gauze moments

Sometimes being a colleague means helping someone figure out an administrative problem, or making hallway chit-chat about teaching issues. But sometimes—on very rare occasions—you might have to stick your hand in a colleague’s mouth. All the way. That’s more or less the thought that crossed my mind last Thursday when helping a friend and colleague with some gauze-replacement following a rather brutal wisdom tooth teeth extraction. Brutal is actually my interpretation: the nurse told me they had to “saw more bone” than usual, and that there was a lot more blood than usual. [If the patient is reading this, I elected not to tell you the blood and bone bit until well past the moment when the Vicodin wore off. You did great, by the way. A total trooper.]

My point to everyone else is that sometimes gauze moments arise, and we just need to do these things.

Though some really just don’t. Do them. This I learned my first year as an assistant professor when I flipped my mountain bike, landing knee-first on a pointy rock, and spent late June and the better part of July with my knee immobilized so that its new hole could drain, be sewn, and then heal. I was prescribed vicodin then, and it made me vomit on the floor beside my bed in the middle of the night. I wasn’t mobile enough to make it to the bathroom. That, my friends, is what they call a low point.

Aside from my biking partner, who helped me fashion a tourniquet out of my bandana and sat with me at the ER, I had four friends (one colleague in my department, two cross-campus friends--hi, MP!--, and another friend) who helped a ton, bringing me food and videos and walking Jada, who was terrified of me on crutches and so pretty much abandoned me for about three weeks. And of course E, upon hearing about the vicodin incident, got in her car and drove 10.5 hours to come help. She also painted my toenails a nice summery blue. But before she got there I needed something specific. What I needed was fresh gauze, because the ER nurse told me I’d need to change my gauze after a shower, and I had not had a shower in a few days and was crutching around in disgusting barf clothes.

Not knowing who to call, and not knowing nearly as many people as I do now, I called a colleague’s house at 10 in the morning. The person was in the middle of something I guess (my guess is writing), and so asked if it could wait until 5 pm. It couldn’t. But I got off the phone quickly, not to try the next person on my list, but to cry. And cry. It wasn’t so much that the colleague couldn’t help (I understood that to a degree), but that I needed help. And also that I was drugged and had puke on me and needed a goddamn shower. I called one of the cross-campus friends who was packing for a month-long trip to the field in Africa, and she arrived in under 15 minutes, my gauze angel.

And so I didn’t not think of her when last week I reached for a fresh batch of gauze, rolled it up tight, told my vicodined-up colleague to lean back, and then said “OK, I’m just going to stick my hand in your mouth now.”

Comments

[Flavia]

Yeah. Some people just have more common--or is it so common?--humanity in them than others.

As someone who lives alone, I spend an inordinate amount of time thinking about whom I could call in the case of various crises. The colleagues I'm pretty sure would help me out no matter the time of night or the distance aren't necessarily the ones I'm friendliest with or like the most--but they're Good People in a way I'm not sure some of the others are.

(I loved both of these stories, btw.)

[dhawhee]

Oh yes, it's hard to tell, Flavia. I do worry about new colleagues particularly. Perhaps those new to campus--especially the single ones, like I was, and like you are--should not only be assigned mentors but gauze mates! Perhaps gauze mates could also help with in-town orientation.

[bonnie kyburz]

lovely :)

[midmodern scholar]

And don't forget when you and JM rushed over to help me when my car wasn't working and my greyhound fell down the stairs and gashed her head open. That should count as a gauze moment. It didn't involve Vicodin, but it did involve a tag team cell phone effort, a bike, and a car. That was awesome.

[dhawhee]

Thanks, Bonnie. And midmodern scholar! How about when you and C ran out for butterfly bandaids and antibiotic for the gash Jada sustained from a scrum SHE started with the greyhound. Oh, and one time I called a senior colleague to say I couldn't make it to his gathering. My excuse? I was in the oncology unit with an out-of-town friend's dog. My friend had asked me to make the call on the dog's treatment. An odd excuse to be sure, but my colleague totally understood.

Dog gauze. Crucial.

[MP]

What a nice reminder! You are so wonderful, and always the kind of friend/colleague that would rush out for "gauze". You did the same for me several times. Remember when you fetched me, also covered in barf, from the airport? and you even pretended not to smell it..

Reminds me of that "pay it forward" movie. I love that concept, though I'm not always good at it.

Not many of those types around here in Bizerkeley though. I must say that I have never even gotten thank-yous from some of the more recent "gauze" recipients, needless to say a years-later kudos! How I miss you and the good old mid-west.

[dhawhee]

ok, MP now I need more gauze, or tissues. I had forgotten about the trip from the airport. Whatev, that's like what, a 7-minute drive? :)

[Jordynn]

Yeah, it is definitely a milestone when you realize you have (or don't have) someone to help with these things. I had to ask someone to help with transportation to and from a rather embarrassing kind of routine screen procedure this year. Last year(my first year on the job) before I had to take myself to and from the emergency room one Sunday when I needed antibiotics for another embarrassing kind of reason. I remember feeling pretty sorry for myself on that occasion.

[dhawhee]

Hi Jordynn! Aw. Yah, being a new assistant professor can be pretty lonely, esp. when one needs--really needs--this sort of help.