Jun 19 | CPE Journal #11: June 14th*

*This entry has an asterisk because I actually just wrote seven entries at once; I seem to have been putting off journalling for awhile and had to go back and reflect on all of the stuff I learned! Each one was under the heading “June 18th”, but I’ve separated them out based on the dates that I had some of these reflections. However, the reflections are also all coloured by today’s work, so they could all be said to be under June 18th as well. But, hey – this probably don’t matter a hill of llamas to anyone who actually reads this, so on with the show.

***

I never journalled about my time with “Quiet.” Quiet was a patient that only stayed for a few days on the unit before being transferred. I am not sure what surgical procedure Quiet was in for – I didn’t look at the chart and didn’t get a chance to chart the visit before someone made off with it.

I walked into the room but didn’t see Quiet right away because there were curtains between Quiet’s bed and the room’s front bed. There was no answer to my soft call. I thought the patient might be asleep, but I when I peeked around the corner I saw that Quiet was awake, looking to one side, hands gently fluttering, somehow like butterflies.

I spoke Quiet’s name several times but Quiet gave no indication of having heard me or even knowing I was in the room.

I came closer and stood at the foot of the bed for a while. I asked a couple of questions, still uncertain as to whether this was a deaf patient, someone who didn’t want to talk to me, or someone who was non-verbal. There was no answer.

I walked around to the left side of Quiet’s bed and stood there for a moment, looking down. After a time, I said, “I’m going to sit down with you for a bit. Is that all right?”

There was no answer at first, but when I drew up a chair and sat down, Quiet had a brief coughing fit. This sounds unremarkable on paper, but it was the sort of coughing fit that only made the space more remarkable, because it sounded very much like weeping at first. There were no tears, but I’m still not entirely sure if it was really just coughing.

Quiet’s hands continued moving, making gestures that to me were cryptic but clearly meant something to Quiet. I noticed that Quiet seemed to be staring intently at a cup on the dining tray, but when I took it down and held it out, Quiet didn’t seem to react. I also asked if Quiet was hungry, saying, “Squeeze my hand for yes?” There was no answer.

After this, I mostly sat in silence, briefly pausing to hold a prayer pamphlet before Quiet and asking if I could read from it. Of course, there was still no response, save for Quiet’s eyes resting on the pamphlet for quite some time. I don’t really remember what I read, but it was an adapted and non-specific version of one of the prayers within. In retrospect I think I did that more for myself than for Quiet, and don’t think I’ll do it again with a non-verbal patient. No response discernible to me followed, however.

I remained with Quiet for about fifteen or twenty minutes. Every so often, Quiet’s eyes wandered to my face, rested there briefly, and then wandered away again, gazing to my left. Quiet’s hands also continued to move, and at one point, I reached out and held my hand close to them. Quiet’s hand moved gently over, explored my hand, squeezed my thumb, and briefly folded itself between my fingers. I was rendered completely motionless by this. It only lasted a few seconds – maybe a minute – and then the hand slipped out and made a motion that seemed to suggest, “You can take your hand away.”

The whole encounter was so beautiful to me I almost cried. Here in the space between two people, connection happened like a brief spark. I believe the spark was God.

Is that part of who God is – the spark in the space between us? We must have a current running through us already to allow such a spark to occur.

-Clarity