A Glimpse of My Life at Work

The day was about two weeks ago and i was rolling my housekeeping cart down West hall to put it in away in the housekeeping closet and go on break. As i was taking the overflowing trash bag off the cart a resident form across the hall, who we will refer to as Lucy, rolled up in her wheel chair.

I wish there was some way to describe "Lucy's" voice but i am rely not sure how. It is kind of high and whiny with a constant low vibrating kind of sound that reminds me of a dying robot. So basically her voice is both high and low, whiny and robotic. Yeah, anyhow back to the story...

"Lucy" asked me if i can turn her tv off. At least that is what it sounded like she said but it is kind of hard to be sure sometimes what she is saying. so i wen to into her room and saw that her tv was already off but her roommate's tv was on (each room is divided in half by a floor to ceiling shelf and each side has its own tv) So i asked "Lucy" if that was what she was referring to and she said no so i decided i had heard her wrong and i turned her tv on. She just sat watching me looking confused and she asked what was wrong with the tv. i noticed that it was not on a channel because it was not set for tv but for dvd so i changes it to tv and flipped to a news channel. She then asked something about there being no voices. The volume was completely turned down so i turned it up. After all this she then asked me to turn it off. So I did. She then asked me why it worked for me and not for her. i told her i was not sure what the problem had been for her but that it had not been set on tv. But i knew she understood how to work the television so none of this made sense to me.

"Lucy" decided that i knew nothing about television and so rolled out in the hall and found the nurse. i went back to putting my cart in the closet. From the hallway i heard Lucy and the nurse in the room. Lucy asked the nurse to turn the television off. the nurse told her it was off. Lucy then asked, "what about the voices" The nurse paused seeming confused. the room was silent, all except for Lucy's roommate's tv. Then "Lucy" finally clarified the problem when she asked, "Don't you hear the voices?" that whole long ordeal had been because she was hearing her roommate's tv and thought that somehow sound was still coming from her own tv even though it was off. Clear, detailed communication is a wonderful thing.