Placement (with a capital p)

I came home early today to drink coffee and read poetry under the warm covers of my bed. I read Starlings in Winter by Mary Oliver at least ten times until the loveliness could sink in. Once it did, I shared it with my friends and then I turned on The Walking Dead, which felt somewhat blasphemous but totally worth it.

Lately, there is much anxiety in the air over placement. It's a strange feeling, to have your fate rest so solidly in someone else's hands. Okay, so fate is a rather large word for a four-month, second-year midwifery placement. It's just toes in the water, getting our feet wet, watching and learning and hopefully inserting a speculum or two. If we're really lucky, a four-handed catch. I really have no idea, to be honest, so I'm just throwing a few things out there. There is a lot of talk about Placement and little hard data to go from. I guess that's the thing about being only the second year of a brand new midwifery program. We'll figure it out.

As for me, I've offered to go to Edmonton for this placement in a sort of "only if I have to" kind of spirit. As soon as I hit send on the email I was filled with this feeling.. regret, guilt, sadness. I'm not sure what it was, really. It would mean four months away from Cub. PB has, somewhat begrudgingly, said that he would keep him here for the duration of my placement, and we'd choreograph an elaborate dance to ensure that I could see him once in a while (or a little more often than that) and PB could hopefully get a few much needed, and much deserved, breaks. There is this sort of loose guideline that says if you go away for a placement then you can stay here for the rest of them, which is nice but not written in stone. Maybe you can stay for all three, maybe you'll have to go away twice. No one really knows. And so I told them that if I have to go, send me now, let me get it done for the shortest placement when it would cause the least disruption to all of our lives (in theory).

The guilt, though? Oh, it's heavy. Guilt because four months away from the little love of my life? I can't stand it. And here I am, offering this up to my program adviser instead of forcing her to pry it from my cold dead hands.

Either way, it will be hard. I know that. The thing I am focusing on is that no matter where I am, Cub will be well cared for by someone who loves him thiiiiiis much. And in case you didn't know this already, that's a heckuva lot of love.

World's Cutest "Firefighter Guy"