the politics of hope

I swear, this man, I love him. I get teary every time I watch this.

Mama Drama

I have a story.

At the beginning of the semester, I sent a note to the course coordinator, saying that my son's birth was traumatic, and that I was a bit nervous going into the setting again, although it had been several years. She said nervous is normal, and maybe I should let the clinical instructor know how I was feeling. Done, with conversation from course coordinator attached for history and context. I ended the email with this:

I feel confident that I can handle this course and I don't want kid-glove treatment at all! I just wanted you to know that I have really strong feelings about this stuff (in other words, I will cry during clinical at some point this semester!)

No response from clinical instructor, which was fine with me. It was perhaps too informal, I'll admit. But I did just come off Psych, and we all know how it went when I cried in front of that professor.

We've been meeting each Monday since the beginning of January with no mention of any of this, other than an aside on the first pre-conference that she knew I had a child, and who else has kids?
Last Monday, I saw TWO births (amazing, incredible and I'll write them up soon, I promise!). I also was talking about my son's birth briefly with two other students in the break room while we ate, and the CI was in the room. She said, "Oh you did have a traumatic birth." I used to enjoy the shock value a little, but I normally don't talk about it anymore - honestly, people are uncomfortable when they realize the implications of the vaginal delivery of an 11 pound, 11 ounce baby and subsequent fourth degree tear. Even indirectly, one's own rectum is not an easy thing to discuss socially, I've found.

The CI and I left together that evening, and she brought it up again. She said that she wasn't sure how to respond and so just played it by ear. I told her that's exactly what I had hoped that she would do, honestly, that I wanted her to know so that she could be prepared, but not because I thought that she would need to intervene in any way. She said, in her Midwestern drawl, "You know, it's been how long, seven years? If you're still having these strong feelings, you ought to think about getting counseling". I smiled uncomfortably and waited until she stopped talking and I could get away. Again? Really? Am I the world's craziest student?

got an email from her two days later that began and ended this waywith this sentence:

Although your clinical performance has been very good, I think you should seek counseling your issues related to your childbirth 7-8 years ago...

Your unresolved long standing issues impede your ability to learn as a student and grow. Please give this matter some serious thought.

See you next week.

So.

There's that, then.

I've stopped screeching phrases like "how would she know?!" and "impede my ability to grow and learn as a student?!" incredulously. I have stopped obsessing about what I would do if she brings it up again as justification for a poor evaluation. While counseling is in order for me (as it is for most humans who have ever experienced anything), it's not on the wait-list for things to do this semester or even this year, I think. Also, I didn't fucking ask you. I guess since I brought it up in writing, she was obligated to respond in writing. but jesus. This is so intrusive, so cold and clinical.

I was all ready to fire off an email detailing my emotional reaction to her note. My friend said, No! She is asking you not to cry on her! Don't cry on her again! Mom said the same. I am immensely grateful for their translation. One of the things that disturbed me so much was that I was attempting to avoid this sort of interaction by sending the email in the first place. I was trying to construct some distance and professional detachment around an issue that is still tender for me, but I did it in a way that put my guts out there to begin with. In a way, it seems that I invited this intrusion into my emotional state; not literally, but on a sort of cosmic plane. What was I hoping to avoid in the first place here? Would I benefit from spending some time on this? Perhaps not with a counselor, but in meditation, doing some root chakra energy work, focused journalling?

I am practicing my pleasant, competent, yet emotionally detached personna for clinical conferences. I am wondering what this means about my way of being in the world in general and as a student in particular. And I'm thinking of it in terms of the conversation that Loving Pecola and darkdaughta are having about what can be expected from the world of academia.

Tonight went well, but I did give in to the temptation to tell a short form of this story to another student who got a similar nasty-gram. I regretted it immediately - it was purely for one-upping the other student, not because she and I are close or she needed my support. I even wonder about posting it here - but will leave it for now.

The instructor did add a comment at the bottom of my clinical journal entry from last week about the births: "I think this week was therapeutic for you!"

More than you know.

silence?

I've been attending Quaker meeting for a couple of Sundays, and tonight I went to a yoga class that used bolsters, blankets and eye pillows to create poses that one essentially laid in for several minutes. All in dim light and silence. Very odd. It's a nice contrast to the chaos of the first of the semester. When I laid down into the first pose tonight, it felt like my body was ratcheting, creaking tighter and tighter with each breath. By the end of the class, I was feeling more smoothed out, less crackly.

