February 29, 2020

by drplasticpicker

I am sitting here beginning this blog post, and I have closed my eyes and am typing at the same time. I am a very good typist because I used to work at my father’s accounting office when I was a child. Therefore I can type with my eyes closed and I can still be pretty accurate. I am typing with my eyes closed because I am trying to listen to the birds in my backyard. They are singing this morning and the sky is only just lighting up. It is a beautiful song.

Yesterday in clinic I saw almost 30 patients and each had something important to address. I saw one 12-year-old boy who had tension headaches and eating more junk food and having some body issues. I saw a toddler for follow up pneumonia who had had multiple hospitalizations in the past for fever of unknown origin, but really it was because the family needed to be listened to and understood and brought in more timely. She has turned the corner and gets into care prompty now because my nurse and I will add them on. I practiced good medicine yesterday and was mostly happy, bringing around my new trash art piece HMO Plastic Dinosaur from the Parking Lot and it made many children smile. One toddler kept on caressing and touching it, and it is clean because I cleaned all the pieces. But they are little plastic pieces that a I hot-glue gunned together and technically can be a choking hazard. So I did have to gently tell the wonderful toddler, “Uh, Dr. Plastic Picker has to take Dinosaur back. You can come back and visit him anytime.” She finally gave him back, and left happily with her Dr. Plastic Picker Reusable Tote Bag fever-free. I told her she can look at it anytime on Instagram @drplasticpicker.

My eyes are open now, and indeed they were open when I started writing the second paragraph. My eyes and my heart are open now. In the midst of yestserday’s 30 patients, I did get a bit overwhelmed and I felt a bit of a headache threatening to come. So I peaked into the treatment room and the patient that was getting IV fluids that belonged to another doctor who had signed out to me looked okay. I checked with the RN and told them that the other doctor was back and I was going for a quick walk. I just exited the building through the loading dock, and walked to the edge of the employee parking lot. There is a little patch of life there with a small flowering bush and bees. I stood there looking at the bees and watching them buzz. I am not scared of bees and I know we need them. And then I stood at the edge of the parking lot near where our large HMO building borders real green space. I looked out into the dry landscape that is real life and real nature, and I closed my eyes. And there again were the birds. They were singing. And I felt better after just 10 minutes. The sun was warm on my face. And I went back to work. I finished on time yesterday even with those 30 patients.

So this month, I finished and the numbers were very even for my plastic picking totals! It is so interesting because it is February the second month of the year of the year 2020. Many even and interesting numbers. Thank you again for following along.

22 Bags of Ocean Bound Plastic Collected

33 Items Salvaged

Object	Total Number	Fate
Aluminum Cans	17	Recycled
Plastic Bottles	5	Recycled
Sand Toys	5	Gifted
Toys	2	Trash Art!
Tenis Balls	3	Ginny – our dog
Flower Pot	1	Reused

Click here to see what happened in March 2020 which was the beginning of the COVID-19 Pandemic https://drplasticpicker.com/march-2020-plastic-picking-round-up/