Camelot

When I think of Camelot, I used to imagine King Aurthur and the Knights of the Round Table......now I think some mentally imbalanced person is probably whipping a chair at someone. Its all contextual I guess. Spending time with people you would actively avoid on a city bus is a different context to be sure. When they say Camelot on the loudspeaker, you just hope it isn't occurring on your floor as that means something has gone awry and the calvary had to be called. So long images of Merlin, hello images of violent psychotics.

I dont mean to paint an overly dreary picture. Truth be told, we have heard the call of 4 Camelots in the 2 days we have been on the floor, but none have been in our unit. The unit I am working on is comprised of the shorter term 'consumers' whose length of stay rarely extends beyond a season. The hospital does house longer tenured residents on other floors (one gentleman just passed away who spent 44 years, the latter 2/3 of the entirety of his earthly existence, in psychiatric care), but we are not privy to their units. The floor I work on is coed, with adults ranging from 18-64 years of age, and with varied levels of mental impairment. We are each assigned a patient and my own is in his late 30s and presents asymptomatically, which is good because it is easier and bad because it may not present much of any interest. He has a very short history medically and seems wholly in denial that he has any problems to contend with. It will be interesting following him from the snapshot view I got from today on through the weeks to see if he begins to accept that he has some issues to work out (which he assuredly does even if they aren't outwardly manifesting at all times) or continues to assert that all problems and issues in his life manifest largely in those around him leaving him blameless. We shall see. Other classmates have patients that display somewhat more readily their impairments. I was anxious about this rotation, but I am now just excited to see what happens. At the very least, the likelihood that I will be cleaning up poop in the next month seems nearly nonexistent :)

I am off to seek out textbooks online for which I will pay an exorbitant amount for up front, enjoy reading little or not at all, and then sell, recouping very little monetarily because, in those few scant months, the newest edition will have been released with such earth altering changes as a new font in the preface, a superfluous rewording to page 346 and a flashy new cover photo. Admit it, no one misses that part of college.