I'm grateful to have had the luxury of silence in this week.

more emo - who can get enough?!

Peds is still kicking my affective ass. After the shower-sobbing reaction to my shifts in the PICU and NICU, I then had a series of less intense but recurrent crying jags last week after my first 12 hour shift on the unit. I am SO good at dissociating that I can't even really tell you what triggered them - but it was akin to the med-surg crying, based loosely around the idea that during those 12 hours, I could have done something or not done something to hurt someone and would never ever know it.

Therapeutic interventions recently employed:

• massage. wow. I said to the nice LMBT, "I feel like I can't breathe a full deep breath, like there's a little ball of silly putty right *there* in my spine and if I could just bend the right way, it would crack open and I'd be able to breathe again. I've also been doing a lot of crying, and I don't want any of that sadness to get stuck in any crevices of fascia and fester". She said, "I can handle that." And she did. She did something under the edge of my rib cage that made me think of my ribs as completely detachable. And she did a controlled version of a sternal rub that warmed me up for hours. No surprise, I cried on the table. But not out of control, not like I wouldn't be able to stop crying - more like the way you might cry when someone you love tells you a very sad story and you hold their hand while they talk. It was good. I felt so guilty picking up my backpack after she'd just spent an hour integrating my upper body bilaterally.
  
• tea. I don't know why, but I seem to only think of tea when it's chilly outside. I can drink hot coffee through the summer - though with admittedly less enjoyment, I do have to shoulder through it. But it's been a journey through the Stash Herbal Tea Sampler Box lately. The colors of the little packages are almost as soothing to me as the tea itself. And I had enough honey and didn't feel like I had to skimp or be judicious.
  
• art. went walking around a historic neighborhood with an artist friend yesterday, looking at amazing pieces of art. It was a Winnie-the-Pooh sort of sky and blustery wind, I woke up in a good mood and so did the kid, it was good all over.
• a productive-feeling new notecard system for Psych and Peds exams upcoming this week. I'll sign off in about five minutes to do more of these. I'm really hopeful that they will help me turn around the Bs from the second exams back to the As from the first exams of the semester.
  
• journalling. Psych instructor, who I have a complete identity crush on (I love her hair, her shoes, her style of speaking, her humor) mentioned it the other day in class, and I have meaning to get started again. I stopped at some point around the time I left my husband, catastrophisizing about supeonas and whatnot. It was intensely helpful Saturday night when all of a sudden, I was going to turn myself inside out with feeling alone and sad and completely helpless to fix either of those things.
  
• write-ups. I know, it's counter-intuitive that school-work would help me feel less overwhelmed. But what's happened is that I'm less afraid to include this emotional response in my weekly reflections. I think that my experience in Psych a few weeks ago (jesus, it seems like a year ago) helped me get a point of comfort, that yes, I am usually able to judge what's appropriate to disclose, and what's inappropriate. And yes, when I say something, and someone looks uncomfortable, it doesn't necessarily mean that I shouldn't have said it - it may mean that they are simply uncomfortable. And no, I shouldn't avoid writing the story about how the nurse said that some parents should be sterilized to me in the break room because I'm scared of getting her in trouble. It's good information for my instructor to have that this is the kind of thing that I'm trying to integrate on a weekly basis. This is an accurate reflection of the level of emotional processing that I am personally doing. Sure, not everyone is having this reaction; who would expect them to? But I am, and that's okay, and I want the prof to know it.
  

The other thing that's been really helping me this week is reading and re-reading the Love Letter to Nursing Students at Head Nurse. I can see myself in some of the things that she is excited about, and I am vicariously proud. A Love Letter to Nurse Preceptors will be forthcoming posthaste.

Smitten Kitchen is feeding me lately with images of amazing food, and reminders that food is something that I love, not just something that means dirty dishes and rotten potatoes. (though rotten potatoes are hands down the most disgusting thing that can happen in a kitchen, I think. You reach in and it looks okay and then you pull it back and it's... not okay. not not not okay.) I've purchased pumpkin and french bread. I cooked a mini pumpkin for dessert last night for the love of pete! I'm considering stuffing some onions! Come on!

speaking of amazing images, these pictures at deputydog are broadening my horizons and making me sit up and drop my shoulders. love love love them. We already talked about the 7 amazing holes list that he has, right?! wow.

