.com totalling $335.

I am pretty shocked, and more than a little touched.

That will pay for all my holiday shopping, or it would have if I hadn't done most of it already. Since most of my gifts are already purchased, I'm thinking of how to indulge myself.

A new laptop case, perhaps?

Some CDs, or should I finally break down and buy an MP3 player?

A whole collection of Sigg water bottles to match any outfit?

Another round of gifts, one more for each person on my list?

Or how about books, those things that I devour all the time but rarely buy. Maybe I'll buy a few of them, support some deserving authors, and give my library card a rest.


But the first thing I'm going to buy is a huge stack of thank you notes to write to all the people who signed the card, and another stack to write to all the people who brought meals, watched my kid, came over and drank tea and admired my scar.

It's funny. I found out this week that the doctors want to do chemo, and even if I do it, they think it's pretty likely the cancer will come back a third time.

But all I can think of is that I'm luckier than most people because of the really staggering number of people who love me.

Complain about your salary much?

Today I went to pick up some medical records and while I waited I looked at all the pictures and mementos on the clerk's cubicle walls.

The following two signs were prominently displayed.

A comic cut from the newspaper announced, "Money can't buy happiness," and a hand-made note taped underneath it read, "but if you work here you'll never know."

Another handmade sign said, "I get paid weekly, very weakly."

Somehow I don't think that's the strategy I'd pursue if I wanted to get a raise.

Maybe I need a bigger house after all

Our 3-person family lives in a 3-bedroom house. I am normally very proud of the beauty and symmetry of this. And I am normally content with the amount of space that we have.

Two of us share a bedroom. One of us has his own bedroom but usually sleeps like a starfish in the middle of his parents' bed. And one of us has his own office that doubles as a guest room. I gave M the upstairs office because I hate his office furniture (hint: many, many ugly file cabinets) and didn't want it downstairs in our dining room.

I myself chose to have my office downstairs in the dining room. My office consists of a small Ikea desk that is so piled up with stuff that I can't ever use it as an actual desk. And beside it is the dining room table, which gets cleared off several times a day when we need it for meals. When I'm working, I put my laptop down on the dining room table, plus a glass of water and the relevant stack of papers, and voila, I have a functioning office. If I need a change of scenery (or access to our landline phone) I carry my laptop into the next room and work at the kitchen table.

The problem is that my office has no door and it's situated in the middle of our downstairs, right between the living room and the kitchen. Currently my mom is staying with us to help us through our little drama. So even when L is asleep in the evenings, there are 3 adults sharing the house. That means that at all times there is at least one person in my office space or in the sound space around my office. And that person is always either talking to me or eating loudly. I find myself saying passive aggressive things to make them go away, like this.

Mom (not talking but standing companionably in the room where I'm working, scraping and scraping with a spoon to get that last little dab of ice cream out of her bowl.)

Me (brightly): I'm just going to work on my computer now, okay? I'm just going to sit here quietly and work. Would you like me to go find your reading glasses and your book for you?

Mom (looking at me for a long moment): I suppose I'll just go upstairs.

Me (trying not to sound relieved): Oh, okay.


The other problem is that my mom doesn't own a laptop, but she needs to spend a couple of hours online every day to run her small business. So we have 2 computers, and 3 adults who all need to spend several hours a day using a computer.

At the moment, I'm in my office (the dining room) and M is upstairs working on his computer. My mother is sitting about 8 feet away from me in the living room, reading a book. She is not eating, but she has this special talent where she can constantly make noises with her mouth whether she's eating or not. She nibbles her lip. She nibbles her fingernail. She sucks a particle of food out of her teeth. She nibbles her lip again. And so on.


Here's what I want.

I want to say f*** frugality and f*** environmentalism.

I want to buy a 5-bedroom house for my 3-person family.

Then, two of us would still share a bedroom, and one of us would still have his own bedroom but sleep like a starfish in his parents' bed.

But here's the beautiful part. M would have an office for all his ugly file cabinets. I'd have an office with a door that would be extra thick to block out all the talking and eating happening in the rest of the house. And we'd have a separate guest room, possibly with a guest computer.

That's what I want.

Overheard Two

Another tidbit from the Emergency Room.

I was sitting behind the desk in the ER waiting for them to register me, and I witnessed this exchange.


A woman walked in and came up to the front desk.

Receptionist: Hi, do you need to be seen?

Woman: Yes, I do.

Receptionist: What are your symptoms?

Woman: I'm having chest pains and chest pressure, and I've been vomiting, and--

Receptionist: Well, which is it? The chest pains or the vomiting?

Woman: What do you mean?

Receptionist: Why are you here? Because of the vomiting, or the chest pain?

Woman: Um, both. My doctor said--

Receptionist: You have to pick one. I can only write down one thing. Which is it going to be?

Woman: Um, the chest pain, I guess.

Receptionist: Fine. Come on back and I'll get someone to register you.

Woman: Okay...

Bored

I forgot to leave the house today, and now it's too late because it's bedtime.

Recuperating is like watching lichen grow.

