Christopher A. Wheeler

OK, besides all the commercials that constantly bombard us, here is what I hate about primary season. This year you have all these GOP candidates (and other years also Democrats) speaking negatively about their opponents. “Romney isn’t a true conservative” or “Paul is an anti-Semite” or whatever. What happens when somebody wins the nomination? If this former candidate now endorses the nominee, how credible is that? “Oh back last week I said Romney wasn’t conservative enough, but now I support him as our party’s candidate”. Jussayin.

The NCLEX-RN exam, as I have told many people, is the only exam that made me cry before, during (yes, DURING), and after taking it. I took and passed the boards a year ago today, and I’m using this anniversary to reflect upon my experiences over the past year and being a nurse in general.

I feel very grateful that I was able to finish nursing school and pass this exam. There isn’t a single day that has gone by in the last year that I haven’t thanked God for where I am now, and for the people who have been in my life to allow everything to fall into their places the way they did. My job is challenging, but at the end of the day, despite  the occasional complaining, I have a feeling of satisfaction. I feel like I’m doing something real and important and useful in my life and in the lives of others. These feelings exist even when it seems the patients aren’t receptive to change; at least I can say I tried.

I am grateful to have a real job career. I have a job where I started accruing paid leave from my very first day. Paid leave! I have health insurance. I have a 401(k). I make significantly more than the minimum wage (or less, think cab driving days) that I’d been accustomed to over the past dozen+ years. These were foreign concepts to me before.

I hear complaints that nurses don’t make enough. Yes, we work hard, and maybe should make more, but I’ve made twice as much this year as I have any other year in my life. Its hard for me to argue that I am not compensated fairly. Complaining would make me an ingrate.

I have made a number of very good friends both in nursing school and since landing this sweet job. One such friend is Rhonda (the name has been changed to protect the guilty), who asked for a shout-out while I was writing this. Of course I’ve made friends in any job I’ve ever had but for some reason I’ve always felt that the connections I’ve made with my peers in nursing have been on a deeper level than other jobs I’ve had. I remember talking with my friend Josh about this a few years ago while I was still in school. I honestly can’t put into words the exact feeling. Perhaps its has something to do with the fact that oftentimes we are dealing with potentially life-or-death situations, as opposed to trying to make sure our customers are getting their soft shell taco supremes in sixty seconds or less, that bonds us in a different way. Or perhaps this is something I’ve created in my head and is merely a figment of my imagination.

I hope I can remain healthy enough (both physically and mentally) to do what I’m doing for a long time. Being a nurse is awesome, really awesome.

Here we are, September 11, 2011, 10 years after our nation suffered the most devastating attack of terrorism in our nation’s history. I lay here in bed, after having worked last evening and being due back at work in a few short hours, and while I am mentally and physically exhausted, I cannot sleep. My mind is filled with racing thoughts, remembering what happened on that Tuesday morning. I’m sure almost every single one of us remembers what happened that day in great detail. Who could forget? I remember the events of that morning quite well.

At the time I was living in Muscatine. I was the manager of the local movie theatre and we had a meeting in Des Moines that day for all the managers. My plan was to leave several hours earlier than I needed to so I had time to stop at the casino in Tama and win some money. As I was getting ready I got a call from one of my employees, Junior, asking if I had heard the news about some plane crashing into some building in New York. I turned on the news and watched. There was a lot of info that we just didn’t know at that point, and there was a lot of speculation regarding what had just happened. Until the second plane hit. At that moment I realized, nay, we all realized, the nature of what had occurred. We were under attack. WE WERE UNDER ATTACK. This was no accident. This was a deliberate act perpetrated by men who wished to hurt us, to damage our collective psyche.

And damage us they did, at least for a while. Personally, I cannot see an airplane up close and not immediately be overcome with anxiety. As time passes the feelings gradually become less intense, but the effects still linger with me. For quite a while after the attacks I worried about the possibilities of more horrors happening. I know I’m not the only one. Just last evening at work a coworker mentioned how she felt nervous that something might happen today, the anniversary of the attacks. And we live in Iowa. I know nothing will happen to us in Iowa.

Imagine how those who experienced person loss that day feel today. Those who lost family members or friends that day. Or those who were there and survived. I feel for those individuals, who have suffered so much because of the events of that day.

