Post Sixteen: Please Annunciate.

Happy transfer-weekend-anniversary blog!

The last time I was on call was the intensely sleep-deprived, mocha fuelled inspiration for Post One! Hoorah for blog times!........ (I just got a prank call. Spooky.)

I had a moment last night.

I was passenger in our transfer van at about 11PM, and I had been working non stop since 7.30Am. All I had eaten was a piece of peanut butter toast (may I just say that Black and Gold brand peanut butter is INCREDIBLE...don't let the hideously underwhelming exterior fool you into thinking it's substandard!). We had just taken a sweet little lady into our care and was on our way back to ops, me with her dentures in my lap, floating in a tupperware container filled with syrup of days old water/saliva juice, and I found myself acutely aware of an odd aural-emotional experience. I just made that up. Aural-Emotional. Yeah, I'm awesome.

The noise the teeth were making sloshing in that little bucket, combined with the drawling American accent of the Christian radio announcer who was delivering insane and totally fucking ludicrous teachings about the twilight series that my partner, the driver, was listening to... These sounds intermingling with the steady hum of the engine, the sporadic passing of traffic and the blow of the air conditioning inside the vehicle. Sure, I was tired and hungry and I still am, but I enjoyed the introspection in that moment.

I then thought of what my friends would be doing and how much I wanted to be out to play, but then thought of the dead lady I just helped and the one still alive that I had left behind weeping at the loss of her best friend of over 60 years. I had given her a hug, a flower and my number, and said goodbye. I then thought about what she would be doing in the next half hour. I had made the bed that the lady had died in, but there was still the former occupants body imprint in the mattress and the pillow was still warm. Would the friend notice the absence in the room, and would she have an introspective moment of her own?

Anyway, this partner of mine for the weekend, let's call him 'Kell'. Kell is quite typically what you'd imagine a funeral director to be like. He's over 55, his grey hair dyed jet black as to preserve his dignity. Very respectful, polite and empathetic, although mostly silent and ominous. When he walks, he moves with a hunched back and a slow, long gait. He is always lovely to talk to, that is, when he can hear you and when you in turn can hear him back. Kell is what Jerry Seinfeld would denounce a low talker. The lowest of low talkers. It drives me insane.

Kell: mmmfff broba smhenha brennha

Sarah: What's that Kell? I didn't quite catch that. Again.

Kell: after 3 minutes of pondering. Mmmmdhufb hishfsud. And then I said.... msuhfus ashufldf.

Sarah: oh. yeah. awesome.

What is really annoying is that I'm on call from Friday 4PM, all the way through until Sunday 4PM. Sometimes I'm out for a couple of hours across the whole weekend, others I'm out non-stop. The district I cover roughly encompasses from Caboolture to the border of Tanah Merah/ far south south side and out to Wynum and Wellington Point. Long drives to Redcliffe, then to Sunnybank, then back to Sandgate and beyond...this amount of low talking conversation can and does send me a little loopy.

Enough said. I need a nanna nap and long for a cuddle.

Peace. X