A frustrating day

 I slept pretty alright last night, three sets of crazy dreams I shared with C but won't go into full detail here. Lots of 

a) me and doug in vehicles/traveling

b) other people moving, and me helping them move (I think this betrays the fact I feel a kind of way about when I help other people move and no one is helping me)

c) I abandoned 2 babies in a yard and 2 guinea pigs in a cage, and was devastated that I did this, but they seemed okay in the end?

d) I think Doug is cheap. For sure in my dreams I do, but in real life yes, he does not like to spend money. 

this morning I slept in until 9:30. I had arranged a series of errands, from going to the bank to deposit all of our Christmas Checks (I can't get the depositty app thing to work on my phone), to returning an oxygen tank that I was told to bring back to the hospital, to picking up boxes and packing paper. 

I didn't want to leave the house. 

I felt like Cameron in "Ferris Bueller's Day Off" sitting in the car in the garage pounding on the car seat next to me saying "no. no. no." or in bed singing "Let my Cameron go..." 

Eventually I got out the door. I went to the hospital first. It is close. The up-front valet guy yelled at me when he noticed me bringing the tank to the door. "you can't drop that off here, where do you think you're going?" I told him I was told to do this and just drop it at the front desk. "No, you can't do that. They don't accept equipment at the front desk." The line to get in was socially distanced, 6 ft apart, 10 people in line. He told me to go park, and call up the hospital main line and find out what to do. 

The automation system had me on hold for 10 minutes and I got pissed. I went to pick up boxes at one house, success. Second house, success. Then to the bank. Doug told me to go to Bethesda, it was closer than the other branch. Got there and they didn't have a drive-through teller, and the ATM was outside, with 4 people waiting. In the freezing cold and snizzle. Fun. 

Finally got all the things done there, decided to take back roads to the next stop. I needed more paper for wrapping plates and shit. Went to the first place, no one was at the front desk. Went to another, the dude there was very helpful and I brought everything to the car. Decided to call the hospital and start over with that. The operator had no idea what to do with me. Spoke with someone else who said I had to call the 'third party provider' who 'gave me the tank,' and I said no third party provider gave this to me, the hospital did, and the nurse told me to return it there. 

No one was helping, and no one wanted to take responsibility for taking this tank back. Doug was all "I guess you own an oxygen tank now," and I was like "NO I DO NOT." I was going to get this tank back to the fucking right party if it fucking killed me. 

I went through all of my documentation from the hospital stay (had to find it and unpack it) and there was no mention of this being a thing. 

Finally I looked at the tank, and saw the name "provided by XXXXXXX" so I figured I'd call them directly, it was their product, maybe they'd know what to do. Hopefully. 

Alicia answered the phone. I was fuming but I always start off customer service discussions with kindness and said "Hey Alicia, how are you doing today?" 

There was a long pause, which made me a little worried. Eventually she said "Well, I can't complain, I'm alive? And I'm here?" I said "Wow, that's what I needed to hear, I will not complain, even though I had a rough day, I'm happy to be here, and happy you're here too." 

She asked what she could do for me, and I told her my saga of Nurse tells me bring to hospital, Valet says no you can't bring to front desk, Switchboard has Zero idea what I'm even talking about, no one wants to take the tank and if I could jettison it to the sun at this point I would. And she said "oh man, that's a hassle. I can arrange pickup." 

Finally. 

That's all I needed to hear. We talked about what day to have someone come, and how I'm moving. Should they pick up here or there.  I decided to just bring the tank with, and have them come to the new house, they could pick it up there . She confirmed my home address now, and the new address. She laughed when I told her the number, it being 3 doors down. 

"Easy move, right?" 

"Not really, I still gotta put all the things into boxes and shit. And move them. But at least it isn't like the last move." 

I said "I am so thankful for you, because no one was helpful all day and you're the best. Thank you." 

"I have to say, I'm so glad you called and I got your call," she said. "Right before you called, I had a really hard and challenging experience. I felt like a deer in the headlights, I didn't know what to do about this call and situation, and I was sitting here .... evaluating what I could have done better. What can I learn from what just happened."

Could I ever relate. I told her a little about my job and how things sometimes go, and trying to learn from the last bad experience is very valuable. A very good philosophy. And to always have empathy, always remember the other person is human. 

She apologized for the hesitancy in how she answered "how are you today" because it was something she did not expect to hear, and it took her breath away.  I told her she should have been honest and said "oh girl let me tell you about the crap day I'm having, Lord." 

"Keep my phone number, Alicia, call me if you ever need to have a conversation like this again. I'm here for you,"

Oxygen will be picked up on Monday. 

Usually I want to get off the phone as fast as possible with these things lately because I know other people are on hold. This time? I was like, let's just talk all day. 

We shared our mutual admiration for "saving the day" for each other. 

I then got to packing. More packing. Even more packing. 

We start moving tomorrow, continue Sunday, and I'm hoping we get a bunch of things unpacked so we can recycle some of the boxes to pack even more. 

Off to bed.  So much more adventure to come.