The last time I had major abdominal surgery I was ten years old, and I ran and played just a few days later. Now, if I walk around the block, I have to come home and take a nap.

At least I'm reading a good book, and we have lots of food in the house. I'm slowly starting to work again, and tomorrow my sister is going to come over and take me out for Mexican food.

I know I need to write those "how to weather a medical crisis" posts. Gonna get right on that one of these days.

Health crisis, sans personal finance

Okay, I knew if I posted this brief note about being in the ER, people would be worried about me. But I've been trying to decide how much to say on here. As usual, I'm going to throw privacy out the window and tell you the story because otherwise I'll just be alluding to it darkly for the next months and what fun would that be?

Many of you know I've been dealing with some health issues this year, and that I thought they were all resolved with a diagnosis of endometriosis back in August. Hooray, I thought, something benign and treatable that is NOT a recurrence of the cancer I had before.

Well, two weeks ago I woke up in the night with excruciating pain in my shoulder. After suffering for a few days, I called my primary care physician, and the Physician's Assistant there told me to go to the emergency room. Thank goodness she did. It turned out that I had severe internal bleeding from a tumor (yes, the same kind I had as a kid) under my diaphragm. Apparently there are nerves which connect the shoulder and the diaphragm, which is why I felt it in my shoulder.

So, the ER visit turned into:
Six total days in intensive care, a surgery to stop the bleeding and another to remove the tumor, two blood transfusions, and an additional six days in the hospital.

I have much to write about the financial side of this whole situation, but at the moment I'll just give you the straight story.

I'm home, and recovering well from surgery. I don't have the full picture on what follow-up treatment the docs will recommend. The type of cancer that I've had twice now has a great survival rate of 95%, so not too many people die from it. It's also incredibly rare, so there isn't much known about it, which is a bummer.

Of course I'm out of work, and haven't even had the energy to finish a freelance project that only needs about 3 more hours of work. We've got a relative here from out of town helping with the kid. My partner is taking unpaid leave. It feels like a holiday in some ways. I hang out in my slippers. Neighbors drop off meals. I read trashy novels and watch old episodes of The Office rented from our local video store. Life is okay.

Thanks to all of you for the emails and comments. When I feel up to it I'll probably do a series of posts about the financial lessons I learned from this whole thing. (Always buy travel insurance, make sure your spouse knows your online passwords and when the bills are due, know your health insurance coverage intimately, know the short-term disability options at your workplace, etc).

I hope everybody has a great turkey day tomorrow and Buy-Nothing Day on Friday.

I certainly intend to.

Overheard

Last week I was lying in a bed in the Emergency Room. Two people wearing scrubs walked by briskly.

Man: I have sixteen active beds.

Woman: You can do this. Just think of all the money you're making today.

Professional part-time work

Rita Arens recently asked,
Where Will We Ever Find Part-Time, Professional Work?

She wants to know what fields have good part-time jobs that pay part-timers a pro-rated equivalent in salary and benefits, comparable to what full-timers earn.

I'm happy to report that I am in such a field.

They are hard to find, but I know many librarians who have part-time professional jobs with pro-rated benefits. I had such a job myself for 3 years.

When I started, I worked 20 hours a week. I earned an hourly rate that was about what I'd be paid as a full-timer at my level. I earned sick time, vacation time, and holiday pay. I had medical, dental, and vision benefits, and I paid more for them than full-timers but was very glad to have them. And I got the same percentage of my salary contributed to my workplace retirement plan.

One of the commenters on Arens' post talks about how she can't leave her job because it's such a rare and perfect situation for her family. I had the same experience. It was very hard to quit that job, but I did finally quit, and haven't looked back since.

Of course, my decision was made easier by the fact that I had a second part time job with benefits. You should really all be librarians, I'm telling you. This job has a good hourly rate but much more limited benefits. I do have access to the company's health insurance program and retirement plan. The company does contribute to my retirement plan, but I only get 5% and the full timers get 10%. But I actually get paid slightly more per hour than many of the full timers, so I don't mind. :)

Must...work...

Sunday night.

My family has gone out to dinner with a friend. I am home. Everything is quiet. The out-of-town guests have gone home. The storm windows are on. The rotting jack-o-lantern is in the compost. I have wiped all the dried alphabet soup off my desk (which also doubles as our dining room table).

I want to eat chips and salsa for dinner, followed by Halloween candy, and read one of the TEN MYSTERY NOVELS our friend brought to us from the book exchange where she works.

But instead, I have to turn a handful of disjointed paragraphs into a publishable article because my deadline is Friday.

(Hi, editor. I know you read this blog. Don't worry. I'll get it done.)

This is the bad thing about freelancing when you don't have enough childcare. There is no such thing as a weekend. Or rather, there is, but you look forward to it because your spouse will be home to be on kid duty so you can get more work done.

This is a test

The other day, my son spent about an hour doing everything he could think of to get my goat.


"Are you trying to make me angry?" I asked, exasperated.

"Yes," he admitted.

"Why are you trying to make me angry?"

"Because I don't much like being with you, Mommy."

"Why not?" I asked.

"Because you get angry."