So Much Fun

 
The snow started so timidly last night, I could count the flakes drifting cautiously past the shadow of my CRV, as though they felt self-conscious being seen. By midnight, their courage having grown in proportion to their numbers, enough had gathered for me to shovel an inch off the front patio; by morning, they reached, shamelessly, halfway to my knees. 

Depending on your inseam, that can be a lot or a little. Mine's 36 inches, so this was a lot. The dogs, by the way, agreed with me. When we went out for morning bathroom break #1, my Yellow Lab took one step, then looked at me and intuited, "Where did all this come from?" 

"From the sky, big guy," I responded, aloud.

Now, if I was a kid, an arguable point on days like this, I'd be torn between anticipation and lament. Anticipation because it snowed and that meant play, lament because it fell on Sunday and not Monday, guaranteeing a snow day. Overall, though, I'd be gladder than sadder since this much, this close to Christmas, ensures this year it will be white. 

We didn't spend much time shoveling snow when I was younger, certainly not in comparison to what I did today. My father would clear off the back walk to enable my mother to reach her car, but otherwise, we'd trudge through the drifts to the barn to feed the horses. If we'd had a snow thrower, it would have been different, but as they hadn't been invented yet, it makes no difference. Besides, dad was raised on a ranch where knee-deep snow was common and no one thought twice about it. 

I probably wouldn't think about it either, but for the fact that snow accumulates in Maine. At the foot of the Colorado Rockies, where I grew up, snow is like a relative, just passing through. Back here, the snow moves in and sets up housekeeping. I can count on the fingers of one hand the number of snow days I had in high school. Back here, it takes both hands and a few toes to keep track of them.

One thing is incredibly similar, though, between the snows of my older youth and those of the younger one I discovered as a medical student, and that is, any snowfall is a chance to play. My new snow brush -- the one I use on the car? -- has a  movable head that lets me pull the snow off the car in sections, creating little avalanches as I move from the hatchback to the windscreen. 

With snow flying in all directions and oblivious to the cold, it came to me: I cleared the cars the same way as a kid. All I had then was a straw broom, so my avalanches had to move away from me. The push broom from my father's shop was okay, but the brush was too soft to work very well. My new one is perfect and as it was then, creating avalanches is still, so very much fun.

Am I ever glad.

© 2013 All Rights Reserved (text and photo) by the author.

Can You Cuss a Little?

I must have been around seven, seven or eight, though it could have been nine -- certainly no later -- when I met my paternal grandfather the first time. If he held me as a baby and surely he must have, I'd be hard-pressed to dig the memory out of my distal recesses. The other first time, however, is as vivid as this morning's frost on the grass. 

He lived in Oklahoma, my parents and I in Colorado, and he'd come for a short visit. More like a stopover than a "visit," he was gone the next morning. I sat in a brown or green -- I never knew which -- overstuffed relic from the 1940s with short, fat wooden feet and a flowery pattern that rose off the fabric like continents on a globe. It was big enough to curl up in while he talked with my parents about people and places they knew and I did not. After a while, he turned to me and suddenly young blabbermouth Beggar was at a loss for words. Particularly, the ones he wanted to hear.

"Have you learned how to cuss yet?" 

For the record, I wasn't really at a loss for words -- by then I'd acquired a vocabulary of two bad and two really bad words and combinations thereof, thanks to my father's verbal creativity. I just wasn't supposed to say them. Ever. And now, here's my father's father, asking me to do what would ordinarily result in my catching the word that began with an "h" and ended with me wishing I'd said "heck," instead. I looked from my mother to my father, hoping for permission. They may as well have been playing poker for all the help I got from their expressions. Hell -- I mean, heck -- of a time to enforce the rules.

"Come on, Beg, you must know one or two. Let me hear you cuss," he said with a truly conspiratorial glint and grin. Let's play a good one on your folks, I read. Talk about caught between "the devil" and the deep blue sea. I wanted to, oh, how I wanted to, the blood rising to my neck and then flowing like a flood over my face. 

The clock was ticking, he was waiting, they're silent, and all I can think is, "Damn it, Grandad, you know I'll get in trouble if I do!" If there was ever a time I needed a Get Out of Jail Free card. 

"Well, I can see you'd rather not go against your folks and that's good. We can save the cuss words for later," he said, winking, after my shirt had nearly soaked through with nervous sweat. 

I felt relieved, but also felt I'd let him down. I wanted to do both, be good (and incidentally, avoid a lickin') and be grown up at the same time. It's funny how these things go. Eventually, you do find out how to be both at once and true to yourself in the bargain. Back then, all I knew was, that's the night I began to love my grandfather. 

I sure hope he knows.  


(English: New Year's Day postcard. Reads: "A New Year's Resolution / Jan. 1st / To Gossip, Slang and Cuss words / I'll bid a last "Adieu" / And place a bridle on my tongue / And thoughtless actions, too!" Photo credit: Wikipedia)

The Sighing Thing

"Oh, God!" he sighed, heavily. So heavily I thought he and the ancient, paint-stained,  ladder back chair he was sitting in were going to sink through the scraped and scratched wooden plank floor to the soil beneath. I waited for the thunk! -- it never came. His eyes were closed, but he wasn't sleeping. Nor was he being profane.  

"It's all right, Beggar, he's just praying," my grandmother said, overhearing him. I wondered if she knew how many times I'd heard him before. So many I'd lost count.

I looked at her and smothered a smile. Did she really believe that or was she trying to preserve my youthful innocence, the very thing my grandfather -- her husband -- had done his best to turn into good judgment, something he considered eminently more practical.  

He did the "sighing thing," as I came to think of it, mostly while sitting in the shade near our bunkhouse door. It wasn't really a bunkhouse, but we called it that, just the same. It was a detached single car garage that had never housed a car, at least in my memory. My father converted it into a saddle shop at one point and I've written about cutting firewood for his stove. Summers, it was the bunkhouse where my grandfather stayed. Those months, I've realized since, were a journey in character development.

