windows

I saw these window washers on the outside of the hospital building this afternoon (look carefully, they are on a hanging walkway near the bottom towards the right) and the first thing I thought is: those guys are never going to finish. Here's another shot of the same building, reflected in the windows of another, equally glassed-in hospital building across the street, the window panes of which I'm sure these guys are also going to have to wash.




It just seems like such a Sisyphean task, because by the time you're done with the last window, it's probably time to start cleaning the first window again, especially so close to the traffic pollution on the highway, or in the spring when the pollen here is so bad. And then I thought: how fitting, because that's exactly what working inside the hospital feels like sometimes too. So many patients. So many issues. You finish one and the next one pops up. Endless. And, after a while, it can all start to run together.

But you keep going, and keep working, and at the end of the day, you can hopefully look back and see that maybe you made things a little better. And then what? More windows to clean. More patients to take care of. So you come back the next day and you do it again and again and again and try, as best as you can, to help.

At least, that's what I thought very briefly, in the three minutes it took me to walk from the ORs to my car. And then I drove home, kissed my kids, and got ready to do it all again tomorrow.