PLAYERS TASKS PRAXIS TEAMS EVENTS
Username:Password:
New player? Sign Up Here
Monty Fuller
Level 1: 10 points
Alltime Score: 225 points
Last Logged In: July 16th, 2008


retired

20 + 85 points

Qualia Feast by Monty Fuller

June 10th, 2008 5:56 AM

INSTRUCTIONS: Document, using text and media, the existence of "raw feels" or qualia, instances of the 'what it is like' character of mental states (i.e. pain, seeing red, smelling a rose), that cannot be communicated, or apprehended by any other means than direct experience.

Okay so I dont know if this counts because the description says 'use text and media' but I cant really think of any media I can use for this, but I think I know of something i can use.
Anyway here is my experience, and here is what I'm trying to describe.
As I've said before, I work in a hospital. A gentleman was standing at my desk and was asking for a wheelchair, earlier today, for his wife, and some help getting her out of the car. I asked him what the matter was with her, and he said "I don't know, she started shaking at home, and fell to the floor. It was all I could do to get her into the car."
I thought about it for a moment, and as i've also stated before, I work at a hospital but I have no medical credentials, but I work at the admissions desk at a hospital.
From my limited knowledge, I knew one of two things, she either had a seizure, which wasn't likely because she should be conscious, but, knowing her age, about seventy or eighty years old, it sounded more like a stroke.
I followed the gentleman out to the front entrance with a wheelchair, and to his car. He opened the passenger side door, and there she was, slumped over in her seat, unmoving. And her eyes weren't moving either. Her leg just kept twitching, but it seemed like a calculated twitch, almost like it was her only way of trying to escape her own body. She was scraping her foot on the ground, like a skateboarder might do. It was eerie.
I helped the man get her into the chair. She must have weighed a hundred pounds. She was scarily thin, and very pale. After seeing people come and go through a hospital everyday, you can usually tell when someones not gonna make it.
I helped the man wheel his helpless wife into the Emergency room, but I had to do so slowly, because, she was twitching her leg, and it was now becoming a hinderance to moving her. So I had to, essentially, push the wheelchair, with the motion of her foot pushing off the ground, almost like she was skateboarding in the wheelchair.
I had to leave the gentleman and his poor wife to let the medical professionals handle it. However, she did have a stoke, and was in a coma when we wheeled her in.
A couple hours ago I checked the computer system, and she had passed away.
What was the most disturbing thing was the woman's husband knew. As I was wheeling her into the ER, he said to me, "More than fifty years... I guess it was a good run..."
I dont know what this story conveys, or if my horrible writing conveys it well, but I think 'sadness' and 'tradgedy' may be some.
I'm gonna include a included a picture of the wheelchair, I dont know what other media to include other than maybe a link to a wiki on strokes and comas?
Lemme know if I did this one properly, thanks.

- smaller

0609081744.jpg

0609081744.jpg

I had to take this picture in the back room, since, due to patient confidentiality, you cant take pictures inside the hospital, not as an employee at least, and being at the front desk, security has us on camera at all times to make sure they see any bad/suspicious visitors first



17 vote(s)



Terms

(none yet)

5 comment(s)

(no subject)
posted by ENØ Bli33ard on June 10th, 2008 6:19 AM

Quite moving.

(no subject)
posted by GYØ Ben on June 10th, 2008 7:54 AM

This is the first praxis to actually get me welled up. Great completion.

Qualias are made visible by words, like smoke and traveling light
posted by susy derkins on June 10th, 2008 5:09 PM

You got the whole "raw feelings-rich" story into that wheelchair image: I´ll be thinking on feet doing skateboard motions next time I see one. The "I don´t know she started shaking at home" in the context of the "but I think I do know" that went inside your head. Hat is way off.
I´m so happy to have written this task

(no subject)
posted by teucer on June 10th, 2008 6:27 PM

I've done this task, and I still don't know what qualia really are. But the strong sense of feeling there is amazing. Thank you.

(no subject)
posted by Evil Sugar on June 12th, 2008 12:26 PM

This is a beautiful expression of sadness. It captures the frailty of life and the inevitability of death. The man's comment that fifty years had been a good run changes the entire experience. It is one thing to read this story thinking that the man came to the hospital with hope that his wife would be saved, but the story becomes a different shade of sadness knowing that he knew his efforts were futile.

The gummies applaud you for your efforts here. It is a very moving completion.