"If you absolutely have to point a gun at someone to protect yourself or your family," he said once, "it's too late for threats. Indecision at a time like that can be deadly." He spoke from experience. Another summer night, years before, he stared down a neighbor who had the nasty habit of occasionally firing his gun in the general direction of my grandfather. "The man's crazy," he said, refusing to get dragged into something he knew he'd have to finish, "and besides, he can't shoot worth a damn." Only this particular evening, it was different. The man had shot at my father who was about my age and I was thirteen. 

Why not call the police or sheriff, I imagine you're thinking. That would have been the thing to do, if they'd had a phone. Forty miles into barely civilized northwestern Colorado, the ranch was a two or three hour drive by Model A Ford from the nearest town. There were no phones, nor were there corner stores or gas stations. I'm not even sure there was electricity. It wasn't that you took the law into your own hands, there just wasn't anyone else who could take it into theirs.   

So, father and son rode out to address the situation. Watching the scene unfold, my father was fearful, certain he was going to witness my grandfather meet out justice just as his father had fifty years earlier. In my imagination, reliving those long seconds, I see my grandfather with a look in his eye that left no doubt, as his hand strayed to the pistol at his side, that he fully intended to use it. The neighbor must have seen that look, too, because he backed down and that was the end of it.

Grandchildren are a second chance for parents to get it right. Those summers, I was my grandfather's trusty teen sidekick, Cowboy Toby to his Roy Rogers (photo). I listened, learned, and hopefully digested far more than I actually remember. I've never forgotten the "sighing thing," though, nor the day I finally asked him what it meant.

I'd really been hoping he'd tell me himself when he was good and ready. That's how things usually went between us, though I never knew from day to day where his mind would lead. But it was nearing the end of summer and he'd said nothing, so I screwed up the courage one day and asked what was he thinking about when he sighed so deeply. He was surprised I'd noticed. How could I not? 

"You live as long as I have, Beggar, you're going to make a few mistakes. Don't be afraid, everybody makes a few and so will you. Some, maybe most, don't matter, least not as much as we give them credit for. People who know you, forgive like you forgive them. Some mistakes do matter -- maybe more than they should, but that doesn't change the fact. Problem is, you either don't realize it or you're too stubborn to admit it, until it's too late. I think about those."

"So you don't make the same ones again, right?" 

"No, because I made them the first time." 

I was too young to understand regret. Sorry, wish I hadn't said or done this or that, oh yes -- plenty. Regret was something else, something -- I don't know -- bigger, something I hadn't lived long enough to become acquainted with. Something that only comes about with experience, with trying to do what you think is right even though you don't and can't know everything but you have to try anyway because it's all you can do and it's really all anyone can do. Don't worry, we all make mistakes, so will you. It's okay. My grandfather said so.

Happy Thanksgiving.


(Creative Commons image by vintagecobweb,com via Flickr)

First Assist

More years ago than I like to advertise, I was flat on my back in a hospital bed, awaiting surgery for kidney stones. It all began on a typical July 4th weekend in northwestern Colorado, visiting family and fishing in the high country. A delightful lunch of cutthroat trout cooked over an open fire was followed by nausea, vomiting, and abdominal discomfort that puts the P in pain. The local ER doc diagnosed a renal stone and I began seeing a urologist in Denver the next week.

As we say in medicine, my initial treatment was conservative, i.e. reduce calcium intake and drink water or cranberry juice like it's going out of style. At that time the theory was, my kidneys were less adept at eliminating excess calcium, so by flushing them with clear fluids, we'd rinse them of the offending chemical. It was a good theory; the problem was, it didn't entirely work, resulting in my first exposure to surgery coming from the patient's side of the operating table.

I spent this past week, and will spend the next five weeks, on the surgeon's side and believe me, that's a whole lot more fun. Not that I minded being a patient, but the lessons I learned have stuck with me. For instance, there's nothing like being at the mercy of the healthcare system to teach future doctors to pay attention when their patients speak. It's one thing to get report of 522b's requests for morphine and quite another to have been 522b, in severe pain, and have to wait -- in pain -- for the hours to tick away like days before the next round of medications arrives. Thanks to the gravel pit that collected in my left kidney, I know what this is like.

What makes the surgeon's side of the table more enjoyable -- apart from the absence of pain -- even for this incipient psychiatrist, is the fact that you're delving into live anatomy. For all the times you may have laid scalpel to preserved, leathery cadaver flesh, when you insert your fingers into the warm open incision of a living person, you've got to experience a mix of awe and fear. Fear that you'll do something harmful and awe because you're in a position to do so, probing where no one has gone before. It's enough to make the crew of the Enterprise envious.

My week, as do most, began with Monday -- orientation, a meet and greet with the staff, butterflies in the stomch. The next four days were spent in the OR from near dawn to mid-afternoon, when the surgeons head off to do office work and I'm left on my own. This rotation is largely self-directed and I have the freedom to pick and choose the procedures I find most interesting to scrub-in on. Since I'm working in a community hospital, I won't see cardiac or severe trauma cases -- we don't have the ICU facilities for major surgeries like those -- but I'll definitely see the kinds of things most of my future patients will experience and that's what matters. Naturally, I'll scrub-in for all those performed by my primary instructors, but I can also work with any other surgeon who's willing to have a student along for the ride.

It was the latter that led to another first this week, an opportunity to act as First Assist, the individual who stands opposite the surgeon, ready to offer whatever assistance the surgeon requires at the moment. Ordinarily, First Assist is a trained nurse, PA, or another physician. Under the right circumstances, however, it may also be a student. Yesterday the tumblers clicked into place and I was in the right place at the right time.

