h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

Activities Part 2

I have to give props to the smokers for attendance. Four times a day, patients, visitors and residents are permitted to smoke. Four times a day the smokers assemble in the courtyard, regardless of the weather, and wait for the CNA who has smoking duty to show up with the lighter. Obviously, there can be no naked flames in the rooms, since there are so many concentrators and portable oxygen units around the facility, so the "smoker," as the CNA with the duty is called, joins the addicts in the courtyard and lights all the cigarettes. There isn't much talking. I've been out there a few times when it's smoking time, and it is only barely a social occasion. The task is to consume at least two cigarettes before end of session. Even those on oxygen still participate (although the bottles remain in the day room.

It's one of those places where one set of rules butts up (you should pardon the expression) against another set. Smoking may be bad for you, but abusing a patient by restricting their rights is worse and, at the moment, smoking still falls in the "rights" column.

Long-term residents are allowed off campus; patients on the skilled hall have to make special arrangements and get written permission from the DON (Director of Nursing), but all a resident has to do is sign out, just like a dorm. You don't have to wait for an organized activity. You can sign out, roll through the front door and right down the street to WalMart, if you have the courage to cross the street in front of the grills of those big American trucks.

Not many residents do; they prefer the safety of the courtyard and the day room.

When I was still on the skilled hall, one of the activities staff stopped by and persuaded me to come to the day room after lunch for a spa treatment. Activities are always announced over the P.A. system twice a day. The Bangladeshi staffer makes precise, formal announcements, but the other, the American one, has a verbal tic such that she always says, "Come on down!" Come on down for bingo at 2:30. Come on down for Mass at 10:30.

I went on down for the spa treatment, and was waved to a table, shortly after which the American brought me a basin of warm water and a towel. She instructed me to put my hands into the water, and then she covered the whole basin with a towel. And walked away. Punked! I looked around. Lots of residents were sitting with their hands stuck in water, no way to dry them off in order to use their wheelchairs to move.

Another resident rolled up and asked what was going on. On hearing it described, she was rather incredulous and wanted to know why. "It feels nice," was the answer. Well, everyone was polite except R the Alzheimer's patient, who immediately dried his hands on his pants and rolled away. I waited as long as politeness demanded before doing the same. There may have been skin treatments and massages later on, for all I know.

That sounds suspiciously like a way of keeping people quiet!

Deb

[Amy P]

Hopefully soup wasn't on the evening menu