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First Aid and a rye whisky cocktail
Nov. 7th, 2008 01:09 amTotally bizarre thing today: I'm sitting in the DMP, headphones in and reading, and about 5 minutes after the 3:30 class timeslot has started, an instructor runs in. He's obviously very agitated, unnerved, and he says "A girl in my class, she fainted -- she fainted, she -- she's fainting..." Before I even really realize what I'm doing, I'm running down the hall, dragging the instructor behind me.
I get into the room, and it's pretty obvious who the victim* is: she's sitting, shoulders slumped, pale (and maybe a little ashen, but that might be my memory adding some choice ornamentation), and her entire torso and lap are covered in red. There was something red hanging out of her mouth. She didn't respond to my voice, or to a firm shoulder-shake, so I told the instructor to call emergency services. While I was feeling for a pulse, she suddenly came to, and seemed... well, honestly, fine, other than being shaken. Anyway, I'm barking off information to the instructor, you know, "she's just regained consciousness, seems aware, breathing normally..." She went to the bathroom with another girl to rinse out her mouth, and walked out of the building on her own power in the company of EMS. The red, so far as I can tell, wasn't blood -- she had had a turkey sandwich and a salad, so maybe it was a raspberry vinaigrette, or something.
Anyway, this isn't really about her, but about me. And I don't mean it was about my heroism, or something ridiculous like that. Really, it's about the power and importance of First Aid training. I've been receiving First Aid training in one form or another since I was... probably ten or so. So when an emergent situation arose, I didn't have to think, didn't have to freak out. I *knew* what to do, and I was able to remain calm, and keep everyone else calm.
Everyone should receive first aid training. Everyone. It should be required in schools, in workplaces. This situation wasn't terribly wretched, but it could have been, and I feel confident that I could have handled that, too, but that's not because I'm anyone special. It's because I've been trained, which is an empowering experience. And if the instructor in question had training, then he, too, could have responded just as ably; the experience wouldn't have been so upsetting for him and his class.
I don't know where I'm going with this, except that I'm grateful in this experience, as I have been in other prior experiences, for the various authority figures who have compelled me to receive what training I have.
*This term seems odd here, since she was the victim OF any act, but the only other possibility I can think of is 'patient', and that seems inappropriate, too, since I'm not a medical professional. Hell, I realized after this was all over that my Red Cross First Aid lapsed over this past summer, so I'm not even technically cert'd in that.
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In other news, I had a lovely cocktail this evening. I got a bottle of Old Overholt on Tuesday (only $14!), because I had a craving for rye whisky. I found a recipe for the Bone cocktail here, and adapted it slightly according to convenience and on-hand ingredients:
2 oz. rye whisky
1 scant teaspoon 1:1 simple syrup (my current batch happens to be ginger-infused, which was kinda nice)
1 teaspoon lemon juice
2 dashes Angostura bitters
1-2 dashes Tabasco
Mix in rocks glass; add 2 ice cubes. Slam quickly if you must, but I liked to sip it in a hot bath with a reading of Paulo Freire's "The Pedagogy of the Oppressed," which was a perfect situation except for the Freire.
I get into the room, and it's pretty obvious who the victim* is: she's sitting, shoulders slumped, pale (and maybe a little ashen, but that might be my memory adding some choice ornamentation), and her entire torso and lap are covered in red. There was something red hanging out of her mouth. She didn't respond to my voice, or to a firm shoulder-shake, so I told the instructor to call emergency services. While I was feeling for a pulse, she suddenly came to, and seemed... well, honestly, fine, other than being shaken. Anyway, I'm barking off information to the instructor, you know, "she's just regained consciousness, seems aware, breathing normally..." She went to the bathroom with another girl to rinse out her mouth, and walked out of the building on her own power in the company of EMS. The red, so far as I can tell, wasn't blood -- she had had a turkey sandwich and a salad, so maybe it was a raspberry vinaigrette, or something.
Anyway, this isn't really about her, but about me. And I don't mean it was about my heroism, or something ridiculous like that. Really, it's about the power and importance of First Aid training. I've been receiving First Aid training in one form or another since I was... probably ten or so. So when an emergent situation arose, I didn't have to think, didn't have to freak out. I *knew* what to do, and I was able to remain calm, and keep everyone else calm.
Everyone should receive first aid training. Everyone. It should be required in schools, in workplaces. This situation wasn't terribly wretched, but it could have been, and I feel confident that I could have handled that, too, but that's not because I'm anyone special. It's because I've been trained, which is an empowering experience. And if the instructor in question had training, then he, too, could have responded just as ably; the experience wouldn't have been so upsetting for him and his class.
I don't know where I'm going with this, except that I'm grateful in this experience, as I have been in other prior experiences, for the various authority figures who have compelled me to receive what training I have.
*This term seems odd here, since she was the victim OF any act, but the only other possibility I can think of is 'patient', and that seems inappropriate, too, since I'm not a medical professional. Hell, I realized after this was all over that my Red Cross First Aid lapsed over this past summer, so I'm not even technically cert'd in that.
---------------
In other news, I had a lovely cocktail this evening. I got a bottle of Old Overholt on Tuesday (only $14!), because I had a craving for rye whisky. I found a recipe for the Bone cocktail here, and adapted it slightly according to convenience and on-hand ingredients:
2 oz. rye whisky
1 scant teaspoon 1:1 simple syrup (my current batch happens to be ginger-infused, which was kinda nice)
1 teaspoon lemon juice
2 dashes Angostura bitters
1-2 dashes Tabasco
Mix in rocks glass; add 2 ice cubes. Slam quickly if you must, but I liked to sip it in a hot bath with a reading of Paulo Freire's "The Pedagogy of the Oppressed," which was a perfect situation except for the Freire.