Now, before this begins to sound "important," in point of fact, I didn't actually participate in the sense I cut this (aside from sutures) or pulled on that (aside from retractors). Still, having an extra set of hands can be helpful and mine were eager to be put to good use. From a student's perspective, you're assisting, even in small ways, and that's always better than observing or merely standing by, all scrubbed up with nowhere to go and nothing to do when you get there.

And the word gets around. You've done the job once, you were attentive and diligent, you didn't screw up, the doctor seemed to enjoy your company; he'll tell other docs and you'll get to do it again. The more often you do, the better you'll get, and sooner or later, someone may hand you a scalpel, which to your inexperience feels like a Bowie Knife, and say, "You make the first cut."

Are my hands ever eager.


(Creative Commons image by Army Medicine via Flickr)

An Ordinary Guy

Well, spring certainly came late to the farm this year. The past few weeks have been chilly, wet, and dreary -- more reminiscent, I imagine, of the northeastern coast of Wales, whence my ancestors came, than coastal Maine. The upside of all this has been my yard no longer looks like August in Colorado, brown and bone dry. The downside is, mowing the grass yesterday was more like harvesting the autumn hay crop.

I'm not complaining, though, nor am I disgruntled because spring decided to take the slow train from wherever. I've wrestled enough with my own "tardiness demons" to be empathetic when the clock runs behind for someone else. Rather than giving spring a good spanking for dragging its heels, I'm welcoming it with open arms. The Prodigal Son has come home at last.

Besides the rain, this means there was a blanket of fog draped over the hayfield when I crawled out of bed this morning, awakened rudely by the sound of water, a steady stream tinkling from my puppy's bladder onto the towels in his crate. Oops. That's what towels are for, right? And it was only his first night and I'd probably pee, too, if it was me, or have to or want to. Something I think he'd like to do again, as a matter of fact, so pardon us while we step away from the computer for a minute and go outside.

False alarm -- he's gone back to sleep, a momentary reprieve. Crate training is a grand experiment. I tried it with my big dog and he did well with house-breaking. Since the little guy has been in a shelter, I thought a crate would make him feel more at home and give him a place all his own. Thus far, it seems to be working; he's slept through most of this post. I can only hope readers don't take the hint and follow his example.

Getting back to spring and grass-growing, it's possible you're wondering why I waited so long to begin mowing, aside from the fact that it's rained almost daily. Well, there was my rotation for one thing. Twelve hours a day at the hospital doesn't leave much time for yard work and that includes repairing the flat tire on my lawn tractor. When I finally had a day free, I discovered it was virtually impossible, with the tools I had, to get the rim off the tractor.

I was, as my late father would say, stuck. I couldn't drive the tractor to the garage because it had a flat and couldn't trailer it because I don't have a trailer. So, I did what any self-respecting future physician should do, namely, phone a colleague and ask for assistance. And that's what I did. I rang up my mechanic, a down-to-earth, easy-going type who is fond of referring to himself as the Car Doc, at least when he's repairing my car, and asked if he'd make a house call. I figured it had to come with the territory.

Now here's what I love about rural Mainers. Not only did the "doctor" take me seriously, though he's probably never had a case quite like this, he actually sent help. A friend of his came over and together we manhandled the tire and rim free. He followed up by insisting on taking it for repair and refused to take a dime in payment. I've never met the man before but he treated me like his next door neighbor.

Driving home -- turns out, the tire was fine, by the way, just a little low in oxygen saturation -- I reflected on what had happened. I've got a graduate degree, nearly two more, and the fellow I'd just met graduated, maybe, from high school. Yet, the measure of his kindness exceeded that which I've experienced from persons who are far more socially adept as well as academically accomplished. He was simply an ordinary guy who enjoyed doing something good for someone else and today was my day to be that person. If spring hadn't been late, if my tractor tire hadn't gone flat, if I hadn't been working so much, think what I would have missed.


(Creative Commons image via Wikipedia)

Wearing Mom's Shoes

"I think Beggar sort of 'adopted me' after his mother passed away," my late aunt said. It was a warmish autumn Sunday afternoon and my female cousins composed her audience. I was in the living room and they were in the kitchen, where my family has always congregated whenever they're together. Only when you can't move without bumping a glass and baptizing it's owner, do we slowly sift, one or two at a time, out the door onto the patio. But not for long. The vacant kitchen is a vacuum, sucking us back inside, unaware we're like pieces of driftwood, floating out to sea, drifting up the shore, riding the tides onto a Maine beach, floating out again.

When I overheard her, I smiled, thinking she was the one who'd adopted me after my father, her younger brother, passed away. Maybe it went both ways, each of us trying to fill an empty space no one else could. Marion the Librarian, my uncle, her youngest brother, christened her because she literally was the librarian for a small, northwestern Colorado town. Though not it's founder, she was certainly it's builder, and it grew steadily, like children, as long as she held her post.

My aunt was a large woman. I don't mean obese, just big. Tall. Buxom. A woman born to be mother who was a good one to one and all. She loved how I lived near Maine's "stern and rocky coast," (The Last Gasp of Summer) though she never saw it for herself. When I think of her, I can't help but see her tall, dark-haired, matronly frame with a gingham apron knotted at the waist. I remember visiting the library once, when I was younger, and being startled when she walked out of her office without that apron. Most days, she tied it on in the morning the same way some women put on makeup -- she didn't quite feel dressed without it.

The truth is, my father's passing was hard on her. To him, she was "Sis," and she missed hearing it. His last years, spent fighting off the disease that could only lay claim to him in his final second at the very end, they spoke regularly by phone. I was never privy to those calls but the way she described them, they were the kind we have when we're acutely aware time is short, and we dare not waste the briefest of breaths speaking words expressing nothing. The kind we have when we fear we'll never have another and what we say will have to last us for eternity. The kind we have when we don't want to leave anything unsaid and regret what we do.

