9 Ampoules

[butterflydreaming]

It took me an hour to figure out why a cabinet was labeled "butterflies".

I have a viceral, maybe primative dislike for giving up my blood, but I started my day at the hospital lab. I'm a weasel about fasting, so I'd been putting it off. (One of the tests was for cholesterol.) Again, Virginia Mason is a dandy place. The nurse was accurate with her needle, kind, and amused that I was quietly averting my eyes from the blood being taken from me. Instead, I was reading the labels on the cabinet doors in the hall. In my mind I had the incongruous image of Blue Morphos and Black Swallowtails preserved in cases, like one of the displays at Ancient Grounds.

This is only the second time I've ever had blood taken, and never so much. Ah, well. I think I'm a little closer to blood donation now. I don't even know my type, for certain.

In the plastic ampoules, it wasn't as pretty as I think of it. It's potent color, subdued and contained, lacked the violence of other times, small cuts or scratches that welled out bright, liquid jewels. Instead, it was ordinary. That's all right. In giving it up, I would rather have it stripped of poetry and symbolism.

Comments

[mimerki.livejournal.com]

I always rather liked the color of blood in the ampoules, all dark and stately.

A good nurse is used to the idea that people don't like giving blood. She tells you that it will only hurt about as much as getting your ears pierced, and asks if you want to lie down or need a cool cloth on your neck. Even those of us who don't need either of those things (I have fat juicy veins) are grateful for those nurses.

[laurus-nobilis.livejournal.com]

It doesn't bother me to see blood (you get used to it when you're surrounded with children...), and I've done some things that are usually considered "gross" like dissecting a few animals, but I still have to look away when they're taking my blood. I wonder why that happens. It's not that I'm not used to it, either; my mum has thyroid problems so my sister and I went to quite a bit of blood analyses ourselves.

The one time I gave blood, for my grandfather's knee operation, I ended up so dizzy that they stuffed me with sugar afterwards. That was my first and last sugar high. ;)

[tsukikage85.livejournal.com]

I'm so scared of needles I now hyperventilate at the scent of rubbing and other alcohols. I've even fainted twice. ^^;