Things that are not getting written about this morning - the upcoming parent-principal meeting regarding the kid and his second grade class (still not going well), the fact that I hurt myself with my menstrual cup and feel really annoyed about it, my continual brokeness and the recent crisis proportions, the chance to do an hourlong interview with a grad student doing research on single moms who went to community college and then a four year school, and the upcoming trip for the ANS Mid-Year Convention.

later, tater.

grumble.

I've been working hard to drag myself out of a trip to the sucking thought-spiral of despair for the past couple weeks. I had been feeling sad and lonely, and sort of on the verge of tears - the kid wouldn't go to sleep, I was being a raving angry shrew anytime we were together, and then teared up when he told me he wanted to go spend the night with his dad. That's the first time he's said that, and though I knew it would happen at some point, I just figured that point would be in five years when I wouldn't let him go bungee jumping or something. All my free time had been taken up with writing essays about how super super great of a student and a human being I am so that nameless bureaucrats would award me some money, which other nameless bureaucrats in the Fin Aid office would then process in such a way that I couldn't get my hands on and pay my cell phone bill, which somehow was doubled this month because of usage charges since I was out of class for three weeks and everyday was a holiday!

And then my clinical instructor wrote "Very interesting! Let's discuss!" on the top of my write-up for Psych, and I cried on her when we had our midterm conference. I figured she meant interesting like "I'm speechless with how poorly you have completed this assignment! Let's talk about how you can get some points for this by re-doing it entirely! You actually have no empathy and should consider a new professional track immediately. " I cried, and stammered that it seemed like she was telling me that I didn't listen to my patient, and of course I listened to my patient, I had just written 500 words about how I want to be a nurse because my inherent capacity for empathy and attentive listening that I will provide my patients from traditionally underserved groups.
She suggested that I seek counseling, because as I had shared with the group, these patients and their PTSD and alcohol abuse issues were obviously close to some emotional issues I hadn't yet resolved with my own father. She didn't say anything that I hadn't said in post-conference to the whole group, honestly - she just linked all that I had said to the fact that "I was moved to tears by feedback on my first paper" and said that "my reaction suggested that I have a bit more anxiety about this rotation than I thought I did". She was calm and compassionate. My reaction to her suggestion that I seek counseling, when I had, in fact, sought counseling in the past, and was currently medicating my way through a bout of depression/anxiety, was to instantly feel like I am much crazier than I thought, and that I had embarrassed myself in revealing what it was like to grow up with a father who had PTSD.

In fact, it turns out she wrote that on everyone's paper, because it was the first time any of us had done an IPR (interpersonal recording - patient said, nurse said, was nurse therapeutic, how is patient's diagnosis exhibited?).

What I'm really proud of is how I handled it. Not initially, of course. For three days or so, I mucked around in a shallow pond of self-doubt and pity. I had imaginary conversations with her, and started arguments with my ex-husband about the cell phone bill and our custody arrangement. I told the story of our conversation to any friend that would listen, and filled in any boring places with sarcasm and dramatic analogies. I felt betrayed by this professor, who I had for a class my first semester and for whom I had much respect.

But then, I went for a long walk in the woods on the cross country trail near my house. I took my mp3 player and listened to the Non-Violent Communication files I have saved. I realized how far removed from reality and the present moment I had become lately. I sweated and swang my arms and stomped along the hills of the trail. I ate an entire huge slice of chocolate cake and checked out two discs of Scrubs to watch back to back. I made notecards for the house to remind me to say "I feel --------- because I -------." instead of "You made me really mad!" and "It's none of my business what anyone else thinks of me." and last but not least, "You can't MAKE anyone do anything. You can only make them regret it." And I decided that I had shared my experiences appropriately at the time, and that my embarrassment was about exposing my tears and emotions to my instructor. And that my sense of betrayal was based on an assumption that because I already had a level of comfort with her, that she wouldn't push me at all during this rotation, when I explained that there was some real potential to get sad while talking to veterans that reminded me a lot of my dead father.

