In Memoriam

I've noticed a certain pattern: the nicer the weekend off, the worse Monday is going to be. Monday's arrival to work was to hear the terrible tales of the wild weekend, complete with *multiple* downed instruments, middle-of-the-night desperate trips across town to open the closed West campus lab to run tests, hospital security and supervisors' doing all they could to make this more difficult, and: the news of sudden death that day of a second shifter.

I don't think there were too many people in the lab this woman didn't drive insane at one point or another. Her incompetence and repetitive apologies would drive you to beat your head against the wall. And all the nights I'd wander back into Microbiology to find her working extra hours *off* the clock because she felt she had finish everything up no matter how long it took. After I while I just got used to it, but kept a nervous eye on that area. Just in case.

She had 'episodes' and seizures. One night she was completely incoherent, like she was drunk off her ass. I couldn't get her to sit down before she fell down, let alone go down to ER to get looked at. Pissed me right off. Finally another lab employee walked her downstairs to wait for her husband to pick her up. She wasn't supposed to be driving because of all these neurological problems, but did anyway. At least twice we got calls from her husband at some crazy hour wondering where she was because she hadn't made it home yet. One of these times she did crash her car and lay there trapped for hours until someone found her. The stories her second shift coworkers had to tell about her nuttiness and self-destructive behaviors could probably fill a book.

So I guess her full-time staff of guardian angels got the word Monday that their gig was up, and she was coming home.

This woman wasn't even out of her 40's yet. She had a new granddaughter. Her confidence and competence were improving by the week since she accepted a full time position last summer.

She also smoked incessantly; had numerous health and nervous problems; ate junk, or not at all; and took (or not) medications with apparent complete disregard for dosing or correct instructions.

So it's not surprising to find comfort in that shiny nugget of logic: of course, someone like that is going to die young.

The shock and sadness is not lessened by any means. There's still a large, strange void where she ought to be. And the guilt for all the times I was short with her, impatient with her or used four-letter words every time I had to correct some problem she'd left behind.

There's a phrase in the Bible that describes all the people you would visit, clothe, feed, comfort, take care of: The least of these. This woman was definitely among 'the least of these'. Almost to the point of not quite belonging in this world. It was just too much for her to cope with most of the time.

But she tried. She tried so hard.

Not even two months ago, she had brought in pictures of her daughter's new baby. While I was working I happened to catch a glimpse of her looking at one of them. The look of rapt adoration on her face was something I wonder now might have been a murky glimpse of something beyond this world. The peace and joy of angels.