'tis the season

Hmm, the title sounds like it should be around Christmas.

Filipino summertime (school summer break of April & May) has just ended and a new school year is starting. At the same time, US schools are winding down their school year and our summer is upon us.

Summer = volunteer breaks.

Summer + volunteer breaks = influx of summer intern volunteers.

The opportunity to meet a whole lotta people from around the world (well this time mainly the US), it's exciting but also involves a lot of talking/teaching/sharing. And yes, overcoming my shyness. I don't particularly jump at the chance to meet a bunch of people I don't know. Actually, I kinda get nervous, dread it etc. But, in encountering Filipino women in prenatals and the birthroom it's different. I feel I have a purpose, we can small talk but I am striving to relate to them & help with their well-being & their baby.

So, if you're chuckling (that's understandable) because many people may think me as outgoing and a people person...But it's true I have these 'discomforts'. Once I know you and feel comfortable, well it's a little different.

On my mind- when life isn't rosy

Living in a foreign country or place changes you—or at least it should.

I know it changed me before and is changing me now. My farming community suburbia of Lancaster, PA has rudely shifted to the gray shades of cement, homes behinds walls/barbed with the bustle & noise of an almost sleepless city.

~(a few times) I came home from a clinic shift at 6:30 am to encounter a man sleeping on our apartment steps. It had rained quite hard during the night, and I'm sure the covered open garage-like structure of the apartment complex kept the rain off him. Did I wake him up, invite him in for a meal or wake him up and tell him to leave? Well, neither...I actually didn't quite know what to do, I turned the key quietly, glanced nervously at him, gently stepped over him and closed the door.~

Where I'm at...

You know I don't regret going to nursing school and then working as a nurse, I feel the life experiences I gained have made me a more well-rounded person. But sometimes being here I feel still trapped in the “nursing school” mind-set of learning when I'm on shift. The process of how we learned a technique first during a “lab” and then got the opportunity to show our skills on a day when we had 'clinical' (an 8-hour shift at the hospital where I was attending nursing school). Always feeling slightly excited, excessively nervous and wanting to remember accurately all the steps in a procedure.