"Hi, I'm stuck in the UP. Would you be able to work for me on Friday night? We are supposed to be getting a blizzard, and we didn't want to get stuck driving in that just to get to work."
"Yes!" I said. "You stay safe!"
So here I am on that night shift. For those who have followed my blog since the beginning in 2007, you know that I loved working nights. I worked 15 years as a night shift therapist here at Shoreline Medical Center. It was a tough decision to shift to day shift. And now I have been a day shift person for ten years now.
Still, occasionally I volunteer to work a night shift. It just so happens that this is my first night shift since before COVID.
And, interestingly, I walked through the ER and a nurse said to me, "Are you going home too tonight?"
"Oh no!" I said. "I volunteered to work the entire night. You are fortunate to have me."
"Yes we are!" he said. "So, if you do decide to go home, can you show me how to run a ventilator before you go."
"Sure, I will. But I have no plans on leaving"
"Good. I was just asking because we have no security tonight. And we have no phlebotomist." He pointed to all the phlebotmy stuff he had sitting on the table by the ER nurses station. "See, we have all this stuff ready to roll. Since we don't have a phlebotomist, we had to be trained to do this ourselves tonight. So, I just figured if you left, we could do our own ventilators too."
"Sure, I'll give you a quick lesson before I take my nap tonight."
We both laughed at that.
Security I can see not having. I mean, it's a blizzard outside tonight. And the doors are locked. But, no phlebotomist? I think this is a first.
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