A beautiful early August day with sunshine, sea breezes, a swim in the pool, reading a great book on the deck, fresh fish and veggies from the shore captain’s garden for supper, only thing missing (which is becoming a bit of a habit) is a stop for ice-cream in the vintage sports car with the sun roof out…life is good! Well, life is good everyday but especially good on ones such as today.
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| lots of muktuk (blubber) to harvest |
We all have those decisions entitled…it seemed like a good idea at the time…and this is the perfect description of my impromptu July ‘short contract’ which saw me bite for a one week return to my former jobshare location. But, you know the saying “you can’t go home?” well, it rings true in this example. The learning from this endeavour is having divested myself of the romantic notion that I could ‘go back anytime’ leaving me free to move on. The most positive event of the contract being that the hunters got a beluga whale to share with the community.
It began with a former coworker (who had been very kind in my first CHN contract) asking about the community and I described it nostalgically to her, then my former jobshare partner (who was in the next community) encouraging me to take a short contract to visit with the clerk and catch up on the job we’d both walked away from two years back with my 8wk casual contract being the only contact since. I expressed an interest in the July 11 - 18 opening and was quickly taken up on it. When I checked with the former coworker she disclosed that she had declined as she hadn’t realized it was two days travel in and three days out impacting a family vacation. Hmmm so now I’m heading in with an unknown coworker…oh well, travel being arranged for Wednesday and Thursday. A weekend away in the River John area for Read by the Sea (wonderful - highly recommend it) with the teacher daughter and two grandkids was just getting underway as we settled in to the cottage when the emails about travel started…..on first standby on the way in, could I travel in Monday and Tuesday? Not wishing to be stuck in Inuvik, I agreed. On third standby on the way out, don’t expect to make it out of community until the 23rd and home by the 24…whenever. Then as it was after 5pm in Inuvik by the time I responded with my preferred flight times, hotel etc. the travel clerk simply looked at my file and used the previous parameters. When I flew early am and direct to maximize my time in Edmonton visiting the western daughter, this got me a 7:30am leave out of Halifax, with the timezone change into Edmonton by 10am and not leaving until 8am the following day. Oh well. Sunday morning out of the cottage, quick stop in the city, home to throw northern stuff into the duffle and knapsack, one last swim, supper and a few hours sleep.
The life partner drove me to the airport in style…..1995 yellow Corvette all original that his sister passed on to him and he swears isn’t an example of a midlife crisis…sweet ride, but you have to watch the gas gauge as it’s pre electronic low fuel warning…glad for all night service stations….just sayin. Check in at WestJet and no sign of the flight on the board - delayed an hour - lots of time for breakfast. An uneventful flight with a nap and time to watch the Clint Eastwood movie The Mule which is really worth the time! The usual airport, shuttle and hotel checkin all made easier by the less luggage situation. Time to catch up on my reading, chat online, have an early supper and bedtime. Morning routine and over to the airport to find a familiar face in the departure lounge who I finally work out is from Taloyoak so I hold the grandson while she does last minute prep. The flight from Edmonton (via Yellowknife and Norman Wells) to Inuvik passes quickly as I chat with a young helicopter mechanic going in for a rotation - he educates me about the 737MAX situation and assures me it’ll take years to be corrected through the system. He also tells me about his previous rotations working wildfires in the northern areas and clearly adrenalin is not in short supply.
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| beauty of a commute |
In Inuvik airport I grab a sandwich at the Cloud 9 cafe and then board my flight with all my luggage guaranteed (a first). Still lots of pack ice in the Beaufort Sea and then we’re into Uluhaktuk and a quick station stop - my former jobshare partner working there comes to the airport as I’m ‘traveling through’ as northerners call it for a quick visit. We agree to do our best to overnight in Edmonton and catch up over supper on our way out of community. Off we go out over Banks Island with its frozen lakes and shortly we’re touching down in Sachs Harbour. Nice to see familiar faces. No one to meet me so I bum a ride with the COOP truck delivering freight and Fred says “that’s your blue flowered duffle right?” and we both grin as that bag has made enough trips in and out to be familiar to him. I call the nurse on call to get in to the health centre - apparently no one updated my early travel schedule to those on the ground and now there are three nurses here for 100 people. Good chance for me to catch up. I quickly settled into the transient unit (missing the cozy apartment we’d jobsharered) and fall into bed.
I spend a couple of days (only moderately successfully) trying to get my head around year of changes. Some things were logical, for example…the handbook Bugs n Drugs which we use to prescribe antibiotics is now online and more current than a printed copy but being advised to just “Google it” when I asked for it’s location is a bit disconcerting, although apparently what CHNs are doing now. I’m of the opinion that it’s not a hardship to print the physician on call schedule - being told to “just call IRH and ask for the Doc on call” isn’t helpful for someone who is no longer familiar with the roster, names when pronounced by their owner are often spelled very differently and I’m recording them on an electronic health record for Pete’s sake! My thoughts when heading up were that at least I’d be able to physically find things, but the entire health centre had been completely reorganized and since accreditation is looming there were multiple teleconferences, education sessions etc. It may have only been a total of seven clinic days plus on call but…it sure felt longer. The community is struggling too, the weather was really crappy and there was only one scheduled flight which actually made it one time while I was there and then…the really hungry mosquitoes arrived.The good thing is that this reality check has dispelled any illogical notion I had of being comfortable doing CHN (community health nurse) work even here in a quiet, known to me community. When I handed that cell phone over to my
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| Replacements yeehaw! |
replacement in the airport, it was a great feeling! And to think my jobshare buddy was trying to tempt me to come work with her in the neighbouring community. When she disclosed that in less than three weeks she’d amassed 150+ hours of overtime….game over, I am no longer interested in the excitement or compensation for such work - sleep is much more important to me at this point in my life. As my buddy says about his northern contracts “really glad I did it when I did, even happier I’m not doing it now”. So yes….it really is retirement planning one day at a time as I ‘shuffle off to Buffalo’. I can handle 10 to 12 weeks annually of homecare (or public health if the location is really enticing) nursing with the ability to keep current and no on call. With the Baffin region being a shorter commute and only one time zone I’ve gotten spoiled. But I digress.
