Category Archives: rural doctor

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Mundane Monday #175: line up

Today’s Mundane Monday Challenge #175 is “line up”. (It’s already Monday in parts of the world!)

The parent merganser led the rested group down the rock and into the water. They swam by us in a line, bunching up when the parent realized we weren’t rocks.

Submissions to last week’s challenge water color:

KLAllendorfer: waters of many colors.

 

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Container dream

I dream I am at a concert in a park. Or some very big event. With my significant other. It is a beautiful day, the sun is shining, the grass is green, there are rolling hills and trees. People are arriving.

There is a gasp of horror. There is a large box, like the hold of a ship. We hurry to look in: there are three open containers down inside, tops removed. They are full of children. Smuggled? Immigrants? The containers are surrounded by water. My significant other and I drop our things and climb down the long hold ladder into the water, which is cold, filthy, and comes up to my thighs. I’ve kicked off my sandals. We are wading to the containers. An ICE agent in a black uniform, bullet proof vest, belt with tools and guns, and riot helmet, blocks me and says, “You have to be wearing shoes to help.” He is handing out plastic stretchers. He can’t see my feet. Yes, I know it’s dangerous and my feet could get cut, but this is probably sewage and dangerous even with shoes. We should really be in hazmat gear but the kids could be dying. I just look at him, silent, and he hands me a stretcher.

Enough people have come forward, into the water, that all the kids have been placed in one of the containers. None of them are dead. They are being lifted out one by one, to ambulances. Now the hold is surrounded by rubberneckers. I climb out and find my purse and camera and shoes. I am grateful no opportunist has stolen them. The ICE agents are telling people to back off and give them room to work. The news crews are there and a Washington State politician says, “This is Washington State, we will take care of these children, we will not see them separated and incarcerated, I will see that they are returned to their parents.” Good luck, I think, but at least there are tons of witnesses and cameras and news crews.

I need to find somewhere to scrub my legs down with soap and to find my significant other. It’s getting more crowded.

I wake up.

And what I notice is that the water did not stink and was not full of lumps of floating excrement. As I wake I hope that I won’t catch something horrible and die….usually my dreams have full sound, color and smells too. I wonder where the children were from, and why, and whether they had some sort of sanitation….

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merganser blessing

For the Ragtag Daily Prompt: bird.

This is the second time that I have been blessed by mergansers! I am sitting on the front rocks, which face east, with P in the early morning. Tea, journal and camera. Camera just in case. The family of mergansers swam around the point and we froze. They came up on the rocks, about 15 feet from us. I took pictures and otherwise we held very still. The family groomed themselves. One settled facing the woods and the others slowly settled, the parent bird still on the alert. After they rested enjoying the early sun, the parent led them back in the water and they swam along the rocks in front of us.

I read an article about productivity yesterday. It talked about taking breaks and more importantly breaks outdoors. A study of work after breaks showed that people thought an outdoor break was better than an indoor one for relaxation, but the measured effect was even greater than expected.

I can only be blessed by mergansers if I go outside and wait and am quiet. I feel so blessed.