I also remembered that each semester so far has had its own teary day. Remember when I burst into tears because of I couldn't inject saline into the hotdog! How much fun was that?! I realized that I thought that the Wellbutrin was going to protect me from emotional outbursts - and decided that I had experienced the emotional equivalent of breakthrough bleedings. I'm actually grateful to know that I can still have super sad experiences while taking the meds; it would be scary to think of never experiencing strong emotions again.

And that when one, who shall nameless, walks around looking for things to mock and deride, then she will get really really good at mocking and derision. And one who is really really good at mocking and derision will be tempted, nay, compelled to occasionally mock and deride herself.

And then I was not an asshole to the kid for one whole afternoon, and made oatmeal cookies with him, which he pronounced "surprisingly delicious".

All is well.

dude. so much to say.

worked all weekend last weekend. skipped class this morning because I stayed up all night watching a disk of House. had a mini-crisis (almost entirely self-created) last week because I hadn't done an assignment that was worth 50 points of a 1000 point class average. At the same time, it was a 6-8 page care plan for a stroke patient - you know, integral skills to have for the field! The stuff that I'll be doing non-stop from here on out in nursing school! eep. Eighteen mini-panic attacks later, I turned it in, not even late, and complete with all five journal articles, cited in APA format. This time the payoff for resolving the drama that I created wasn't so good, didn't really feel worth it. fuckit.

Finally went to Campus Health to put my cloudy, smelly urine in a cup and find out if it's a uti without the pain and burning (i've been symptomatic for about a year now, and have only recently had health insurance and easy access to a clinic to see someone. Can we say functional limitations in healthcare?) Starting cipro today and I even managed to advocate for a follow-up urine sample to be ordered to ease my mind that it is resolved with the drugs.

Signed a lease on a passive solar apartment yesterday - wow oh wow it is cool! big windows, brick floors, W/D, and no pet rent. exactly what I wanted, although not on the side of town I was hoping for.
May is looking a little crazy-making - finals the first week, a much belated birthday party for the kid the second week. The semester starts (with my first clinical rotation!!!) and later that afternoon, I'm leaving for a four day retreat in the mountains in the third week, and then I'll get to pack and move before June 1. sigh. I really don't understand how I've been able to pay a security deposit before the summer fin aid dispersement.

found out this weekend that one of the cool kids from work is going to join the Army for six years. I teared up, and then handed him my address like I was in the third grade and had just found out my family was moving to Georgia. I was embarrassed, and sent this email today. Still a little embarrassing, but it feels resolved now.
Hey R!
I saw you on campus the other day, and realized I could look up your email through the campus directory. I wanted to apologize for throwing a little tantrum the other night. It was such a shock to realize that I wouldn't see you again at work (and since that's the only place I see you of course, then it's not likely that we'll meet again). I was a little surprised at how upset I was, and didn't really know what to say (or what was appropriate to share without being creepy and weird, you know?).
It's odd to think about the loss of a close acquaintance - you are someone that I'm always happy to see, and who I really enjoy talking with. I like the way that you are sarcastic, but not often nasty (probably since I think that I tip that balance too often toward just being rude, as opposed to funny or clever). You manage irony without being an asshole - which is a rare gift, it seems. I think that you're crazy smart and genuinely a sweet person. You remind me of my kid in a way (and I know that's weird to say - and possibly to hear) and that's most of the reason that I was upset to hear you are going into the Army. I don't know anyone personally who is serving in the military right now - and so I'm privileged to be (sarcastically) academic and removed from the whole situation.
My dad was in the Marines, mostly before I was born, and I know that it was important to him to enlist, and to serve his time. I also know that he was a unspeakably different person after having served than he would have been without the experience of service in Vietnam, and I usually think of the loss of innocence, the gain of the burden of seeing horrible things. I don't really have a concept of the other more positive pieces that he spoke about regarding his service - the discipline, the feeling of being a part of something that made a difference, the actual 'service' part of serving the country. I had this irrational hope that time could be just frozen, that we could just talk when I happen to work with you, and talk about how ridiculous the world (and the restaurant) is... The thought of you being at the whim of the nutbags running this country's military takes my breath away, truly. At the same time, I want to say that I support your decision, since I know that you've thought it through carefully, and I feel like you have the strength to handle the experience. Other than having a kid, I've never done something like this that so immediately and profoundly affects my life.
I would be proud if my son grew up to be like you.
I wish you all the best. I'd be happy if we kept in touch - it would be good to know how you are doing.

with love, kati

Yep, it's officially reiterated - I'm a geek.

