Ladyhawker - On Sabbatical: April 2009

I stand at a crux point in my life. A goal that I have been working on is actually, finally coming to completion. In three weeks I will graduate with an Associate of Applied Science, Respiratory Therapy. I have one final oral examination that I must pass to graduate. The rest of the time is clinical practice. After graduation I will need to sit for my certifying examination, which I will do within about a week. The next most important step after graduation and certification is to find employment.

Here is the crux! Where will I go?

I do not want to stay here! I have wanted to leave here for a very long time. This very day holds some significance. I didn't even realize it until later in the day, while checking my calendar for something else. Happy Cherynobl Day!

In my heart I want to go West. I long to find myself a progressive modestly sized cosmopolitan city that offers cultural opportunities, interesting cuisine, equally interesting people. I long for the ocean, and the mountain. I have sent my application to the hospital network in Eugene, but lacking experience I think this door is not open to me yet. I may have to wait a little longer.

Fate seems to be pulling me in a direction I don't quite desire, but that I might have to walk.

My father has been hospitalized for well over a month now. He is stable, but you can't say he is really recovering. He had a tumor in his intestines removed. He then suffered from an ulcer, and a pulmonary embolism. He has lost a lot of his strength and has been bed-ridden. He has been increasingly suffering from alzheimer symptoms, and those have only gotten worse while in the hospital because he has not been getting his medications for this. It is very likely he will never return home. He has not recovered from all the events stemming from the tumor, never mind if he'll have the stamina for cancer treatment. He is not taking his hospitalization well . . . and it is causing increasing stress for my mother. Mom is not very healthy herself! And she really should not live by herself.

I think I may be getting pulled "home". El Paso is just about the LAST place I want to go to, but I feel I may need to do this, for awhile.

There are several hospitals in El Paso. One has an opening for a Respiratory Therapist. I will be applying for the position. If this is the path I am to walk for a little while, the job will be made available to me. I cannot let my education go to waste. I need to begin working as soon as possible. I need to get the critical experience necessary that will open up the doors I want to go through, once my family duty is addressed.

I think I can practice my falconry there. I may live with my mother for awhile, but may get my own place because I long for my own privacy. However, I probably could set up my facilities at her house. Certainly, if there are not many red-tails in the area to trap next fall, a roadtrip out East will find lots of them. With a Texas license, I could drive wherever in Texas to find the bird I will need. If I live there, I can make a point to go and visit all those places I never did when I was down in the Southwest . . . the Big Bend of Texas, the Grand Canyon, and more of New Mexico. Also, being just a few hours from my friend Sharon, I could get a New Mexico out of state hunting license, and go visit her from time to time and fly birds with her.

If my path leads me into the desert, until the day comes that I can truly go to where my heart wants to be . . . I will make the best of it.

It is now about three weeks after Spring Break. I took these pictures while on Spring Break, but I've been so busy and overwhelmed since that time that I could not post them. The last three weeks have been the final class-time of my study program. We'll still have a few odd Fridays, but for the most part, the classroom portion is OVER! We finished this all off with a final in Neonatal and Pediatric Respiratory Care, and more importantly, a mock board, which we HAD to pass to graduate. The heat was on all of us, but yesterday we all passed it. YES, that big collective sigh you may have heard from Wisconsin . . . that was us!! Our last 5 weeks of clinicals gets going on Monday. Of those 5, one week is set aside for the State Convention, so that is essentially 'play-time'. Sure, we'll be in meetings a lot, but it will be at the Kalahari in the Dells. Real tough duty!!

Over Spring Break I got busy and took care of a pesky detail that has been troubling me . . . what to do with that HUGE birdcage in my storage shed. It's not that I don't want to keep it, as it is a very nice,large cage, but it is HUGE, and HEAVY!! I really don't see myself moving it when I do finally relocate to wherever it is that I'm going. At some future date I may collect it again . . . but for now it has gone on long-term loan to my bird buddy, Darla. My very good friend Rich came along on the adventure . . . and more importantly, brought his nice big Dodge diesel truck. The 8-foot cage, broken into parts, fit nice and handy in the back. We got that down and out into Darla's garage . . . and while there, had her show us around downtown Chicago for a couple days. It's one of those things I hadn't done, so it needed to be done!

We visited the Lincoln Park Zoo, and the arboretum there. I didn't take and won't post any pictures from the zoo. Nothing really spectacular there. I did take some pictures of orchids which are posted at the end of this entry for my friend Dan. We did a lot of walking around, and went to an old-time malt shop for lunch. I won't be posting those pictures either!! At the end of our first day we went to the top of the John Hancock building, took pictures and watched the sun set. There is an "open porch" at the top . . . really it's all screened in, but you are open to the wind. It's a good opportunity to see WHY Chicago is called the "Windy City". Yep, at that height, very windy! There was an audio tour, and you can look out over and hear all about the history of the city.

The next day we returned to downtown Chicago to go to the Field Museum, and catch some authentic Chicago deep-dish pizza. On our journey we drove around and around Millenium park where "the Bean" is. I don't know what hole I've been living in, but I had never heard of this art icon. Anyways, we didn't pay to park (which can get to be very expensive in downtown Chicago) in order to get our own pictures of the Bean, other than out the window as we drove around it. However, I did find and post a link below. So if you want to see a clear picture of it, click the link. It's stainless steel, and very reflective. Kindof neat!

The Bean

There are lots of things to do in downtown Chicago. We only had time to do a few of them. There is Navy Pier, if you want to go shopping. You have the Field Museum (which we did) and then the art museum, which I wish I had more time to go to. Then there is the Shedd Aquarium, also which we did not go to, but that's OK . . . fish are OK, but I'm not that enthusiastic. There is a big baseball park (*yawn*). The Field Museum was cool, and had a really nice collection of stuffed birds (and other animals too). Mostly, I was trying to avoid being in Darla's camera. Here I missed and was caught by Rich's camera.

The Field Museum has a really nice collection of Egyptian art. I took lots of pictures, of which only a small portion came out clear and sharp. They do have one of the MANY statues of Sekhmet, the Lioness-Headed Goddess, but a rather poor example. An exhibit a few years ago of art of Rameses the Great had a fabulously preserved statue. She has a sun disk on her head with ureas (cobras). The statue in the Field Museum has not passed through history as well preserved. If you click on her name I've linked to a good example of a well-preserved statue. Still, much of what was there was interesting to see.

The best part of the Field Museum is there are lots and lots of dinosaurs!! Well, dinosaur fossels. Here is a Velociraptor chasing down something else!

This is a close-up of one of their signature pieces they are highlighting right now. They call her "Sue" and she is a Tyranosaurus Rex. Previously they had the Brontosaurus, or is it Brachyosaur they call it now?? That has been moved outside. I can only imagine what it would be like to actually see one of these creatures for real, in flesh and blood. I was fascinated with dinosaurs when I was a kid. They are still interesting now!

This is overlooking the inner "courtyard" of the Field Museum. You can easily spend all day here! It was a good setup to bring the world to people, prior to all the fabulous documentaries we have on television now. The stuffed collection of animals is all well and good, but now you can see live footage, which I think is so much more educational . . . other than getting a perspective of the size of some of these creatures. I enjoyed some of the history exhibits, but there just was not enough time to see all of it.