President’s Message:
The 53rd Annual STC Conference and the Fear Factor

by Debbie Kerr, President

In my last message, I told you that we all had nothing to fear but fear itself, and that the only thing that held us back from greatness was not facing our fears. Well, it turns out that my fear of the unknown was founded. Some bad luck turned this article from the “Fear Factor” to “The Good, The Bad, and The Ugly”. Unfortunately, for the purposes of this article, “The Ugly” has to be presented first or you can’t truly appreciate what is good and bad.

The Ugly

Shortly after attending the Leadership Day on May 7, I was eating some crackers on my bed in my hotel room when I experienced excruciating pain. When I say pain, I mean pain on the same level as labour pain, for those who have experienced it. I told my husband that I had to go to the hospital, and he called the front desk to call an ambulance. Suddenly there were about eight extra people in my room—security from the hotel and paramedics. Luckily we had purchased medical insurance, and by the time the paramedics arrived, my husband had talked to the insurance company on the phone and knew there was a specific hospital that they wanted me to go to. It was, of course, different than where the paramedics wanted me to go. My two children, who are 14 and 10, stayed at the hotel room, and my husband came with me in the ambulance. The security guard at the hotel would check on the children from time to time.

I laid in emergency for hours beside some woman who was on drugs and watched as someone was brought in with a self-inflicted gunshot wound. I wasn't allowed to drink anything, and my lips were now sticking to my teeth so when they asked me anything they couldn't understand me when I tried to answer.

I had lots of tests, but it wasn't until after midnight that they diagnosed that I had a ruptured appendix and that they would have to operate. The 40-minute surgery took nearly an hour and a half and when it was all done the surgeon drove my husband back to the hotel once I was safely in my room. I don’t think you would see that in Canada.

I then spent from May 8 (the first day of speakers at the conference) to May 12 (the day we had our flight booked to come home) recovering in the hospital.

The Good

While I worried about flying, the pain I experienced when I flew the last time (over 20 years ago) was no longer there, and the kids really enjoyed their first flying experience—aside from the delay taking off from both Detroit (baggage door) and Las Vegas (high winds).

Leadership Day

I got to attend Leadership Day. It was great to put some faces to names. It made me laugh (to myself) to think of how passionate I get about technical writing in general, and then have Rob Moran, the acting Executive Director, say, as a third party looking at the society as a whole, that if nothing else, people are very passionate about what they do. It seems that technical communication and passion go hand in hand and that I am not special in any way. I also got to meet the new Executive Director. She seems very down to earth and very easy to talk to. She is very interested in what you have to say. I attended a lot of sessions where STC Head Office seemed to be truly listening, and the people from the communities were certainly providing their feedback.

Old Friends

The first person familiar face I saw at Leadership Day was Nancy Halverson. For those who read our newsletter, you know that she is the person who writes the great articles about life in England. It was great to see her again and speak to her before she lost her voice. She was busy promoting the Region 2 Conference, and I was proud to wear one of her promotional peel-offs until I faded from the scene. I think I got sick the moment I removed the Region 2 peel-off from my shirt. That’s one of the last things I remember doing.

New Friends

Valerie Ball is one of the people with whom I judged at the International Competition. I was supposed to meet with her at the Welcome Reception on May 7. She was one of my main concerns when I was going by ambulance to the hospital, because I really wanted to meet this person. We had only exchanged e-mails and talked once by conference call, but I had really looked forward to meeting her at the conference.

When my husband told Valerie why I was unable to meet with her, this special lady took the time to take a cab ride to the hospital and brought presents for both my family and me. I didn’t even know whom she was when she walked through the door, but her gesture of kindness was one of the highlights of my week.

Familiar Voices

Fei Min Lorente and Margie Yundt called to ensure that I was on the mend, and to see if there was anything that they could do for me. When you are in a hospital in a strange land, hearing a familiar voice is always welcome and appreciated.

Family Fun

My husband and kids did do some family vacation activities. They would have done other things if we had all been together, but it wasn’t a total waste. They did go to the Sahara and test drive Corvettes and Hummers. They did go and see the sharks at Mandalay Bay. I did walk through Caesars Palace and watch the Bellagio fountains. My husband took a lot of great pictures, so can I see things through the lens of a camera.

Dancing Fountains at the Bellagio

Medical Coverage

Who would have thought those few extra dollars would have made such a big difference? With all the drugs I was one when I first went in the hospital, some of the dreams I had had to do with the hospital bill. It was like a bad PowerPoint presentation that kept playing over and over again. I was worried that some how we would be paying for my stay, and I knew it wouldn’t be cheap.

Travel Agent

Since we hadn’t traveled in so many years, we decided to book everything through a travel agent instead of online. For us this was a blessing. With a travel agent, we had someone that we were in touch with regularly. It was great to have a familiar voice to talk to when everything seemed to be falling apart.

Flight Times

On the bright side, since we had booked extra days to do family stuff after the conference, we didn’t have to change our flight to accommodate when I could get out of the hospital.

The Bad

This was my first STC Conference, even though I have been in the business for over 20 years. There was a great line up of speakers, and I was really looking forward to many of the sessions. Although I know there will be other ones, I know this was a missed opportunity.

Health Care

People have asked me what the health care system is like in the States compared to Canada. On the plus side for the States, parking, at least in Nevada hospitals, is free. As for the actual service, it is like here; you have your good ones and you have your bad ones. While we have RNAs here, they have CNAs. One CNA I had, named Ester, was great and was my benchmark for what all CNAs should be. Unfortunately, no one else was nearly as good as her. In fact, many others made me feel inhuman, and gave me even more incentive to leave the hospital as soon as possible.

Diets

I will never understand how diets work in the hospital and how they can be remotely healthy. I wasn’t to drink anything for days, so I got ice chips and got to dip this sponge into the ice and rub the water around in my mouth. I then progressed to clear liquids, which were more like pure sugar. I could drink concentrated juices, ice desserts, Jello, and some broth. They told me that my glucose levels were high and I told them if you were being fed pure syrup, what they think would happen to them? When I was told I could eat solids, they told me I could go directly from clear fluids to lasagna. I asked them for a turkey sandwich instead. The logic is just beyond me.

The Sum of the Parts

While I am not eager to get on plane right now, people remind me that I have one less organ to worry about. The trip did not turn out exactly as planned, but it was not all bad either. It could have been better, but it could have been worse. I have faced a whole new set of fears, and I have survived.

Just think of those little things you were afraid to try. Surely after this story they don’t seem so insurmountable now.

One conclusion you will have to draw on your own was whether my failing to see Margie in her neon spandex with her trolls was a "good", "bad" or "ugly" experience. I couldn't decide on my own where to put that one.

About Debbie Kerr

In the 20 years that Debbie has been writing documentation, she has worked in a variety of industries: government, retail, software, and insurance. She is currently employed at The Economical Insurance Group in Waterloo, where she has stepped out of her traditional role of writing user guides and help files, and now writes a variety of specifications.

Debbie has been a member of the STC since 1994 and has been a council member for many years. Most recently she was The Quill editor for two years.