AKA and the power of enjoying the journey and being yourself

no, aka, does not mean that i am going to be talking about the many nicknames and alter-egoes that i am also known as, but a great patient that i had in clinical today. she was a gem, an absolute gem. she has survived 4 bouts of cancer( including uterine, when she was twenty, resulting in no kids of her own.) her husband recently died, and she is living all alone in an apartment out in orem.

she left home when she was 13 married her childhood sweetheart, whom she met when she was only 9. her grandma would put cayenne pepper in her mouth if she would say slang words. so now, she uses fluffing for gas. she also says that her grandmother taught her that "horses sweat, men perspire and women glisten."

she lost her t-shirt upon arriving to the hospital and it said "don't give me any attitude, i have enough of my own." though she just had spunk not, attitude. she decided to wear her brightly colored polka-dotted pajamas instead of the hospital gowns and she has now had 4 sets of dentures.

she told me i was an angel and that she had just loved her stay in the hospital, the people were so great. she was n ice to everyone who walked in the door and told me she never stopped worrying about her nieces and nephews. anyone who was her friend was her family and she worried about them just the same.

she is going to write a book, she just got someone to help her. it is going to be called the disillusionment of life. she told me that "yeah, that sounds sad, but really its not, its just about my life." she is going to give me a signed copy as soon as it comes out.

she shared a poem with me that she wrote when she was just sixteen. here it is:

if only i could be happy and truly know my place
if only i could think clearly and tear through this human rat race
and if only i could understand that there will never be a perfect world, nor a perfect man
and if only i could see faults that others see in me
then maybe, just maybe this life i could endure
and maybe, just maybe life's opportunities would be waiting outside my door
but i guess these things couldn't be, because then i wouldn't be
just plain, adventurous, complicated me.


AKA loved life and realized a young age, that life isn;t going to be perfect, you aren't going to be perfect, the world isn;t going to be perfect, but hey, if we were perfect, life would be more boring. this lady enjoyed life's journey, just like president monson's talk. how refreshing.

i hope i can be just like her, when i grow up.

thankyou AKA,

love
Jen the student nurse, content with being complicated me!