The Enduring Wisdom of Chumbawamba
In general, I try not to discuss unpleasant events when the wounds are still fresh. Sometimes life is so incredibly busy that I really don’t have time to transition beyond my initial visceral reaction right away. While my unprocessed first impressions are sometimes quite amusing, the unfiltered version isn’t always kind and may not be ready for primetime. Today I’m going to make an exception and share an open, oozing gash.
For the last six months I have been working with a company to get set up to provide relief surgery coverage in Alaska. I got what we call in the south “a wild hair”. I’m not sure if this is a universal expression, but when I hear or read it, it’s always with a southern accent and usually with a description of exactly where that wild hair is. Over the years, I have taken part time and short term jobs in different places to broaden my experience and learn different ways of doing things. I love Alaska and it occurred to me that working there could be fun. I also have a passion for rural medicine. You know, like Doc Baker from Little House on the Prairie or Doc Hollywood (portrayed by Michael J. Fox). They took care of their communities and got paid with eggs or goats or whatever. Anyhow, back to Alaska. I was intrigued by the remoteness and I wondered how the delivery of health care worked under those conditions. I consulted my benevolent and all-knowing friend Google. Within seconds I had a few leads. I made cold contact and before long the process was under way.
I have an adventuresome spirit and I love trying new things. I also have a great deal of wanderlust. It’s not that I desire a purely nomadic existence as much as every once in a while, I feel a deep compulsion to get out and explore the world. My desire for a home-centered existence and for adventure and exploration may seem to be at odds, but I feel that they are actually complimentary. This is a part of my nature that I often have to suppress. Due to the realities of the demands of my profession and of having a large family, I can’t always just get up and go on a whim. When we can, we try to seek out new experiences. Going new places. Learning new things. Meeting new people. Reconnecting with family and old friends.
From the beginning, the process was not at all smooth. It was as if it was emerging from the uterus into the bright light of the world before my very eyes. It was painful and messy. Both the licensing and the credentialing were way more task and paperwork intensive than anything that I had experienced before. To compound things, I was very busy at work and was having to get things done the best that I could between rounding and clinic and trauma activations and consults and surgeries. Everyone that I was in contact with was very nice and helpful, but who I was supposed to be in contact with for which things was not clear. After much labor, we reached full effacement and were dilated to 10 cm. We pushed our way through it and delivered. The license was approved. Credentialing was completed. All of the boxes were checked. It should all be smooth sailing from here going forward.
Just over a week before I was supposed to hop on a plane for my first assignment, I got an email informing me about the small matter of the organization’s policy regarding the COVID vaccine. All workers entering the facility must be vaccinated 14 days prior. 100% compliance is required. No exceptions. No exemptions. That one seemed worthy of a phone call to me, but whatever. This was a problem beyond asking me to do something that is physically impossible with our current understanding of time dilation and the time space continuum. With my initial paperwork, I had submitted my religious exemption from my primary employer with my vaccination records. I was unaware of the company’s policy. Needless to say, I was less than thrilled.
Awkward silence… Yep. I’ve been outed. I’m one of those tin foil hat wearing, butt-naked moon howling, conspiracy theory endorsing lunatics. Or am I? People can and will think what they want to no matter what I say, but maybe we can discuss it at another time. Months of effort spending almost all of my spare time doing paperwork, jumping through hoops, rearranging my schedule, and patiently hoping everything would come together was instantly undone. Dammit.
Life is strange. Sometimes it’s all green lights and open doors. Abundance. Opportunity. Success. You truly feel like God’s good graces are shining directly down upon you and illuminating your path. Other times it’s like Rocky and Apollo Creed are taking turns doing speed bag drills on your scrotum. It’s as if you’re stumbling blindly in the darkness through an endless thorny thicket while trying to hold an ice pack on your pulverized genitals. I set out to accomplish something but didn’t succeed. I failed.
So, what are failures and what do they mean? Are they God’s way of telling us that we’re getting off track and need to recalibrate our compasses? Are they training us for a future opportunity? Are they tests of our persistence and commitment? Are they tests of our faith? Are they divine protection from some unperceived danger? Are they random events that are just a part of life? Sometimes they are signs that we need to make some adjustments and recompute. Or try harder. Sometimes they are signs that you should change your course and try something different. Failures are a call to action of some kind, not a call just to lay there and wallow in the circumstance.
It has taken years, but I’ve learned that I don’t always get to control the outcome, but I do get to control my reaction. That’s not to say that I don’t get pissed off. I just choose not to hold on to the anger. Instead, I strive to let it go and move past it. Sometimes the bullshit comes in a torrential downpour and I have to remind myself. Choosing to not let things get under my skin too easily and to not take things too personally is the equivalent to girding my loins with a titanium cup. Failure isn’t getting knocked down or missing the mark. Failure is not getting back up, recalculating and trying again.
I was disappointed. They were too. Everyone was very kind and apologetic. I didn’t throw a temper tantrum. I didn’t offer unsolicited commentary about what I thought about the policy. I didn’t treat anyone with disrespect. What good would it have done? It wouldn’t change anything and that’s not who I am. This door was closed, but on the positive side, now I have an Alaska license. One step closer to something new. Back to the drawing board.
Neva and I cancelled our tickets.
I had set aside a significant chunk of time to accommodate the coverage. When we finally got a few minutes to talk about it, the next step was obvious. We took the money from the cancelled flights and put it towards another trip. Something totally different. A new adventure. More to follow on that soon. Opportunity harvested from the fields of an apparent failure!
Life is good!
But it doesn’t seem like the story is going to end there. The lines of communication have remained open with my new friends in Alaska. I have been informed that the current situation has resulted in a review of the COVID policy at their highest corporate level. It seems that the winds of change are blowing. If things proceed on the current trajectory, everything should be in order in a few months. I should be able to start work during the next planned scheduled block this summer. Perhaps a greater good will come out of this after all.
What if we were to chose not to accept setbacks or not getting what we think that we want as failures but rather as unanticipated opportunities?
Can you guess where we’re going?