It's a Big Big World

I was up till 4am reading at Obama's site, watching his YouTubes and typing a letter to him (which was embarrassingly autobiographical, and will need heavy editing before anyone but me and my cats see it). I finally got my copy of The Audacity of Hope from a long hold list at the library, and the library clerk told me that Obama is on her friends list on MySpace. How bizarre. It reminds me a bit of Clinton's sax playing on Saturday Night Live.

More than the intricacies of the internet, I'm a little shocked that politicians have time to write books. As I skim Audacity, I'm feeling grateful that this politician has written a book. It seems like a remedy for the sound bite. The idea of a sound bite offends me in part because I worry that someone (ie the politician) will think that I choose to get my information about a topic in that manner. I'd like the book, instead of the movie trailer. (Unless the trailer is for a two-hour documentary by Al Gore in which he sums up his life work thus far with heart-rending animation of floundering polar bears, in which case the movie will be an acceptable substitute, and the trailer a good teaser.)
An excerpt from The Audacity of Hope that caught me where I stood yesterday:

I understand the frustration of these activists. The ability of Republicans to repeatedly win on the basis of polarizing campaigns is indeed impressive. I recognize the dangers of subtlety and nuance in the face of the conservative movement's passionate intensity. And in my mind, at least, there are a host of Bush Administration policies that justify righteous indignation.
Ultimately, though, I believe any attempt by Democrats to pursue a more sharply partisan and ideological strategy misapprehends the moment we're in. I am convinced that whenever we exaggerate or demonize, oversimplify or overstate our case, we lose. Whenever we dumb down the political debate, we lose. For it's precisely the pursuit of ideological purity, the rigid orthodoxy and the sheer predictability of our current political debate, that keeps us from finding new ways to meet the challenges we face as a country. It's what keeps us locked in "either/or" thinking; the notion that we can have only big government or no government, the assumption that we must either tolerate forty-six million without health insurance or embrace "socialized medicine."
It is such doctrinaire thinking and stark partisanship that have turned Americans off of politics. This is not a problem for the right; a polarized electorate - or one that easily dismisses both parties because of the nasty dishonest tone of the debate - works perfectly well for those who seek to chip away at the very idea of government. After all, a cynical electorate is a self-centered electorate.

Typing this out made me read much more carefully! I hadn't seen how skillfully he enumerates the tactics of the Republican party, while ostensibly discussing the habits that thoughtful citizens should avoid. And on my first and second reading of this passage, I kept thinking of that study about how narcissistic college students these days are.
But on this reading, I'm struck by how he has captured the feeling that I have when I hear Cheney say things like "The American people won't tolerate a policy of retreat." Actually, that's exactly what I'd like to request, sir, and furthermore, it makes me feel hopeless, excluded, and insulted to hear my exact sentiments negated. Yes, I feel Cheney is still dangerous. He's certainly dangerous in a foreign policy sort of way, but he's also psychologically dangerous to Americans, when he reinforces ideas that are not held by the majority, with that nasty sneering tone that dares anyone to countermand him. It's bullying, and it makes me feel useless.

I've used up my blog time getting all these links (why can't research papers be written with links instead of those pesky citations!), and I haven't got time to wax poetic about political crushes. I need to think that one through anyway before I post it - it may be a bit heterocentric.

And I need to remember to add Suzette Haden Elgin's LJ to my links, as she is certainly one of my Favorites. Check out the entry on March 4th. Good stuff. She makes me want to make new words.

hmmph.

so. still awake. now, instead of blaming the quart of coffee I had today, I'm staying up to keep an ear out on the kid. (he is breathing much more regularly and quietly now. regular is good but quiet is not, since it makes it harder to know if it's regular, for fuck's sake.)

the mania i was whining about a week or so ago - thinking I was signing up for too many things, setting myself up to fail, stretching myself thin, the cliches are endless and all boring - well, it looks different to me now. Calling it mania seemed histrionic, even at the time.

there was a whiff of inauthenticity about it. even in my own head. i'm not really scared that i'm going to sign up for too many things and not be able to do them. that's possible. fine. that's even happened before. cool. i'm scared that I will say out loud in a crowd of some sort - I can do this thing! and screrch the music stops and everyone looks and waits for me to do the thing. well.

this is true of any role I have ever taken on or currently hold. mother, student, queer person, writer, smart person, sarcastic bitch, teenager, spiritual woman, aware to the immensity of the horror and the beauty of the world. i sense that there's a right way to do that, to be that, and the fear and the judgment starts immediately that i'm not doing it well.

and the moment that the music stops is the moment that i lose the connection with the present moment. you know, like literally, i'm bopping along to the music, really feeling it, and rip - gone. bereft. The Void.