On Friday late afternoon (a flight delay of one day due to weather) the two nurses exited with specific instructions (one an expert after a week in the community and the other now ‘in charge’ after my mentoring of last year) to the point I was pleased to see them off. My coworker (a 55 yr old Iranian RN with a strong critical care background - a real asset if the bad thing happens in such a remote location) arrived and I attempted to get him setup with tech access as all health records are now electronic - that was a circus that took almost two hours and was only partially successful. Would’ve been nice if the departing experts had set this up instead of micromanaging my to do list. Manouchehr turned out to be quite a mover and shaker and I opted to stand in his shadow and enjoy the benefits. He tortured management with requests for second on call pay (my jobshare buddy and I had lobbied for years, approached the union, HR etc to no avail) threatening to leave if not paid and was quickly advised that we were both told to claim. When I suggested we would not be exiting the community on the 18th as third standby didn’t look good, he again called management and reminded them he had a seminar to attend on the 20th (he later revealed it was a Warren Buffett investment seminar) but I’m sure the powers that be thought…nursing seminar (which caused me to smile). Ultimately we were booked on a charter as there were two nurses in both directions and not enough total seats on the scheduled flight - shift changes require as many staff arriving as departing. The charter was originally booked to leave Inuvik at 9am and my jobshare partner sadly noted that we wouldn’t make the daily flight south with that timing so, I alerted my coworker and he sprang into action. I diverted his first suggestion to rebook the charter earlier explaining that we weren’t paying the piper so someone authorizing this pricey mode of transport ($7164.40 in total) would be making that call. His first management contact suggested he ask Canadian North to hold the flight for us - when he disclosed this I snorted and said “what are we royalty?” so instead he asked for the latest possible check in time (1:25pm) and called the general manager at Aklak Air who agreed that the charter flight could depart anytime from 8am onwards. The only variable he couldn’t deal with was the weather delay on our departure day but that was just a minor glitch. We had the usual quiet week in clinic and I was welcomed warmly back by the community which is always comforting and I had missed the clerk so it was good to see her. I was glad that it wasn’t two new nurses who didn’t know people which was the case when we did handover.
We had an uneventful flight to Yellowknife, off for security screening and then on to Edmonton through lots of turbulence and thunderstorms. I overhead a passenger chatting with the flight attendants about Pond Inlet and her father passing away so at the baggage carousel I mentioned that I'd been in Pond Inlet a few weeks ago working as the homecare nurse and she quickly said "oh you must've known him" and named her father, who's obituary I'd seen. I had been surprised to read that he'd been an MLA for decades, critical to the formation of Nunavut etc etc. as he was a very humble, down to earth man. We chatted about his passing in Iqaluit and his strength and I wished her well. There really aren't any random occurrences in the universe eh? I grabbed my bag, caught the shuttle and checked in to the hotel.
About an hour later there was banging on my door, my jobshare partner yelled "hey let's go, the pole dancers are here" and dropped her bags in her room down the hall. We headed to the sports bar for supper, adult beverages and a few hours of catching up. It was SO good to visit after a couple of years. I miss her. With early morning flights looming for both of us we headed back to our rooms where she bragged about having a king sized bed and we parted ways after midnight. Following my four hours of sleep, the 5am alarm woke me to find a message from my buddy saying that she'd checked her email before climbing in the shower and found her morning flight had been cancelled and she'd been put on the red eye (which she'd already missed at midnight) so she phoned the airline and was told the flight was delayed until 0227 so she was sitting at the airport when she messaged me. Not even a chance to catch a decent nap as the flights to Moncton stopover in Toronto. By comparison I felt privileged to have had at least an abbreviated sleep and a direct flight. The shuttle over to the airport, a breakfast taco in the restaurant as the lineup at Tim Hortons was just too painful and an on time departure. I was seated next to a three year old whose mother quickly assured me that she had lots of entertainment for her...no worries, reminiscent of my granddaughter I told her. As we chatted, it evolved that we had mutual acquaintances previously in Slave Lake - one of my son in law's good buddies, now in New Zealand - they had attended the wedding which my son in law was a groomsman for. Again that universe! Met by the shore captain and off to supper with the city kids and grandkids where we ordered double desserts for the toddler then sped away in our sports car, leaving them to deal with the sugar high. Bwahahah
The following ten days have been filled with swimming, good food, family visits and generally enjoying the very brief maritime summer we have here. Looking forward to some more company and then just a little over a month before we head off on our adventure across the pond. Ahhh
breakfast, a walk on the malecon and Hop on Hop off tourist bus. Managed to get my dollars exchanged at the bank, see lots of Havana I'd never been to and even make it home for a siesta. Up for supper at a local restaurant - lovely! An early bedtime and up at 5am for the
breakfast, a walk on the malecon and Hop on Hop off tourist bus. Managed to get my dollars exchanged at the bank, see lots of Havana I'd never been to and even make it home for a siesta. Up for supper at a local restaurant - lovely! An early bedtime and up at 5am for the
