Lapping the main

Yes that's right... I'm back rediscovering my 'roots' in good ole Bushville.

In order to:
a) escape the memories of last week and S
b) spend some time with my dad whilst I can
c) support mum
d) catch up with my gandparents

I decided to make the trek over the Blue Mountains to my home town out in the sticks. To be honest, it's not that exciting. All people do here is work, shoot things, drink beer and lap.

Now 'lapping the main' is a peculiar phenomenon to country towns. Devoid of such fun things as nightclubs or restaurants (other than the obligatory Chinese takeaway*) they have construed a novel pastime that entails them acquiring a standard white ute with bullbar and spotlight and gun rack and occasional live-dog-on-back and revving their aforementioned vehicle up and down the main street and leering at girls who are brave/stupid enough to be walking outside at that time of the evening (ie after 6pm)

* I use the term 'Chinese Takeaway' very loosely as I am aware of how the cuisine in such places is of no way related at all to true Chinese cuisine and is in fact a lame attempt to feed Westerners lots of MSG under the guise of being 'multicultural', but never let it be said that I don't actually enjoy the sweet-&-sour-insert-name-of-any-meat

However eventually the road comes to an end and faced with the prospect of having to turn off into another street, the local council so thoughtfully constructed two (that's right the only ones in town!) roundabouts, so that perplexed drivers may now turn around at the end of their journey and (you guessed it!) do it all again!

And people wonder why there's NO doctors in the bush. Ha!

But on a more serious note, it's kinda great to be home and also heartbreaking at the same time. Dad's already lost his 3 object recall ability (for those of you familiar with the MMSE) and his dementia seems to be progressing fairly steadily. I really wonder if it'll err on the shorter side than the longer.

Which raises a more uncomfortable question... is it better if it progresses quickly rather than drags on? Like on one hand, we love him heaps, wanna spend time with him and don't wanna let him go because he's so young. But at the same time, a long protracted illness will only mean suffering for everyone involved and be a long hard battle (esp for those who will be living with him daily).

Today he officially found out he's lost his job. We kinda knew it was coming, but he doesn't accept or understand it. It was really hard to watch him get hostile and angry about his termination, knowing that he has no insight into what's going on. Mum just looks on with a sorrow I've never seen before.

I see less and less of the man I once knew. I see disease taking him away from me, inch by inch. I see a man once full of life and love now reduced to a diagnosis.

The battle's only just begun.

Fallout

So what happened?

Well to sum up, we spent the last few days enjoying the beautiful city of Sydney and eating some very exotic cuisine (never tried kangaroo till last week!) and then said a very emotional farewell at the airport on Sunday morning. As she left the country I felt a part of me had left with her...

But life goes on. Despite my desires for the world to stop and lament with me, the sun still rose, the drone of everyday activities kept humming and the daily mundane numbed the recent scars.

Thanks to all for the enouraging blog comments! And to those of you who have talked with me, I do appreciate it... talking through things helps get them out of my system.

So where to from here?

Well according to the SMH's well researched blog (http://blogs.smh.com.au/samandthecity/archives/2006/07/would_you_reloc.html), LDRs (long distance relationships) are the 'in' thing.

But yeah, S and I will keep in contact as friends... and who knows, one day I may end up in her homeland again? But I cannot give her the expectation that it will happen. Because it most likely will not.

And so I'll dedicate this last song to her...
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AJR7SJuT-OI&search=sun%20yanzi

Translation: "Tears turned into a Poem"

I've already turned my wounds into roses
My tears have already turned into rain and come again.
I've already stored up our conversations eternally
I can't remember if the sky is black or grey

When we break up, who gets hurt the most? Who makes it beautiful?
I've written my tears into a poem and now it's okay. Don't you remember?
The words don't make people drunk, they get drunk of their own accord;
Because the memories are so beautiful.

I've already turned insult into compliment
For you thought you were inferior; you thought you were not good enough so you said goodbye?
I've already turned the silence into sorry
I have no way to return, I can only face this with silence.

Zai jian MC...

Sometimes love just aint enough...

18 months ago in country far from here...

"On Tuesday night we were taken out for dinner by one of the nurses S. S works with the mountain health teams and visits the mental health patients (especially schizophrenics) to deliver their medications. She really cares a lot about her patients and even bought all 70+ of them Christmas presents (out of her own pocket). She is also very blunt and frank with people (which is extremely rare in Taiwan because of people wanting to preserve 'face') which meant that we all get on really well with her... during the course of the evening, S told us about herself and her family and she has been through some very bad experiences and has had to face some awful things in her life. She told us that she is looking for 'answers' to the questions in life and so we were able to share with her what we believed about Jesus and she wants us to give her a Bible in English so she can read it. She even says she feels like becoming a nun in order to escape for a while and find some meaning/answers in life. As we talked she even told us about how she has had to forgive certain people in her life and the way she talked sounded like the way that Christian's talk. She is so close to the truth and it's really sad that we have to leave next week, because there is much more we could have said. We are going to invite her over for dinner next week before we leave and I would ask you to pray for her. I think God is working in her life and I pray that she will soon come to know Jesus."

It would be a year before we met each other face to face again. In between we emailed, we phoned and we used the ever-popular MSN to keep involved in each other's lives.

12 months later I went back to spend a week with her and to see the sights. Since then she had become a Christian, moved to another city and I had just finished my final med school exams.
We had some in depth discussions about love, life and God and parted sadly with a deeper friendship.