So, I think that I was calling the lack of presence, the lack of attention, being in the costume but not in the moment, going along acting like my heart isn't broken open, trying to say that I can't do but so much, trying to call out of work in advance of even being scheduled the shift - calling that mania. because it feels all fast and scary, like i've done a thing that is too much, said a thing that can't be unsaid, actually articulated a desire or some shit like that.

and my last web-based expedition this evening led me to inga's site. and this excerpt from her book, which really synthesizes a lot of what i've been reading, thinking, hearing , singing and seeing lately:

An acquaintance and I were talking about this just the other day. He was telling me that he hunkers down into his daily life scheme of things because he cannot deal with all the horror in this world. I told him that I cannot live like that. He thought I was full of shit. “You can’t take in all that stuff,” he insisted. “It will drive you insane.”

But I disagreed. I hear this sentiment often, in a variety of forms.

Your average pissed-off citizen in the U.S. is willing to fight for three or four “causes,” maybe, but the line’s gotta be drawn somewhere.

When you’re present in the world you don’t just see one or the other. The horror and beauty go hand in hand. Even as this environment breaks your heart, the world fuels, protects, instructs, inspires, guides, and gently humors you.

So things balance out.

The whole excerpt is worth the read. seriously. This is deeper, bigger and wider to me than 'we're all desensitized to the horror and destruction around us and it's perfectly normal to feel hopeless' idea that i have held for many years. I have thought many times that the reason I was all of a sudden feeling so overwhelmed, tired, full of despair, was that I was taking on too much that wasn't mine. that i would go insane if I tried. that it was good self-care not to take stuff in. (and i do believe deep in my heart that is good self-care not to take in the medical emergencies on Discovery Health and the random tragedies that the folks at work want to wring their hands about for entertainment. that's self-serving melodrama.)

this is a way to re-think the idea that i can't work on all the causes I want to because i'm so busy paying the bills or going to class or raising the kid. that feels like a cop-out and it is. If I'm truly present in paying the bills, going to class and raising the kid, I may not be able to show up at a committee meeting for some non-profit. But being fully present (in the world, not the environment, is the HUGE distinction that inga is making here) IS working on the causes/issues that are important to me.
it's true that I'm interested in more things than I'm passionate about, and sometimes i latch onto the interest, and subsequent lack of follow-thru, as a nice-n-sneaky way to say i'm not good enough. Add it to the list of things I haven't done adequately or haven't done at all. oh, me. i can take in that star that was twinkling directly at me last night. the world, not the environment.

i swear, next week, i won't have a single deep thought. i'll watch wallace and grommit all weekend and expunge all of the cathartic self-examination* from my communication, web-based or verbal. no no. i can't mean that. i can't start talking about how this is all because of my impending period, or whathaveyou. it IS true for me that I'm full of this stuff lately, and it IS true that that's embarrassing to say out loud, and it IS true that I'm honored when others are willing to say shit like this. perhaps it should be a little more internal dialog and a little less internet rambling in the wee hours of the morning. shrug. if this was livejournal, i'd throw it behind the cut so noone had to scroll thru it. and this is all very rough draft, stream of consciousness. (what isn't at 2am?)

it's important to talk about love and imagination and what it feels like when your heart breaks open. look away if you're embarrassed by it; that's what I always did when my mom embarrassed me.



* from rob brezny's free will astrology

Leo Horoscope for week of February 22, 2007

You're strong medicine these days, Leo. You're 100-proof mojo. You might want to consider pinning a warning label to your shirt or jacket. It could say something like "Caution: Contents are hot, slippery, and under pressure. Use at your own risk." It's not that you're evil or neurotic. It's just that as you revisit and revision your deepest psychosexual questions, you have so much cathartic potency that you're likely to transform everything you touch into a more authentic version of itself. People with weak egos will be afraid of that, while those with strong constitutions will love it.