I did try to step into my father's shoes, to the extent I could, since at last we lived close and a visit was so easy you'd be embarrassed to call it a drive down the road. We were both glued to the tube on 9/11 when I began punching in her number. You remember how it was, how you reached for the phone, ringing up mom or dad to tell them you loved them because it was the moment drawn close when tomorrow may not come. You didn't know for sure and couldn't take the risk. She was wearing mom's shoes then and was a comfort I still feel.

As you can tell, I'm thinking about Mother's Day and have been all week, how it was for the women I've known and how different it will be for the women I've intimately met in the birthing room. I saw them the very instant each became "mom." The same instant some lucky slug of a guy became dad. Until this weekend, the first-timers, at least, experienced the day as a daughter, wishing their mothers happiness. Now, I imagine those mothers calling their daughter-mothers, offering them the same wish. It's really quite something.

Happy Mother's Day.


(Creative Commons image by JoshBerglund19 via Flickr)

Thanks, Norm.

The coffee in my brand new mug from the Norman Rockwell Museum this morning, tastes as good as I hoped it would. The material from which a mug is made and the manner in which it's fired, really does impact flavor, you know. For instance, dark roasts taste cleaner in my white bistro mug with the letters U-N-E stenciled down the side in blue (see Pink Hats, chapter 9). In The Black Dog pottery mug given me by my dog and cat for Christmas last year, dark roasts seem to mellow. The Rockwell, as I think this new one should be christened, strikes me as midway between the other two, but we'll find out, once I'm back in Maine and writing on some bleary, early morning. That's the acid test, when I can barely see the keyboard, what's the coffee like then?

How I happened upon The Rockwell is a story in itself. I thought the museum housing this treasure was located in Sturbridge, 50 or so miles east of here, my destination on the 30th for an osteopathic students' conference. "Not so, Mr. Schuyler!" to borrow a line from Lord Lindsey, Chariots of Fire (1981). It's in Stockbridge, a little town memorialized by James Taylor in his song, Rockabye Sweet Baby James, the merest drive down the road with a turn left, then right, then back left, from here.

I was wandering through Richmond, a village that reminded me of my home away from home in Maine because both are mostly countryside and locating a "town" is an exercise in futility. If there was one once, there's not one anymore. But it's a lovely place and it felt so familiar I was on the outskirts of West Stockbridge before I knew it. A gentle nudge on the steering wheel from an oddly convincing feeling took me past the real Nook and Cranny coffee house (Pink Hats, chapter 3), up a long ridge, over the Mass Pike, and all of a sudden, out of nowhere, I saw a sign directing me to the Norman Rockwell Museum, 3/4 miles away. And they say there's no unconscious.

I grew up reading old copies of The Saturday Evening Post I found at my aunt's and having Rockwell's covers take me out of my comfort zone in the West through my imagination to parts unknown. It was his "Stockbridge Main Street at Christmas" that led me to think I might make a home somewhere in New England someday. Standing in front of the original and trying to explain what that meant to a beautiful septuagenarian on the museam staff, reminded me trying to say anything at all at moments like this is useless. I'm going to choke up, so I may as well shut up and write about it, instead. But I never do and we both end up crying because childhood dreams have finally come true.

Standing outside his studio was like hanging with a pal who knew the things about you your family would never understand. I was the kid raised on Country music who fell in love with classical. It baffled my father worse than anything adolescence could have thrust into his path. Why his son, of all sons, liked "high brow," quite frankly, blew his mind. That was alright, I couldn't explain it either. Johnny Cash and Marty Robbins would just have to learn to share the stage with Brahms and Beethoven. Rockwell somehow knew what this was like because he created images that were just as evocative and made just as much sense to me. Like Stockbridge at Christmas. And a few minutes later, I was right there, standing across the street from the Lion's Head Inn, in New England, of all places.

Thanks, Norm.


(Photo of Norman Rockwell's studio on the grounds of the Norman Rockwell Museum copyright 2011 by the author)

Pink Hats 23: Conspiracy Theory

Holidays at the Livingstone House were a crowded, cacophonous intermingling of three generations, at least one dog, and abundant good food. This year, the din was periodically disrupted by squeals coming from the twins, "on loan" from their foster parents, who already had a house filled with their own children and grandchildren. Together, it made for the happiest Thanksgiving Bob could remember in a long, long time.

Following dinner, he drew Jessie's younger sister, Jennifer, aside on the pretext of discussing her family medicine residency at Central Maine Medical Center. "Jen, I need your help," he said, whispering and glancing at Jessie to make sure she couldn't overhear, "I'd like order an engagement ring for your sister, but I have no idea what size. Do you know what she wears?"

Jen, nearly a carbon-copy of her sister with the exception of auburn hair instead of Jessie's blond, said, "Of course, the same as me. We've always exchanged clothes and jewelry. I wear a six -- this is so much fun! When are you going to ask her?"

"Soon. There's a jeweler in Colorado -- I visited his store last year while attending a conference -- who has a design with filigreed mountains along the sides of the ring that I'd like to get for her. Let me show you." He took out his iphone, opened Safari, and turned to the page he'd marked. "What do you think? Too modern? Not traditional enough?"

"Bob, it's perfect! Jessie will be thrilled -- she's loved Colorado ever since she spent a summer out there working at a camp near Estes Park while she was in high school. You've got to get this for her!"

"She mentioned that but I never made the connection. I called this past week and they have sixes and sevens in stock -- so, anyway, we can count on you for family medicine, right?" He changed the subject as Jessie approached.

"What's the confab, you two? You look like you're acting out a scene from Conspiracy Theory," she said, taking a seat next to Bob and pulling him close.

