I thought we’d breeze through the prairies, but it hasn’t worked out that way. My partner’s health has been so bad, we have finally bowed to the inevitable and are spending a couple of days in Regina to recuperate.

We spent ten hours in the Regina General Hospital emergency waiting room yesterday. I’ve never had to go to the ER before, and it was as nightmarish as I imagined but also quite touching. We came at the worst possible time and were there from about 1pm to midnight, so we really got a slice of ER life. I was pleasantly surprised by the camaraderie between our fellow patients-in-waiting. I was left with the conviction that people are not as shitty as you expect, in fact people are generally pretty decent even in bad situations.

One man befriended an old lady who had been dropped off by an ambulance alone and had been waiting for hours for a bed. He called her daughter on his cell phone and talked the staff into finding her a more comfortable place to be check out here.

We came away exhausted, but at least we know Chris is going to be OK. He just has to take some medicine and rest for a few days.

Sadly my poetry-under-fire skills were not up to this test. I did no poetry yesterday. I have no pretty pictures to upload. But I’ll leave you today with this snippet observed in a Regina ER.

Home

 A little girl wears a blue bootie as a hat over crinkled chocolate hair, runs in circles, climbs chairs, laughing around the thumb in her mouth. The cut on her head stopped bleeding hours ago. Her mother watches, baby brother on one hip.

Families build small oases of home
in every corner.