In the past 6 months since then, S and I have been regularly emailing each other about all matters pertaining to life. It so happened that her holidays fell at exactly the same time as mine and so with a bit of planning she arrived at Sydney International Airport last week with a beaming smile on her face and so begins this story.

When I first met S 18 months ago, her first words to me were:

"I hate doctors!"

And thus began a truly unique friendship.

You see, very rarely do a find someone who is willing to be 100% open and honest with me... we all like to hide behind our defence mechanisms and not allow the 'other' person into our lives. It's the way we learn to protect our fragile self-esteem from being trampled upon by the ruthless world.

But not S. She openly shared her life with me and told me what she thought on all sorts of topics. And I soon warmed to her and told her about my life and hopes and dreams. And so this week we finally sat down at my favourite bubble tea dining spot to talk about 'us'.

When I first met her, she wasn't a Christian and so not on my list of potential girls to consider asking out. However God works in mysterious ways and soon my only objection to this girl disappeared. It seemed to easy.

We talked about my plans/goals for the future and what hers were. We talked about our feelings for each other. We talked about the possiblities. We both said we would think about it.

So over the last few days I have been sleeping less and worrying/stressing/praying/ranting more than usual.

On the one hand I have this gorgeous girl who I like (and who likes me back!!). She's funny, honest, has similar goals in life and I think is quite attractive.

On the other hand, she lives in another country (although one I have been considering as a potential place to live in future years), speaks a different language and is 5 years older than me.

One part of me says "J, go for it! She'd be great for you and any differences can be worked through" whilst another part of me says "J what are you doing? Even if she does like you and vice versa, she speaks a different language. No matter how much you try, you'll never be able to communicate with her the way you want to."

What to do? What to do?

Well last night I told S that although I'm crazy about her and care very deeply for her (research girl and pharm chick are but trivial jokes at work to keep me from going insane), we cannot be together.

Today's society would tell you that if you're 'in love' then you should stuff the realities of life and make it work. But sometimes love just aint enough.

Sometimes despite the best of intentions, life's obstacles are too insurmountable. Just because I can, doesn't mean I should.

To be honest I feel so awful inside right now. I've deeply hurt a girl whose only crime was to actually care about me. I've thrown away a chance at getting to know a potentially amazing girlfriend.

Growing up I would despise men who did things like this to girls. I alwasy promised myself I'd try my hardest to not hurt a girl. And until now I've been content to cop my share of the pain and tried not to deal out any myself. But today I've failed my own standards.

Relationships in this world are frustrated and frustrating. We hurt people and get hurt in the process.

I need a 'physician' for this 'sickness'...

* Yes this is Dr J of KEC fame.
** Research girl alas is not Asian in extraction and therefore didn't really stand a chance because I have what my friends would like to call Yellow Fever or AF (Asian fetish) because I am an Egg (white on outside yellow on inside) and find oriental girls far more likeable than their caucasian counterparts.

Universal Consult Request Form

Dear Registrar-on-call-for-consults-today,

You may not know who I am, but I unfortunately kow who you are. I am the intern for Dr A who has requested that your boss, Dr B come and 'offer their opinion' and 'assist with management'.

I know that as a registrar you get many stupid phone calls a day from interns such as myself asking you to drag your sorry bottom up one level (there are lifts if you're that unfit) to see our patients. I know that we have not investigated our patients as well as you would like us to have. That, my dear doctor, is why we are asking your assitance. If we KNEW what to do, we would have done it already.

I realise that having me page you is as annoying as when I get paged by stupid nurses asking me to chart a 'bottle of whiskey" on my overtime shifts. I realise that you probably have more important things to do with your life. However it's a two way street; just as you direct your intern to get us to see your patients, likewise you must come see ours.

Please try to remember as I fumble through my history that I am not psychcic and cannot remember every little detail of the patient's social situation. Please remember that it was my registrar or consultant who asked for the consult, not me. If I had my way, I'd never bother you and sort out all my patient's problems with a good old placebo, but unfortunately my bosses think otherwise at the moment and have not been convinced of this approach.

Please do not try to patronise me over the phone by implying (or just outright stating) that this consult is of questionable quality. I am quite aware of this and can think if a hundred more pleasant things to do than convince you that this reallyIS important (number 87 on that list would be "Sell ice to Eskimos"). In fact, don't try to educate me over the phone as if that will reduce the number of consults I give you. Unless you call my boss directly and educate him, the consults are gonna keep coming. Therefore when I call again next week with the same easily solved problem, please do not tell me off. I know it's a stupid request and have told my boss what to do, but they somehow feel a consult written will hold up better in court if something goes wrong than taking at face value the orations of their intern.

Then if you finally do see my pateint, please bear in mind I don't have all day to order another $1000 of tests in order to placate your fury at being asked to see more people. I know this trick too well for it to be of any use on me. I use the same tactic on nurses when the hassle me about 'falls' ("full neuro obs half hourly thanks!)" Please have mercy on us poor interns I beseech you! You were once in our shoes, you know what it is like. It's not like we are uneduacted nurses requesting things that are completely unreasonable now are we?

Thankyou for taking the time out to listen to the humble cries of us junior medical staff.

Yours sincerely,

Dr J

PS All the best with your exams!
PSS Will you take over care of this patient?