"The Next Holiday is:"

I usually wear a watch that tells me the date. I don't need to do so - my work phone also tells me the date as does my personal cell phone. And most of the time I know the date. Despite this, every time I write a visit note, or sit down to write a group of notes, I look at my watch or the unit calendar for the date.

I do this even though virtually every nursing home unit I visit has some variation of the same sign, telling me the date:

Today is: Monday   May 16, 2011

The weather is: cold  rainy

The season is:  Spring

The next holiday is:  _________

It's "The next holiday is" part of the sign that amuses me. I don't know if it is dependent on the placards that come with the sign, the calendar that the staff look at, their knowledge of holidays, random chance, or just personal whims, but "the next holiday" is not always consistent.

Last month I was on one unit and "the next holiday" was Easter. I went upstairs and in another unit, in the same building, "the next holiday" was Passover. The next day I was in a different nursing home and "the next holiday" was Good Friday.

This week I have seen "the next holiday" as Armed Forces Day (May 21) and Memorial Day (May 30.) (I don't expect that I will see Shavuot, nor is any nursing home I visit counting the Omer. ) Right after Memorial Day, the signs will battle between Flag Day and Father's Day. They'll then stay consistent with The Fourth of July and then Labor Day, but come the Jewish Holy Days, Columbus Day, and various other fall holidays, "the next holiday" will again differ from place to place and unit to unit.

Perhaps this is why I need my watch. It doesn't focus on "the next holiday" but just on a number between 1 - 31. And most of the time the number it tells me really is that day's date.

Happy . . . Hanukah ? ?

One of the residents at a facility I visit is always happy to see me. "I love you, I love you," she has told me. She met me when I was her brother's hospice chaplain in the the same facility. I am grateful that she doesn't connect me with her loss or see me as a reminder of her sorrow.

Initially she recognized me by my kipah, now she recognizes me as me. Whenever she sees me, she gives me the appropriate Jewish greeting (or at least the Jewish greeting she knows.) "Happy Hanukah," she says. "Happy Hanukah." I thank her.

I saw her last week, just before Rosh HaShanah. She wished me a "Happy Hanukah."

I couldn't help noticing that the local Chabad has their hanukiya fully lit for their New Year observances. Perhaps she's right: it's always hanukah somewhere.

yarmulke

In addition to the times when wearing a kipah leads to serious discussions or requests for additional support (or "courtesy visits" as one of my fellow chaplains refers to them,) there are the unplanned moments of humor.

• I'm sitting at the nurses' station at an unnamed nursing home working on my visit notes. A patient (not one of mine) comes up to talk with me. The back story, which I find out later, is that she noticed the kipah and asked one of the facility nurses who I was. The nurse told her: "That's the rabbi."    
• Patient: "Oh. You're Jewish." Me: "Yes." Patient: "I thought you just liked to wear doilies on your head."

• I'm visiting a patient in a "memory unit" in an assisted living. A staff member comes up to me and notes that several of the women have noticed my headcovering. They are wondering where I'm from. A quick series of responses runs through my mind. I can't say, "I'm from "We Care For You Hospice" because that would violate HIPPA rules and patient privacy. I don't really want to say, "I'm from the "We Care For You Agency" for similar reasons. (Although I wear a name badge and most of the staff know where I'm from.) I could say, "I'm from 'Hometownville'," but I don't really think that's what they're asking. So I go for what seems to me to be the simplest answer:
• "Just tell them I'm a rabbi." Staff member: "What?" Me: "I'm a rabbi." The staff member walks over to the residents and says: "She's from A-rabb-ia."

To be perfectly fair, in the first case it was a particularly lacy, open crocheted kipah. And wearing a doily is sometimes a fashion choice on the dementia unit.

At the second facility they were playing Christmas music ("O Holy Night" when I walked in) even though it was a hot, late spring day.  I reported to my colleagues afterward that apparently I was only "alert and oriented x 1" that day. Which is to say, I knew my name, but it seemed that I didn't quite know the date (December? May?) or the place ('Happy Dawn Assisted Living'? A-rabb-ia?)

Some days all you can do is laugh.

Signage

On a nursing home door:

"Door is alarmed."

It looked pretty calm to me. Perhaps the calm was a facade.

Always good to laugh

A sign I saw today in a staff bathroom at a nameless facility:

ALL STAFF
WHEN your
Done using the
toilet Please
giggle the handle
or it will not
Stop Running.

So I giggled. The toilet did not find it amusing.