Wasp

"Many of us spend our whole lives running from feeling with the mistaken belief that you cannot bear the pain. But you have already borne the pain. What you have not done is feel all you are beyond the pain." ~ St. Bartholomew

I hate the holidays. I can't remember a time when I didn't. I think, for a while when I was very young, I imagined that there was some possibility for "happy" holidays, but I don't think the vision was well-developed or lasted very long.

When I was a child, the holiday season always meant at least a solid month of my dad enjoying his favorite sport even more regularly than usual. His favorite sport was hurting people. My birthday, the days leading up to Thanksgiving, from then until New Year's day, Easter--they were all really fine excuses to engage in torture. Sometimes it would last for an hour or so, sometimes a day, sometimes many days. He tortured my mom. He tortured me. He tortured us both. Sometimes he tortured my pets.

It's funny that I'd forgotten how easy it is to dissociate when I think back to those times. I feel blank. My brain has clicked to a different channel. The channel is called "Numb."

Just to add some extra zest to the whole holiday festivities, my dad upped the ante by killing himself nine days before my birthday, a bare month from Thanksgiving. That event has cast a lovely glow over the holidays, too.

The weather is changing. Right now, the sun is shining and I'm watching leaves being blown off the trees. Tomorrow, it will be cold and windy. While I get ready for Thanksgiving dinner, the past will be replaying itself in the back of my mind. No one will hearing it buzzing around in my brain like a wasp.

I hate the holidays.

Monday in Crazy Land

Owner was out of the office a couple of days last week while his office was being painted. He's back today and unhappy with the paint job. That's entirely predictable. Owner is one of the pickiest people I've ever known. Hemorrhoid Guy, as a joke, left the vacuum cleaner and some Pledge furniture polish right outside Owner's door. Owner's attention to detail is legendary. (Note to self: If you're going to call him that, try to learn how to spell the word, "hemorrhoid.")

Even though he hates the paint job, Owner sashayed over to my office a little while ago to ask me if I'd like to have my office painted. Not particularly. That means I'm going to have to move a bunch of stuff and probably end up working in Loathsome's office in the interim. After I move back in, I'll have to inhale paint fumes for a week or so until they dissipate. He asked me that question two weeks ago and I told him then I'm fine with the way things are. He's decided we're going to paint my office.

Then Owner made me follow him around, pointing out to me how much the entire place needs paint. Maybe we could paint everything else first and get to me sometime late in 2008. Or early 2009.

"What if someone were to come here?"

Well, people come here every day and we try to distract them from noticing by making them fill out employment forms and lecturing them about safety. No one yet has commented on that smudge above the copier.

I received an injury report a little while ago. Yes, I love getting those. One of our female employees was lifting a pallet on Friday and hurt her back. Did she report it then? No. Why? Because she didn't think it was a big deal. I called her foreman and told him to have her call me.

Hurt Girl called me in about half an hour. After some time-consuming pleasantries, I asked her if she'd seen a doctor.

"Well, no," she said, "I think I just strained it on Friday and I soaked it in the spa all weekend and it's not any better. I thought I'd report it just in case."

"Well, 'just in case' I need for you to see a doctor." Yes, I'm a bitch.

"I don't have a regular doctor. Can you recommend one?"

I told her I can't recommend one, but I can find her a doctor who's listed on our worker's comp HMO list. I gave her the name of someone we use regularly.

"But I live in (fill in name of small town about 20 miles from here). Can you find me a doctor there?"

The answer to that question is that I should be able to, by checking in on our insurance company's website. I typed in the URL and waited. This is the message I got:

Firefox has detected that the server is redirecting the request for this address in a way that will never complete. (Most of my requests in life have apparently been made in a way that will never complete. How appropriate.)

I tried it again. Same message. I told my injured employee I'd call her back. I called my insurance company and asked them to find a provider. I sat on hold for 20 minutes, then the woman got back on the line and said she was having problems. Really? I asked if she'd like to call me back.

I received an email 3 hours later. Let me repeat. Three hours. It's a good thing no one's bleeding to death. She couldn't get access to her own company's website so she sent me an excel spreadsheet with names of doctors. They were not organized by name, by specialty or by city. Yeah. This is mighty damn helpful.

I located some potential doctors and called the Hurt Girl back. I gave her a couple of names and told her to see them so she can start feeling better and I can complete my report. She called me back in 10 minutes to tell me that one of the doctors doesn't accept workers compensation patients (even though they're on my list) and the other didn't answer the phone.

I gave her some more names and now I'm waiting to hear that none of those doctors accept worker's comp, either. Our insurance company is a nationally known, highly reputable provider. They do an excellent job of taking Crazy Land's astronomically high monthly premiums. This whole HMO thing was supposed to be the way Insurance Company was going to keep a lid on those ever-increasing medical costs. I guess the best way to do that is to make sure no one ever sees a doctor.

Well, Hurt Girl hasn't called back. In exactly one hour and 25 minutes, my day here will be over. The time can not possibly pass quickly enough.