Thanksgiving

On this, the week before thanksgiving, there are so many things to reflect on to be thankful for. On thursday I was lucky enough to take part in an 8 hour work retreat at a fabulous country club. My hospital puts it on once a year and actually pays us for the day and we have a great motivational speaker that breaks down many problems that we occur on and off the job and we use teambuilding skills to accomplish and overcome barriers. This is my 8th one and it just gets better every year. At each table there are people from every walk of life at DePaul. You don't know when you sit down if you are next to a CEO or a housekeeper as everyone is dressed in their sunday best. Throughout the day we get switched up to make sure that we are out of our comfort zones and not just sitting with the people we know and work with. This year I finally found out the name of one of the cashiers in our cafeteria that I have seen many times over the last 11 years and never knew or bothered to ask her name. We thoroughly enjoyed each others' company during the day. Sometimes at work, as well as at home we get such tunnel vision to our own probems and it is difficult to see past them enough to recognize the problems of those around us. Especially in the hospital setting it is easy to get stuck with the labels. There is always been the "us" verses "them" mentality with the nurses and techs. And there is such diversity among the education levels of all staff in the hospitals. Doctors on one hand and dietary or housekeepers on the other. Many times you can see resentment from those on the bottom looking up and those on the top looking down. That is why I give my hospital credit for taking the money and time to make sure all employees are included in these retreat days to take a bread from the often thankless work we do and spend time getting to know the person behind the uniform or label.
The topic of this year's retreat was "Excellence" which is one of the 5 core values of our hospital system. We talked alot about what excellence means in terms of how it looks, how it feels, how it sounds. I guess since I haven't worked in 3 weeks since I keep getting called off, I turned more towards incorporating what I was learning into my own life at home since this has been my only employment lately. I think in terms of wife and mother my former self would probably describe it as June Clever looking and a picture perfect, neat little house. My current self though, not so much, or I am just that far from achieving excellence. Last weekend when Emily's friend's mom came to pick her up, Emily threw a stuffed animal up and it hit the ceiling fan and a dust bunny the size of Canada came flying down and landed on the floor. I thought I was going to die. She instantly said, Oh don't worry about it, if we went to my house and threw stuffed animals at the fan, the same thing probably would happen. We had a big laugh about it. No, my current self view excellence in a much different light. As far as how it looks, excellents can be seen in the smiles on my kids faces. I cannot ever get tired of taking their pictures up close to see how their eyes light up and those big toothy smiles. Excellence can be seen in simple ways like when Scott comes home and sees a homemade apple pie or I make special treats for him to take hunting. As far as how excellence sounds in my house. I would love to say their are no words of meanness or hatred but that would be far from the truth. After all God is determined to get me back for all the fights Jackie and I had growing up. Lord only knows I get a sharp tongue when I am angry or tired or frustrated. However, I think excellence is achieved not through perfection but the abilily to say we are sorry. For me excellence sounds like "I'm sorry" " I forgive you" and "I love you." And for those 3 phrases we are plentiful in this house. The third thing is how excellence feels. That can only be described in the warmth I get from a hug from any one in this house. I had a bad day last weekend when Scott was gone for 3 days and in my exhaustion and frustration I started crying in front of the kids. Lauren (4) told me to come up in her bed with her and she said "Mommy, I will hold you" and I laid my head on her chest. Last night after dinner I needed quiet and dark for 15 minutes after a long day with 2 sick kids and Emily and I went to my room closed the door and had the lights out. We were talking about Christmas and I asked her what made Christmas special to her. Of course inside I was saying " say Jesus, say Jesus, not presents," but fully prepared myself for the latter. Then she said " Mom, it is special because it is Jesus' birthday and it is also special because he doesn't want any presents so he lets santa give them to us." Yes, to me that is excellence!