"Shh. We're plotting to take over the medical school," he replied, with a wicked gleam, "by loading the clinical faculty with friends and family. I'm sure Chuck would love to get his hands on psychiatry, so that makes four of us and Halley makes five." She looked at him quizzically. "Someone has to run the place, can you think of anyone better?"

She covered her mouth, laughing, and shook her head as Jen looked from one to the other, asking, "Who's Chuck?"

"Oh, he was a student of mine during his first rotation. We're becoming friends over time. He's two years behind you -- "

"-- and he's single, good looking, and," glancing at Bob for his confirmation, "distinguished," said Jessie.

"Mm, 'distinguished.' By that do you mean 'older'?"

"Older than some, younger than others," Jessie said, with a playful but tantalizing tone. She's circling the bait, she thought.

"Older like, um, Bob?" Jen persisted, giving him a deliberate and appreciative appraisal. Now she's smelling it.

"Close but not quite," he said. "Honestly, I never asked his age, if you can believe it. I guess it's something guys don't think about. I'd say he's a few years younger than me." Then he added, "He did ask me if, uh, Jessie had a sister..." He ducked his head sheepishly and blushed.

"I see," she said, straightening in her chair and squaring her shoulders as though she was an elementary school teacher preparing to scold a misbehaving student. "Well. If he's anything like you, it sounds like you'd better tell him she does and she's interested." Aha! I've got you now!

"I don't know how much he and I are alike, but we are becoming friends, like I said, and I already did, the first part, that is."

"Then will somebody please tell him the second part while he's still interested!" she said, exaggerating for effect.

"Why, certainly," said Jessie, assuming a prim and proper demeanor, also for effect, "I'll get right on it. Now, what were you two really talking about?"

This time Jen came to the rescue. "Christmas presents, if you must know, now drop it before Santa puts you on the Naughty List!"


(Creative Commons image by alvy via Flickr)

With Outstretched Hands

In your heart, you already know ~ Zen saying

Yesterday's Red and Rover cartoon depicts Red telling Rover about his holiday homework assignment. He was supposed to make a list of things for which he was grateful on Thanksgiving. All he needed was one word and it filled the entire page: Rover. I'm the same way. Give me a morning like this where my dog is lying on his bed next to my chair and the cat warming himself in the sun by the window and I know what I'm grateful for.

Some things are not so easy to appreciate and getting to the point where we can express gratitude for them may leave friends or family wondering if we've lost our marbles along the way. For instance, failing boards once was tough, twice bordered on downright demoralizing. However, the eight weeks I spent at the PASS Program were redemptive, they put medicine together in ways I could scarcely have imagined and my gratitude for Dr. Francis and the friends I made, overflows.

Redemption means more than putting a positive spin on things. It often entails self-forgiveness and I don't know about you, but that doesn't come second-nature to me. Letting myself off the hook for stupidity and stubbornness is frequently the last place I look for peace, even it's the best place.

Sometimes it helps to accept it from the hands of another. One of the things that helped me immensely in Champaign was the refusal of the staff to accept the verdict I had imposed on myself. I drove down there towing a virtual U-Haul trailer filled with regret, self-criticism, and fear over the possibilities of facing failure once again. And I wasn't alone. It seemed like everyone had a variant of my story to tell.

While no one could provide absolution, I experienced it nonetheless. I'm not certain when or how it arrived on my doorstep, but over time I just felt better. There was hope; I hadn't screwed the pooch so badly that I may as well pack up my toys, go back to Colorado, and spend the rest of my life hoping nobody ever asked me if I'd thought about going to medical school. There was hope because others had found it and could show me where to find it for myself.

I don't think it would be reasonable to say I'm grateful for those two failing grades because the truth is, I could do without them both. But I'm getting better at forgiving myself for them because there's so much more ahead of me than behind me. Does that make sense? There will be obstacles to overcome because of my mistakes but they're not insurmountable. It's kind of like what St. Paul once said, "Letting go of what is past, I press on with outstretched hands toward the goal of my high calling." On this Thanksgiving Day, I'm grateful for those who have helped me let go of the things that held me back so I can reach forward once again.

(Creative Commons image by Dominic's pics via Flickr)

Cranberry Sauce by the Fire

It's windy this morning, usually not a good thing. A little breeze is fine and velocities from 10-20 mph, even up to 30 now and then are okay, but lately there have been days when the speedometer has flirted with 50 and that's when my internal warning sirens go off. Unlike Colorado or Illinois, Maine is heavily forested as readers from New England well know, and it's the trees that generate my concern.

In Boulder, the wind comes swirling off the mountains, swooping down a long corridor paralleling the Flat Irons (photo), and slamming into town like a freight train out of control. We have trees, of course, but they're not nearly as dense as they are in my back yard or along the lane to the east. When power lines go down in Colorado, it's more often due to heavy, wet, early winter or late-spring snows.

The unpredictability or perhaps better, the predictability of losing power at some point is why I'm writing this post now, while I can. I'd love to get back to Pink Hats and a Mack Truck because, frankly, I'm just as eager as I hope you are to see how things turn out with Dr. Bob and the twins. Some writers work from an outline and have a story fleshed out in advance of its development. I take my clue from Stephen White who freely admits he has no idea how a novel is going to unfold until he gets to the end. I like that; it allows the unconscious to work and express itself spontaneously.

My plan, as of last night, was to have morning coffee with Dr. Bob and see what he's been up to -- until the vigorous sound of waves washing up on the beach drug me from a sound sleep and I noticed trees swaying precariously through the window. Two weeks ago, while I was basking in 60 degree weather on my Champaign patio, anxiously buried in cardiology or some other medical -ology or -ary, a white pine on my property split two stories up from the ground and sent wood flying into the power lines, blocking the road and inconveniently blacking out my neighbors across the creek. I hope that doesn't happen again but you never really know.

