Day 677: Pink

I woke up this Saturday morning — not completely in the pink — but knowing that “Pink” was my title for today’s post.

In case you don’t know what “In the Pink” means, here’s the definition:

in the pink

in very good health and spirits.
synonyms: in good health, very healthy, very well, hale and hearty.

I think that definition comes from Google, but I’m not sure.

I feel more in the pink when I include facts in my posts I’m certain about, and I’m sure the following images of “pink” are from a Google search:

(This Pink image lives here)

(This pink and Marilyn-y image lives here, supposedly)

(This pink and beard-y image lives here, for some reason)

When I look for images with Google, I am sometimes tickled pink, and I am also often having other feelings that do NOT have colors assigned to them. For example, I am now confused (insert any color, here, you think would fit) about:

• how Google decides which images to show me  (like, for instance, most of the images that came up  for “pink,” just now, were of the singer Pink, or P!nk, which might be representative of the culture’s focus on celebrity),
• why a man with a pink beard would appear on a web page that seems, to me, to be about Australia and cars,
• how every time I use Google to search for images these days, it seems a little different and slightly more difficult (but that might just be me), and
• where the pink ribbons are, which I expected to see early on, in this Google Image search.

Let’s see if I can find any pink ribbons, in those returns of my Google Image Search.

As I’m searching, for that expected pink ribbon, I’m finding many, many more images of P!nk, plus

(this pink and Starbucks-y image lives here)

(this pink and Jennifer Lopez-y image lives here)

(This image lives here on YouTube)

(This image lives here)

(This image lives here)

That last image is close to what I was expecting to find, but not exactly.

I’m now feeling a little pink or blue or green or red or white or whatever color we might assign to impatience, since I thought this part of my post would be very quick to write.

Okay, I’m going to dive back into that sea of pink images again, to see if I can find that pink ribbon.

(this image lives here)

(this image lives here)

I think this search might be endless, actually.  I know I could find the pink-ribbon image I’m looking for, by doing a Google Search on “pink ribbon,” but color me stubborn, as I try one more time (even though, at this point, it feels like looking for a needle in a pink haystack).

(that image lives here, on YouTube) (and by the way, if you’re looking for a music video in my post today, click on that link, and you’ll find it)

Okay. I give up.  You’ll just have to imagine or search for a pink ribbon, on your own.

If you read this blog on a regular basis, you might notice I don’t often give up. However, today, all these pink digressions have distracted me from what I thought I was going to write about

Which was ….? (And what color might we assign to the state of distraction?)

In order to pick up the pink thread I started here this morning, here’s my first sentence, which I wrote about an hour ago:

I woke up this Saturday morning — not completely in the pink — but knowing that “Pink” was my title for today’s post.

Why am I not completely in the pink, this morning?

I’m not entirely sure, dear readers. I mean, there are a lot of things in my life I feel tickled pink about these days, including:

• the growing success of my therapy groups at work,
• how much help it is, for me, to write these daily blog posts,
• how many friends I have — in the blog-o-sphere and in the life-o-sphere — including  (1) Louise Gallagher who confused Black Sabbath with Pink Sabbath in her comment about my post yesterday and (2) Mark, my co-worker, who has appeared here and here and also in this photo I haven’t posted yet:

Mark pink-papers Ann.

That was the caption Mark and I came up with for that photo, which I took when I was making copies for my sold-out presentation about The Koplow Method of Group Therapy, two weekends ago.

But NOW I have to explain what “Pink Paper” means, in that caption.

Actually, a photo I took yesterday, in my office, might  help make this crystal (is that a color?) clear.

Arrrghh! I haven’t up-loaded my photos from yesterday yet, and now color me hungry.  I wonder if there’s any pink food around for me, to eat?

Close enough. I also have some pink grapefruit juice, but I am not stopping to take a photo of that.

Where was I?

Oh, yes! Looking for that pink-paper photo, from yesterday. Here it is (mixed in with some other colors):

We really need to come up with a color for confusion, because I’m assuming all my readers are that color, right now.

Let’s see if I can help with that, even just a little.  Here’s the definition of “pink paper” which is, apparently, a local, Massachusetts expression:

House Bill 4681, an Act to Improve Emergency Access to Mental Health Services (Section 12 Law) was passed by the legislature and signed into law by Governor Patrick. As of November 8, 2010, LICSWs in the Commonwealth of Massachusetts will be authorized to sign a Section 12(a), known as a “pink paper.” A pink paper is the mechanism by which a LICSW moves to hospitalize an individual believed to meet the criteria for civil commitment. A LICSW may order that a mentally ill individual be restrained and taken to a hospital in the belief that failure to hospitalize would create a likelihood of serious harm by reason of mental illness.

Examples of situations where a Section 12 might be appropriate include:

• Suicidality
• Homicidality
• Markedly impaired judgment due to mental illness to such an extent that a person is unable to protect himself/herself.

— The National Association of Social Workers (Massachusetts chapter) web site

Thank goodness, I have had to “pink paper” very few people, in my years practicing as a Licensed Independent Clinical Social Worker in Massachusetts. And when I have, these were situations where I truly believed people would be much safer, because of my action.

I’m wondering, again, what colors might be in your face as you read this portion of my post. If you have thoughts or feelings about any of this, I hope you know you can comment, freely.

I’m also aware that I still haven’t told you why I’m not completely in the pink today.

Well, I had a phone conversation with my cardiologist, Dr. Salem, yesterday.

Doesn’t Dr. Salem (who last appeared in this blog post) look pink and friendly in that photo?

These days, I am seeing Dr. Salem once every three months, so we can pay more attention to my very unusual heart (which might have some pink in it, but is probably mostly red, although, I can’t really say, not having seen my own heart, but believe me, some surgeons saw the color of it, up close and personal, when I was a little kid, when I had two heart surgeries, for pacemaker implants, which needed to be sewn directly onto the heart, back in the 1960’s).

Somewhere in that long and winding parentheses, above, lies a pink thread to why I am not completely in the pink today. In my phone conversation with Dr. Salem yesterday, we spoke about the  distinct-as-pink possibility of my needing heart surgery again, for a valve replacement.

How distinct-as-pink IS that possibility?

Honestly, I think Dr. Salem and I really have no idea, because of my oh-so-unusual heart. All we really know is that:

• climbing stairs is increasingly difficult for me (which could mean lots of things and not necessarily that I’ll need heart surgery) and
• every three months, we shall track the colors, size, and other important attributes of my heart.

I’ll end with some good news, I think …

All my toes and my fingers are pink!

Thanks to all who made it through this pink and many-other-colored post, today.  I think you deserve … a ribbon!

(pink ribbon, but not the kind of pink ribbon I was looking for before, found here)