driftfleet | (no subject)

Who: Beverly Crusher and Friends!
Broadcast: No
Action: Blue Fish
When: October 13th

[Dr. Beverly Crusher, Personal Log, October 13, Seventh Month after arrival. Today is my birthday.

Theoretically.

With a sigh, Beverly stops typing. Normally, she is all about birthdays, both her own and everyone else's but today... frankly, today is weird. By her own calendar, her birthday should have been two months ago, yet time isn't flowing normally back home. Or time isn't flowing here normally. Or something. Damn alternate universes. And does it even matter when no one is aging anyway? She rubs her temples. This is too much to think about before breakfast (though admittedly, the vagaries of traveling through spacetime are better to focus on than the fact that there is no one from home to celebrate with in the first place).

Once she has some coffee in her, she comes to a decision. Real birthday or not, she's going to give herself a little holiday. Which means people aren't going to be seeing her around the dusty moon, or much at all really. After taking a nice long hot bath, and changing, for once, into something other than the fleet issued jumpsuits, she spends most of the day in her quarters, reading and listening to old letters on her tricorder. Even if she can't be with them today, she at least wants to hear Wesley and Jean-Luc and Deanna, surround herself with their voices. It doesn't make her as sad as it once did. Instead, she finds the recordings comforting, for the most part.

Late in the afternoon, however, she will emerge to set up shop in the kitchen where she's going to bake herself a cake! If anyone wants to find her (or that yummy smelling cake), that's where she'll be, humming a jazzy little tune as she cooks.]

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

Yeah... at least we all have that much in common. And oddly, I find it easy to relate to people when they're my patients, but outside of that? Not so much.

No... that makes sense to me. When someone comes to the clinic, there are very clear roles: you're the doctor, they're the patient. There are usually pre-established expectations of what those roles entail and you're both working towards the same goal, so it's easier to know how to act.

Yeah... that's a good way of putting it. And when people are sick or in pain, sometimes they can't even speak to me beyond expressing that. So when I'm in that mindset, and have a specific thing to talk about and a goal to focus on... it's easier to navigate than just chatting to a stranger. [She laughed nervously.] I know... I need to just go out and do it. Stop feeling so self-conscious, you know?

But easier said than done, isn't it?

It is- and when I don't do it, when I put it off and continue keeping to myself, I feel self-conscious about THAT, too. It's a vicious cycle.

Try not to be so hard on yourself. Start out small. There are a lot of projects going up on the Iskaulit… maybe you could offer to help with one of those. That way, there’s a certain goal in mind and everyone is working towards that, so there’s not as much pressure to socialize.

That's not a bad idea- I'd kinda forgotten about the Iskaulit, to be honest. I've not had much of a reason to go over there, since my clinic idea ended up not working out.

Well, Ino and I would be happy to have you in the garden. Or, if this would be of more interest, I know Jim Barnes is setting up a gym. There's the bar as well but... I don't know how that's proceeding.

I'm not a huge drinker, anyway... but the gym sounds good. I need to spar... become slightly less sucky at fighting.

[Beverly smiles.] You should talk to him then! I admit, I don't know him well, but he seems like a very nice person.

I'll do that. ... thanks for the advice. And for listening to me. I feel like I should have all this figured out by now, you know?

Believe me, no one has it all figured out in their twenties. Hell, I don't have it all figured out now at... [She rests her chin on her hands.] Whatever age I am.

That's comforting to know, believe me. I guess nobody ever figures everything out, huh?

No, and anyone who tells you they have is lying. Or misguided.

[She smiles again.]

You'll figure out a lot of things though. You just have to be willing to admit you don't understand something and then be ready to put in the work it takes to find the answers.