The upshot of all this is the cranberries and home-made rolls I want prepare for tomorrow's dinner with my best friend's family need to take precedence over pleasure, so I'd better get cracking. If we're lucky, the lights will stay on and the oven hot. If not, Thanksgiving dinner might turn out to be a can of soup warmed up in the fireplace. As disappointing as that sounds, it reminds me of wonderful evenings around the campfire with Boy Scouts and their fathers. At least the soup will be accompanied by fresh cranberry sauce and who can complain about that?


(Creative Commons image via Wikipedia)

Where the Wind Blows Free

Now, let's see, what was that I said about not usually writing about politics? I must have gotten on a roll the past four days -- surprised even myself. Well, enough of that. Time to turn this young man's fancy toward something else for a change. Oh, I heard coyotes last night in the wee hours before dawn, a whole pack from the sound of them, yipping and yowling in the trees behind my house like a group of college students at a frat party.

You'd think, coming from the West, I'd have seen a lot of them "out on the lone prairie, where the coyotes howl and the wind blows free," as the old ballad goes, but I haven't. I only recall seeing one and while our acquaintance was brief, it was also deeply personal. I was living in Southern Colorado at the time, and driving home one afternoon a gray-brown streak on four legs darted across the highway in front of the car ahead. The driver swerved and tried to miss, but it was too late.

I pulled onto the shoulder and approached on foot, then took her by the legs and pulled her from the traffic lane. She was unconscious, breathing shallowly, and it didn't seem right to leave her to die alone. There wasn't anything I could do -- as far as we were from town, she'd have been gone before we reached the emergency vet clinic. She had a head injury and though it didn't appear severely traumatic, they'd have likely put her down, anyway. So, I waited with my hand on her side the few minutes until the end.

I'm soft-hearted where animals are concerned, I know, but I think of her when I hear distant relatives in the forest. Most human-coyote contacts aren't so intimate as the one that afternoon along the highway. They're a nuisance to some and a threat to those who raise small animals for a living. And, honestly, had she been conscious, I doubt my company would have all that welcome. But she didn't have much choice in the matter and neither did I. It was one of those times when all you can do is wait and offer comfort in those places where the wind blows free.


(GNU Free Documentation image via Wikipedia; Lyrics to Bury Me Not On the Lone Prairie are in the public domain.)

Memories of June

I've always felt June got shorted. April has April Fool's Day, May has Mayday -- along with Cinco de Mayo -- and then here comes poor June with nothing. It's like being a bridesmaid at a wedding with one of the groomsmen out sick. As the other couples are walking back down the aisle, she's bringing up the rear, smiling bravely -- and wishing she was somewhere else.

When I was a kid, of course, the first of June signaled the end, or close to, of school. Any time spent in class after that date was torture, even worse than what I'd experienced the ninth months previously. Visions of prison camp danced in my head as I imagined my teacher morphing into a whip-cracking taskmaster to rival Severus Snape. Well, maybe it wasn't quite that bad, but it sure seemed like it.

Fortunately, the weeks of freedom that followed were filled with baseball, riding horses, and exploring the woods and fields near our home. Those days come to mind while planning the next three weeks of board preparation. But it's different now, since I'm the one insisting on time before the computer, hoping the pile of review books almost brushing the ceiling doesn't come crashing down on my head.

It also helps not having my friends knocking at the door, wondering if I've gotten a new outfielder's mitt or a list of chores to perform that my father left for me, considerately, before driving to work. Knowing all my work will permit me to begin rotations in August is payment enough, but there's still the memory of summer days with cool mornings and warm nights, that come trickling into consciousness, reminding me that June is here, at last.

A Rainy Saturday Morning

It makes good fiction to say, "it dawned raining this morning," but the fact is, I wasn't awake to see it. All I know for sure is it's rainy now and the clouds were moving in late last night. Have you ever thought of all the different ways it rains? For instance, it's probably accurate to say we're having light rain at the moment, which is nothing more than regular rain without all the fat and calories. Sometimes it falls in sheets, at which point I get to replenish my linen closet, and when it pours I find out what a mug feels like, standing under a beer tap.

In any case, I'm glad I finished mowing the yard yesterday. Until I moved to Maine I'd never driven a riding mower. Growing up, those were the toys of the rich and famous. Here, if I had to depend on pushing Old Bessy, that's all I'd do from sunup to sundown. The one I have is a hand-me-down from the previous owner, replete with torn seat and manual choke. It's loud enough to wake the dead, tips eerily going sideways down the hill toward the hayfield, and it will never win a lawn mower race, but it gets the job done.

I've grown rather fond of that mower, actually, and I've taken to giving it a pat and "good job" at the end of the day. I don't suppose the encouragement will keep it out of the shop, but it makes me feel good anyway. Speaking of feeling good, I've noticed something the past few months.

When I moved here, I brought my Colorado tradition of waving to everyone who passes, with me. I figured country folk are the same everywhere and since this is the country, things shouldn't be any different. Well, it turns out they were and I was the only one who did it. At first, I felt like a fish out of water, but I decided if it was good enough for Colorado, it was good enough for Maine, and a little change never did anyone harm. So, I waved and pretty soon, everyone was waving back. If I'm driving down the road and forget, they wave anyway. It's not much, it probably won't change the world, but it makes people feel connected, a little less alone, and that feels good.


(Creative Commons image by matt.wagers via Flickr)

Making It

If you foolishly ignore beauty, you will soon find yourself without it. Your life will be impoverished. But if you invest in beauty, it will remain with you all the days of your life. ~ Frank Lloyd Wright

I was prowling a dockside gallery on my first (and only) visit to Rockport, Massachusetts, when a watercolor of a Vermont farm in the moonlight, with snow covering the roofs of the barn, house, and surrounding fields, caught my eye. The price tag was nearly as large as the painting, but the artist assured me in five years I'd never miss it. He was right, though it was hard to believe at the time.

