Waiting in the Endless Rain

I have packed 6 shipping barrels, the survival gear for my North American incarnation. I have also packed 2 enormous suitcases, my laptop, and my carry on bag. Nothing much left to do but wait and watch the gray sky meeting the gray sea. It has been unusually overcast the last few days, lots of rain and little sun. Carnival is certainly damp and cool this year, poor revelers. I am not up for "Mas" this year, as I await my departure. Sad, sad, sad.

I have so many decisions to make. I just got an offer to go back and work in the Cardiac Catheterization Lab where I worked before my departure for Dominica. I am just not sure. That position requires a lot of on call, which means being a slave to the pager. Time is of the essence when there is a cardiac emergency during the night, so you have to be ready to awaken, throw on clothes while nuking the coffee,and drive to the hospital within 30 minutes. Since I have been lounging in the tropics for a couple of years, that would be a tough reentry, I think.

I could also go back to doing Intensive Care or Hemodialysis. I am just not sure where I will plant myself. But the enthusiastic interest from up North kind of makes me want to stick out my tongue at the people who refused to license me in Dominica and say, "Look at all the offers I have from those who have worked with me!"

I also heard from a psychiatric hospital looking for an old nurse. After living on Dominica, I think I would feel right at home working again in psychiatry. After all, every trip to Roseau is an encounter with mental illness. Years ago I did psych nursing. We used to say you could only tell the staff from the patients by checking to see who was carrying keys to the door. Yeah, listening to delusional mutterings sounds more agreeable than wearing that electronic leash, the pager, again.

So, I have a lot of possibilities.

I wrote something in my book about the Goddess who dwells on Dominica. For me there is a presence here like nowhere I have visited. But I have come to know that presence more intimately, and she is (at least sometimes) Kali, Goddess of destruction.

I am the dance of death that is
behind all life
the ultimate horror
the ultimate ecstasy
I am existence
I am the dance of destruction that
will end this world
the timeless void
the formless devouring mouth
I am rebirth
Let me dance you to death
Let me dance you to life
Will you walk through your fears to dance with me?
Will you let me cut off your head
and drink your blood?
then will you cut off mine?
Will you face all the horror
all the pain
all the sorrow
and say "yes"?
I am all that you dread
all that terrifies
I am your fear
will you meet me?

leavingdominica: off to meet a fresh batch of fears...