I feel grateful that the person behind this, Osama bin Laden, has been eliminated. Yet I did not celebrate his death. How tragic that many rejoiced upon hearing the news of his demise. However, symbolic as it may be, bin Laden’s death  has provided some amount of closure to a painful situation. Yes, I just said bin Laden’s death was symbolic, and I’m sure you’ll agree, for who among us truly feels as if the threat against America has vanished? But like I said, I’m glad he is gone. The United States made a promise to find him, as a matter of justice, to the thousands of people who perished on 9/11, and find him we did.

Every year on the anniversary of the attacks we hear the familiar refrains, something along the likes of “Never Forget” or “Always Remember”. I am positive on this milestone anniversary, 10 years, we’ll hear more of it. And I hope that it is something that we mean, and not just something to say to sound as if we care, for this is one of the most significant events to happen in the lifetimes of people my age. We must never forget what happened and honor those who died.

Well I’m going through my blog and I’m trying to categorize all my uncategorized posts, and I’m wondering why I’m wasting my time doing this.

I’m generally not a fan of revising history, but as I look through my blog here at some of the things I’ve written over the years I find it necessary to do just that. Some things are private and at one point in my life didn’t mind sharing with everyone, but now because of my job or my family situation I don’t feel they are appropriate to be made public. Others have to do with my marriage to Kate, and although we get along and I wish her nothing but the best, didn’t feel that it was appropriate to still have posted online.

So I’ve had a few people ask “How did you and Velvet meet?” and “Is Velvet her real name or her stripper name?”. To answer the 2nd question, the answer is “both” because that is in fact the name on her birth certificate, and what I call her when she is stripping for me (just kidding… or am I?). So anyways, here is the story of how we met…

In early May I posted a platonic “friends only” (we see how well that worked out) personal ad on Craigslist. I don’t remember the exact text of the ad but it went something like this:

I’m a 33 year old divorced father of two children fairly new to the Cedar Rapids area. I don’t know too many people in town, not ready for a relationship because I just got out of one, but I am looking for some new text buddies to keep me company…

I dunno, something like that. Anyways, a few weeks later I got a text… “You still looking for friends?” “Of course, who couldn’t use more friends!” We started texting back and forth all day that day. She seemed really cool, and I decided to ask if she wanted to hang out that night, just as friends, since we both had the evening free. She accepted the invitation and we made plans to meet at Carlos O’Kelly’s for dinner.

I got there early and waited for her. She walked in and immediately I was attracted to her. It wasn’t what I was expecting or hoping for, I honestly thought I was going in to it as friends. Yet, there was something about her that I found amazing. She was so sweet, and fun, and easy to talk to…

We finished dinner and decided to go back to my place and just hang out and watch some movies or something. We drove over to the Walgreens on 16th Ave to rent a movie from Redbox. However, it was pouring crazy hard rain out there so we decided to sit in the car and chat and wait for the rain to break. So we waited. And chatted. And then I leaned in to kiss her. And we kissed. And waited. And chatted. And kissed. And waited. And then we decided we were tired of waiting so we just went back to my place and watched something on Netflix. I think probably some stand up comedian like Brian Regan or some such guy.

We spent most of the weekend together and had a really good time. The next day she was my date to Paul and Sarah Switalski’s wedding and reception. We got to have a nice fancy dinner! And drinks! And she got to see my karaoke skillz (I’ve got MAD skillz). Oh yeah, also that day, we survived the rapture together. Thank goodness, I was worried

So there is the story. Maybe its a good one, maybe not so much. From my perspective, it is a fantastic story. Speaking of perspective, this is the story as I remember it happening. I invite my lovely Velvet to make any corrections or add any details she thinks I may have missed. After all, she is the boss

So 2010 has been quite a year for me. I’ve been really busy with work and studying and such and haven’t done a very good job of keeping up on anything. Lots of stuff happened in 2010, and now it’s over. I’m looking forward to having a great year in 2011.

So a few weeks ago when I was in the hospital and we were in the dining room, a U2 song came on the radio. Of course, I was excited and requested the volume be turned up slightly so we could hear it better. One of the other patients asked me if I was a U2 fan. “Of course”, I replied, “they’re only the greatest band ever.” He did not agree with my assessment.

