Location: Lakeview Nursing and Rehabilitation Center
Date: Wednesday, May 22, 2013; 6:30-8:00 pm
I arrived at Lakeview Nursing to
find that Noel was already there and chatting with Jim, Larry and Jack. Knowing Jim’s liking of baseball and his
White Sox, I engaged him in conversation, especially since Red Sox were in
town. He was in good spirits since White
Sox had already taken the previous 2 games and was excited at the prospect of a
clean sweep. “Speak for yourself”, I replied.
Gwyn arrived soon after followed by Tash and two new volunteers, Nicky
and Hannah. Today we would be starting
work on the July/August issue of ‘As We
See It’.
Before we began, Larry announced
that he had some bad news. It seems that
he had printed 23 copies of previous month’s issue and had kept the stack under
a blanket in his room, away from all other trash. But before he could distribute them, they had
disappeared and he was told that they had been discarded with rest of the
trash. He was adamant that he had taken
every precaution and was angry at not only the facilities people, but at himself
for losing them. He took full
responsibility; though the rest of us tried to reassure him that it wasn’t his
fault. If Larry was angry, Gwyn was
absolutely livid. She said that she had
enough of the people managing the Lakeview facilities and that from now
on, she would deal with the printing and distribution issue and Larry would not
have to do anything. This was a
recurring problem at Lakeview and Gwyn said that the facility was very close to
losing this project through Chicago Cares, which would be an absolute
shame. She was clear that this was not a
poor reflection on Larry’s ability to do this, but rather she wanted to protect him
from such situations where he ends up feeling sorry for himself. Larry was feeling terrible, but Gwyn said she
would handle and he should not worry about a thing. Sensing her mood, Noel and I were looking at
each other and at Hannah who must have felt awkward at her first outing. I joked that it wasn’t always like this and
she had to come back!
 |
| Now lets all be kind to our Air Conditioner |
We could have vented about
Lakeview Nursing practices throughout the evening, but there was work to be
done. Gwyn split us into groups and
while Tash and Nicky took to their smart phones for research, Hannah was using
the computer and Larry and Jim were going to be working with them. Noel, Jack and I teamed up to do our favorite
activity, which was look through ‘Chase’s
Calendar Of Events’ to find some trivia for the months of July and
August. No sooner had we started when
Jack found that July was the ‘National
Bikini Month’. Well, not that we had
to restrict it to one month in a year, but July certainly seemed like the right
candidate. Jack was insisting that we
put that in and so Noel made a note of it.
Some of the other days that we selected were July 2nd which is ‘Wish Everyone Forgotten Birthday’s’; ‘Tell An Old Joke Day’, ‘Decorate A Wheelchair Day´- which Noel
insisted that Jack follow, and something called a 'Glorious Granny Day’! Plus
there was a ‘Be Kind To Air Conditioner
Day’, though I was unsure how we were supposed to do that. Did it mean we should not turn it on or that
we should not play with the dial? In any
case, if the temperature outside was hot, I would be using my AC to its fullest
extent, kindness or not!
 |
| Plan 9 From Outer Space |
Tash’s research led her to find
something about the first UFO sighting in July 1947, where someone spotted an
object moving at 1000 miles an hour. I
said that with current UFO technology, I would expect the object to move much
faster than that. Gwyn said that no
wonder there were Area 51 trials during that era. Whether it was true or not, this piece of
trivia would make the issue. Some of the
other things they searched for were local events in summer and there was an
abundance of street fairs and music festivals.
Gwyn said that this time the restaurant review would be on a place
serving root beer and since for the last issue she had bought a pizza from the
place reviewed, I told her that she should get the root beer for this one!
It was almost time to leave and Noel, Jack and I stopped at July 24th in the book; and since I would be missing
the next meeting, I told them to find more funny stuff. I chatted with Noel and Tash outside and we
talked about upcoming projects and how tonight had started roughly with Larry’s
story and Gwyn getting angry. But the
reason she was mad was not because Larry had misplaced the copies, but the
negligence exhibited by the facility.
All of us get together to put the issue together and have a great time
doing it. But there are several other
residents who are not on this committee, but actually look forward to reading
the copy. This may be one of the few
highlights of their month and that’s why Gwyn was upset. “I will
go door to door and deliver if I have to”, she had proclaimed. Knowing her, it’s probably going to
happen.
*All the client's names have been changed in order to respect their privacy
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