Mostly, my "artistic purchases" have been limited to unframed posters that share wall space with Western art I inherited from my parents. Artifacts from childhood -- a well-worn teddy bear, spurs, the saddle my father made for my fifth Christmas -- vie for space on bookshelves or rest atop the large brick mantle in my study. A small clay bust of a cowboy I gave my father one year stares out from my mother's antique china cabinet. It's my tip of the hat to sculpture.

One print has a story. It depicts a white wolf leaping from one ice flow to another, and it hangs over my desk. A patient's donation that never found a home on the psychiatric unit, I placed it in my broom closet of an office where it dominated the west wall. By the time I was packing for medical school, it had become such a significant, albeit silent, partner in my work that leaving it behind felt like abandoning a friend.

Often, when conversation in therapy lagged, or a patient was particularly taken with the image, I'd ask, "Do you think s/he'll make it?" Depending on how hopeful or hopeless they were feeling, their answer ranged from ambivalent to certain. One patient, as we were preparing his discharge, said to me, "I used to worry about that wolf, but not anymore; he -- or she, maybe -- is going to be just fine."

Eventually, the print became an image of my own journey, first from Colorado to medical school, and now, through the stress of board exams and rotations to come. The ice reminds me of flagstones floating on a cold, dark blue path. One slip and it's swim for it, but that doesn't matter because home lies at the end and one way or the other, s/he's not stopping until the door is in sight and there's the warmth of a fire within.

Oh yeah, this wolf's going to make it all right.

(Photo of "White Wolf Leaping" by the author; print copyright by Jim Brandenburg)

My Horse and His Boy

 
The following is a piece I've dabbled with, off and on, for several years. It borrows from my own youth and yet, it is still a work of fiction. The horse, however, and our relationship was very real. I hope you enjoy this tidbit and will leave a comment or two.


Psychiatry hadn't so much as crossed my mind at 13, but I suppose its seeds were there. I discovered quickly that my freshman year in high school wasn't going to be much fun. I made few friends, and despite my efforts to fit in, felt like an outsider. I realize now I was an outsider and for good reason. My classmates were the children of professional parents -- many were faculty at the university nearby -- and had grown up in the insular society that wealth and intermarriage create.

My parents owned a small farm and I grew up in the shadow of the Indian Peaks, a range of mountains that rises 13,000 feet above the plains of Eastern Colorado. From my upstairs bedroom window I could see the morning sun strike above the snow line, transforming them into flames of fire in the western sky. My earliest memories are images, really, of fields of snow with horses crowded together to stay warm, icicles hanging from the porch roof, and the sunrise on the mountains.

It was a different world from the one of my classmates, and while I won't say it was a better one, still, it was mine. Having a world of your own is important at 13. For me, returning home from school meant a long walk down the dirt road that passed in front of our house. It was nearly a mile from the bus stop on state highway 119, and in the fall, the huge cottonwoods that lined the fields shed their leaves, transforming the lane into a river of gold. When I came within sight of our pasture, I'd stop and whistle to my horse, Dandy, and his head would rise from the grass in response to a signal that was ours alone.

Sometimes I'd cheat the distance to the house by slipping between the fence rails and crossing through the field, eying Dandy as he trotted to meet me. The difficulty I had making friends at school stands in sharp contrast to the ease in which my horse and I shared such a simple, unpretentious intimacy. In the few years we had been together he knew me better than I knew myself, and at the same time, knowing him enabled me to know myself. He was my best friend and I was his boy.

There is great solace to be found in a relationship that places no demands on you to be or do in a manner foreign to yourself. There is a freedom in it, too, that allows you to give according to your capacity, only to find your capacity increasing with the giving.

As I look back on it, that's the way it seemed to be between Dandy and me. I felt there was an understanding between us that didn't need language for expression. On warm summer days I'd climb onto his back, and without saddle or bridle, nudge him with my knees toward a smallish elm tree that grew against the north fence line of the pasture. There, in the shade, I'd strip leaves from low-hanging branches and hold them by my knee while Dandy twisted his head round to gently nab them from me.

We'd do this for hours, him growing fat on elm leaves, me growing fat on love. Whenever I would approach anything approaching bliss in my later life, the memory of those summer days would surface, as if to remind me how I ever learned to recognize bliss at all.

(Creative Commons image by garryknight via Flickr; Text copyright 2014 by Patrick W. Conway, all rights reserved)

Whitewalls, She Said.

It's been another early morning but this time, it was intentional. I had to take my car to the mechanic for its annual inspection and it's first-come, first-served. In Maine this is always a slightly stressful experience because they look at everything from the tip of the tail lights to the depth of the tread on your tires. Anything defective has to be repaired before you get a sticker. It's a practice that goes back a few years and testifies to successful lobbying efforts by the state's mechanics.

Now, Colorado is different. All you have to do is take your car to an emissions testing center, they plug a unit into the exhaust pipe (yikes, my dog would say), and run the car up to speed. If your results are under the limit, you get a sticker. There are even drive-by testing stations that somehow measure emissions like a radar gun gauges speed. You're charged for the service when you complete your annual registration.

Ordinarily, if my car was in good condition, I could ensure passing by changing the oil or adding a can of BG 44K to a full tank of gas, running the car to empty, and refilling the tank. The older the car, the more likely there could be problems and, after a particular age, emissions testing is waved entirely. I guess they figure a really old car has paid its dues and deserves a break. It's kind of like the company that makes glasses available for free if you're over age 100. That's something to look forward to.

Fortunately, mine got a clean bill of health today with one exception: the rear tires need replacing. Since snow season is near at hand, I can have my winter tires installed, pass inspection, and everybody will be happy. Almost everybody, that is. On the drive home my car pulled me over and said, rather petulantly, that she had been wearing these tires far too long and she was getting weary of the looks she was getting from other cars. If I knew what was good for me, I'd do some serious shopping in the spring. "Whitewalls," she said, "I want whitewalls -- four of them. They really bring out my headlights."
(Image by bondidwhat via Flickr. BG 44K is a registered trademark -- this is not an endorsement.)