So I started thinking, is U2 really the greatest band ever? I have a habit of choosing whatever is my favorite as the “best ever”. Part of it may come from a person I know, Dan. I remember things like “Boetje’s mustard is the best mustard in the world!” or “Harris Pizza is the best pizza in the world!” and how could you argue with that? They truly are the best mustard and pizza, respectively, in the world. So I think this is partly where my habit comes from. U2 is the greatest band in the history of music. 24 is the greatest show in the history of television. Blah blah blah…

Anyways, like I mentioned, this got me thinking. What is the true measure of greatness? Is it popularity? Does having the most “fans” make you great? Obviously something must be great about your music or art or whatnot to get so many people to like you. The problem with this is, most times in order to have such a broad fan base, one must market to the lowest common denominator. Can something great come out of something that appeals to the masses? Or does being great require something deeper? Another problem with popularity is, one can name too many examples of popular, without being great. Are the Jonas Brothers or Spice Girls great? One would think not.

Is it longevity? U2 has been around forever, like 30 years. Certainly they wouldn’t still be one of the most popular bands in the world still after all this time if there wasn’t some measure of greatness. I think longevity might be a marker for this. Another band that has been around forever, even longer in fact, is The Rolling Stones. They’ve been together for 47 years! Personally, I don’t like The Rolling Stones, but would I have any sort of argument against the greatness of a band that has been around for nearly a half century? In fact, I don’t think I could mount any sort of argument against any band that has been around forever. I mean, seriously, certainly longevity has to count for something right?

What about the ability of the art or song to touch many different people on many different levels, depending on what stage of their life they are at? I will again use U2 as an example, only because I am most familiar with them. I have a book at home about the lyrics of U2′s music and how, in the author’s opinion, their lyrics have deeper meanings to Christians than non-Christians. Yet, to non-Christians, the music still conveys meaning, and not just a bunch of random, non-sensical phrases strung together (think Summertime Girls by LFO). Is this the measure of greatness?

Or am I asking a ridiculous question, in that greatness can’t really be defined?

So sometime Monday I started experiencing this back pain. It’s not uncommon for me to have this pain; its been recurring off and on for the past several years. Sometimes I go a month or so between spells, other times it may be 4 months or more. Sometimes it just lasts for a day, other times for a week. There seems to be no rhyme or reason as to when I am afflicted with this. I can never figure out what causes it to go away either. All I know is that it hurts like hell. A sharp pain. It doesn’t feel like a regular sore back like when you lift something wrong. It feels like a pinched nerve, or at least what I imagine what a pinched nerve would feel like.

Normally the pain isn’t too bad, I can manage quite well with just ibuprofen or tylenol. However, Tuesday morning the pain was so bad I couldn’t get out of bed. So Tuesday afternoon I went to the doctor. The doctor prescribed cyclobenzaprine, which is a muscle relaxer. The thinking is, my muscles aren’t… relaxed? Anyways, I’ve been taking these pills pretty religiously for the past few days. It doesn’t really help the pain go away, but what I have noticed, is that it makes me REALLY sleepy! Basically, other than eating, drinking, and going to the bathroom, I slept all the way from Tuesday night until Friday morning. A very long sleep. However, the pain is not going away. In fact, if anything, it is getting worse.  I don’t really know what to do about it. I’ve been taking the muscle relaxers and alternating ibuprofen/tylenol. Nothing seems to help except to sleep. But I can’t just sleep the rest of the weekend, or the rest of my life. I have too many important things to do, I think.

Anyways, why am I up at 4:30 in the morning? Well, I just got off the phone with a friend a little bit ago. I was going to write about that, but I want to think it over first, so more on that later.

One time I almost drowned in the wave pool at Wacky Waters. Some people are sympathetic when they first hear that. And then they hear the rest of the story. I wasn’t a little kid, as they imagined, and in fact was about 23 years old. Also, I was in the 2-ft section of the pool. As I was trying to leave the pool, a big wave hit me in the back and knocked me down. I smashed my face on the bottom of the pool. Everytime I tried getting back up, another wave would come and knock me down again. I was seriously underwater for over a minute, and I was choking on water and I kept thinking about how ridiculous the news would be that night: “Adult dies in 2 foot section of pool, full story at 11″. Finally I was able to get out of the pool and I lay there and was coughing up water and blood was running down my face. The lifeguard ran over and said he thought I was just playing around and that’s why he didn’t come help me. Now when people hear this story they laugh at me.