Corinne's Blog

This is me simply talking about events in my life…as I sit outside the emergency Center at the Hennepin County Medical Center…waiting.

The hospital

The first thing I’d like to discuss is a conversation I had with my Pastor Matt Johnson. I had asked Matt if tomorrow I could testify in front of my church congregation. Technically it isn’t my congregation because I am not a member…but I have found a family among the members these last few years. Matt and I talked about why I wanted to testify and what is important when thinking about God and a testimony. Many people want to just talk about how God has blessed them but they fail to mention that struggles they are still going to God about. For example: I was blessed with a new job…but I’d like prayer because -I am making less than Minimum wage at my job -I am unhappy not being able to start school like everyone else I know. -I am having trouble communicating with people I love because of my lack of a cellphone, the internet. -how it is hard to be on my own and independent when I only really have my mother and Craig to talk to no consistant friends.

Another event that has happened in my life was my choice to wait to go to Scotland for a couple of months. Putting Scotland off till after the holidays will allow Craig a time to meet and get to know my mother so my mother will trust him to be my main emergency contact if anything happens to me while I’m overseas.

My third event is that yesterday was September 11th, eight years after the towers fell. I was 12 years old when it happened and like many others I remember where I was when the towers were hit. I was sitting in Ms. Wilcek’s sixth grade classroom during quiet reading time when my teacher got a phone call from her fiance now husband. I remember I was sitting across from Derek S. and that we were quietly chatting to each other over our books…my teacher left after the phone call and came back crying. She and other teachers chatted quietly in the corner of the room until they decided to turn on the TV and they all sat watching the news as we children sat reading. We wondered what was going on because my teacher was crying and it finally came on the intercom that America had been attacked earlier in the morning in New York City I remember wondering where New York was and if it was anywhere near us. We were told that we were being sent home early and that our parents would be informed of our early release. When I got home my mom arrived a little later and she explained everything to me…I was really sad because I thought we were under attack in MN. I remember going home and watching as they showed footage of it on every channel…I watched the footage of people committing suicide after deciding that it was either jumping out the window with a plastic bag parachute or burning to death. I remember after 9/11 I went to my church and asked if the people who had commited suicide were going to hell…my youth ministers said no…because it was God’s will.

I’ve moved inside because it is extremely hot so I’m sitting now in the emergency room lobby at HCMC and just a few minutes ago there was a young girl who discovered that her father had died…she started yelling histerically about how her dad was dead…the kind of screams that make your heart skip a beat…like true pain. I was thinking in my heart about what may have happened to the girl and the man…was there a car accident? Was it a heart attack? Had the girl herself commited the crime? and being in the emergency room I’m thinking about what’s going on…I was raised and shown on tv that when you are in the emergency room you should expect the worst. I wanted to go swarm the girl to see what she looks like and comfort her…hug her and sooth her so that she will stop yelling and frightening the babies and making them cry. I’ve decided to stay where I am…because out of sight for me is out of mind. My mother on the other hand has gotten up to investigate. The girl was yelling and was taken back into a different room wondering and asking if anyone could help her dad. It makes me think about what Craig is doing this weekend and what I may have to do with my mother having cancer that is slowly getting worse. Letting go of loved ones is very difficult…but even though my mother says that she has “too much to do” to die…it still scares me to think about losing her. While some people like Craig don’t yell and scream histerically when they learn that they have lost their loved ones …people who stay strong and keep their composure to keep their family strong there are people like this young girl whose live are totally shaken and with them everyone around them are shaken as well. My brother has stopped complaining about his burned wrist…the reason we are at HCMC anyway…he burned it on a pan at work and it looks painful..but not as painful as losing someone you love. It might be a third or forth degree burn but he no longer complains of the pain as he was before the girl was screaming…I wonder if he realizes that it could be worse and that the pain he feels now isn’t so bad. Or maybe his pain reliever kicked in.

Now that the girl has been taken away the heavy heart I am feeling remains…the people who also sit in the lobby with my have continued their lives as soon I will continue mine…I think about Craig and his mother and death. This weekend Craig and his family are releasing his mother’s ashes in Elie Scotland…a beautiful place full of many family memories I can tell. I wonder if I was cremated where they’re place me. Or, if it was my mother…where I’d put her…I would never want to think about anyone I love as ashes or in a wooden box to rot in the ground. I do not pray for a fate like that to befall anyone.

“oh my god! oh my god my dad’s dead…no! OH MY DAD! OH MY GOD…NO i DON’T WANT anything I want my dad”…I can hear the girl in my head ringing still.

I need to get my mind off of death because it depresses me…so on a lighter note: my roommate Louie is allowing me to use his laptop. it is nice because i am sitting in HCMC and they have guest wifi. Before when I was sitting outside in the car I was thinking about how nice it would be to just loiter outside the hospital to get wifi…but then I felt bad about not being able to get on facebook because it is blocked.

In back of me are some giant tropical fish…they are like I’ve never seen before and they have huge eyes. I wonder if these fish could be the last things a person might ever see in the world if they were to die in this hospital as the girls father had.

My brother used sweet corn to cool his burn…it reminds me that I am hungry and I reach into my bag and grab one of the boxes of museli bars I won from the slogan contest…there’s a really loud annoying woman calling people to the counter…

there is a girl here with two boys and I wonder if they are here for a maternity test. They look like they might be.

I wonder what the hospitals will be like in Scotland if or when i ever have a child and need to give birth in one.

I wonder why they are butchering a man’s name over the loud speaker…and when they are going to call for my brother.

Wow it has been 5 hours…

wait, my brother Tyler just arrived with a really high fever…they are going to take them in together, I’m going to call Sean and see if I can get a ride home…laters.

Mom and Tyler waiting for the Doctor in room C5