The following happenings occurred on the night of 11/07/10.
It’s 4am and I’m finally sitting down during a very busy 12 hour shift (it started at 7pm). My head is spinning and I’m surprised I can still speak in coherent sentences. Both of my patients are new admissions and very sick. In addition to this, I have two new nurses in my module with me and I have been their resource for questions or concerns.
I want to sleep, but I still have charting to do. Labs will need to be drawn in an hour. A nurse from another module approaches me a smile on his face. “Hey, Barbara. Writer Barbara.”
“Hey Mohammed. What’s up?
“I need you to write something for me.”
Write? Like now? Sure, let me get my mighty pencil and sharpen my brain. I sigh.
“What do you need?”
“I need a thesis statement.
Riiiiight. A thesis statement. “You want a statement, right? Not a whole thesis . . .”
“All I want is a statement to help me get going. To work my project around.”
That can’t be too hard, right? “Well, I can’t promise how good it’ll be. My brain is toast right now.
“Oh, it’s not that hard. You’re a writer. You can do it.
If I wasn’t so tired. I would’ve been laughing about right then. I pull out a piece of physician progress notes and pick up my pen. “Okay, what is the statement about?"
“I need a thesis statement that makes an affirmative of bradycardia (slow heart rate) and tachycardia (fast heart rate) in a clinical setting.”
I didn’t drop my pen, but I almost did.
_______
It amazes me how many people think how easy it is to write. How writers just pull finished manuscripts from their minds and get them published. No rewriting or revising. No blood, sweat and tears.
Maybe it is the case for some writers, but not for me. Anyone have the key to the Magical Wizardry of Writing? Is there a Hogwarts school I missed?
BTW, I did write the statement. Then minutes later, I had to rush to a code.
Abbi :-)
