Noxious

Noxious- adj- harmful, poisonous, or very unpleasant.

A couple of weeks ago, the regional director of the Department of Health came to Summerville.  The purpose of his visit that day was to inspect the office and make sure everything was in order before the new state director came to tour our facility.  Halfway through his tour, he came to my office and noticed the terrific job the inmates from the local detention center had done painting my office.  (They painted AROUND my desk and a 2’ x 3’ poster that has since been removed from my office).  As he left the office, he talked about the need to paint the entire health department, but then laughed as he said, “and as soon as I do that, I’ll get twenty complaints about the smell of the paint.”

After he left, I was thinking about what he said and decided it was a little ridiculous that we would complain that much about a positive change, particularly after we had complained so much about the terrible paint job in the past.  So when we found out we were getting new flooring put in the office, I decided I would not complain about any noxious smells involved with the new flooring.

Thursday after lunch, we began the cleaning process.  Everything in our offices had to be removed- every last piece of paper, every random toy we had for the kids, and all the furniture.  As you can imagine, there was dust everywhere.  To combat the dust, there were no less than four cans of generic Pledge floating around the office, and the sound of aerosol spray being released was constant for those several hours we spent cleaning.  But I was not going to complain about the migraine-inducing lemon and orange vapor cloud that was hanging in the hallway like everyone else was.

Friday morning, the first thing the workers did was tear up the old carpeting.  Ten years of dirty shoes, spilled juice, and infant bowel movements and spit-up (its happened more than once) were in that carpet, so it certainly didn’t smell the best.  But I was just happy the carpet was leaving, so I wasn’t going to complain.

Apparently there were a few spots that needed to be leveled out, so some kind of weird cement-like compound was mixed and placed on the floor.  It smelled like limestone and they carried the open container of the mixture through the office for a good half hour. I was good though, I ignored my co-workers comments about the smell and kept on working.

The worst part of the process for a lot of my co-workers was the adhesive that was used for the tiles.  I’ll admit, it wasn’t that pleasant, but since we were now less than one hour away from having new, clean flooring, I wasn’t saying a word to detract from this great joy.

All day long, everyone who stopped by my office had something to say about the smell.  It was just like talking about the weather: “Hey, did you see they got the carpet out of Sharon’s room? But that smell is overpowering.”  “Wow, Wynne’s room looks a lot brighter with that new flooring. I hope that smell goes away by Monday”  It’s just what we said as we made our way through the day.

Finally, about four, my co-worker came around with my last client’s chart.  “Aren’t you bothered by that smell?  I can’t stand it!  Why couldn’t they do it on Saturday?  I’m going outside to get some fresh air before I get sick.”  As I took a breath and opened my mouth to start my speech about being happy that we were getting new floors and not complaining about the smell, I choked on the heavy floral scent of her hand lotion.

After my brief coughing fit ended, we ended up staring at each other for a few seconds while she waited for my response to her statement.  Several different thoughts ran through my mind, including the original speech about not complaining and a different speech about her hand lotion.  Finally, upon realizing the absurdity of complaining about smells to a woman complaining about smells, I smiled my best smile and said, “Why don’t we walk outside and get some fresh air?”

All’s well that ends well- the new floors are all in and there’s no sign of any painting in the near future, so we’re not likely to encounter any noxious smells anytime soon, save for some dirty diapers here and there.

Well, it’s ninety degrees outside right now and I want to go swim, so that is what I’m off to do!  Have a wonderful week.  Good luck to my friends who have finals coming up, Happy Birthday to my Grandpa Henry, and to everyone else- have a fun Monday at work!