With the Tongues of Men or of Angels

What makes it hardest is he's forgiving. My cat, I mean. He could have held a grudge or at least been angry and scattered his food or some such thing, but instead, having lost the mouse, he crawled into bed with me this morning. I still feel badly, not because the mouse got away per se, but because I ruined my cat's evening. He's been on the hunt for days and just when he's got success firmly grasped between his teeth, I come along and, well, if you read last night's post, you know the story.

I know, this sounds a bit like anthropomorphizing -- attributing human emotions to animals -- and I can see how it might be taken that way. But I've learned my animals have lives of their own. Sometimes they seek my company, sometimes not, and I'm the same way. They have habits and preferences and within certain limits I'm determined to respect them. If the dog wants to chase a squirrel into the forest through a bed of poison ivy, that's not okay. Better to stay on leash.

But the whole question of emotion is another issue entirely. One of my closest friends is a veterinarian out in Colorado and she fully agrees, animals have the same emotion-producing centers in the brain as humans. Now, whether their feelings are as nuanced as those of humans is difficult to say, but that doesn't mean animals don't feel sadness, anger, or love. Nor does it mean we shouldn't use those words to describe them.

I wonder if the tendency to minimize animal emotion (and cognition) stems from a misinterpretation of human significance. It may be that humans aren't so much the pinnacle of evolution as simply one path among many. With greater capability comes greater responsibility.

If I may speak theologically for a moment, the Latin Vulgate version of the Bible translates the word dominion in Genesis, where it is said God gave humans dominion over the creatures of the earth, as servant. President Obama encourages us to embrace a new commitment to service because thereby we not only improve the lives of others, we raise ourselves to new levels of humanness. Speaking for myself, I think it's time to take on the mantle of servant-leadership with respect to non-humans as well. Time to take care rather than take advantage. Time to be a voice for those who cannot speak with either the tongues of men or of angels.*


(Image of "Homersapiens" by PhOtOnQuAnTiQuE via Flickr)

*Often quoted at weddings, "Though I speak with the tongues of men and angels, if I have not love, I am but a clanging brass or tinkling cymbal."

Transforming 9/11

It was a fine Colorado autumn morning and I'd taken my car to the shop for something unmemorable when, listening to NPR, it became clear this was no

Image by Getty Images via Daylife

ordinary plane crash. Along with most of America, I spent the rest of the day glued to the television, calling family members to tell them I loved them.

The mental image of a country at war, younger friends being drafted, me insisting on enlisting in order to take care of them, began to form as a real possibility. There was no way to tell what was coming next or where, and daily life seemed comically trivial in comparison. I thought to myself, so this is what it was like for my father sixty years ago. Well, dad, now I know.

That's where I was then. Where I am now is something else again. You see, a little over a year before September 11, 2001, thirteen were killed at Columbine High School, only a few miles from my home in Boulder. Over time, I would eventually work with some of the survivors. The strangeness of this life can't be measured and even the outcome of terror may be transforming.

While there are still some who pejoratively accuse the new President of being "an Arab," as a though that qualifies him for a front row seat in hell, I've become friends with medical students who are Islamic. We share the same desire to become doctors, we've stood side by side long hours in the anatomy lab and together, sweated out the uncertainty of exam week. Their uncertainties are identical with mine and they, too, rely on their faith to get them through. It would never occur to any of us to show each other anything other than respect -- and trust.

We love our country and we love one another. We're people, we wish to be healers, and we remember where we were on September 11 not only because it was horrific but because we want to do something about it. We want to change the future, and we do that best by changing one another and ourselves, as well.


(Reflecting on Columbine, Image by Getty Images via Daylife)

A Global Walk

Polly Letofsky is my kind of woman. She's a walker and she's from Colorado. I love walking -- my dog and I do a couple of miles every day. When I was younger I discovered I got shin splints while running, and since I wasn't very fast anyway, I decided I'd be the fastest walker I knew.

Polly did 15 miles a day, around the world, by herself, and she's the first woman to have done it. She got the idea of a global walk when she was 12 -- it's funny how things like walking around the world (or medical school) get started. People no doubt chuckled when she mentioned it or said, "little girls don't do things like that."

Well, the dreams of childhood have a nasty habit of not going away and at 37, she was working part-time in a hotel and happened to notice the following quote on a piece of paper: "'Definition of commitment: When you find a way over every hurdle in your path and nothing but success is an option." That changed everything.

It took her two years to find sponsors but once she'd gotten them, she packed her bags, broke up with her boyfriend, rented her condo and took off -- on foot, raising money for breast cancer research. There was more to it than that, of course, but this is the short version. You can get more details at her website: www.globalwalk.org. Her brother made a film of her journey (www.pollysglobalwalk.com/Gallery.htm) and you can see clips online.

I've mentioned a beloved aunt in previous posts -- she died from breast cancer and I wear a Livestrong bracelet for her. She'd have liked Polly, and I think you will, too.


(Image via Wikipedia)

Haying Season

We used to do it the hard way. While a truck was driven along rows of freshly bailed hay, we'd walk alongside, picking up the bales and throwing them by hand to a partner who stacked them in the truck bed. It was back-breaking work, and though it's been years, I think I still have sore muscles to prove it.

Things are different now. Someone was finally sufficiently inventive to develop a machine that not only generates a hay bale, but throws it onto a trailer that follows behind. It's really something to see, especially if you grew up in the country or you love the country life. If I can obtain a photo of this process in the next couple of weeks I'll post it for you. In the meantime, I've included one of my hayfield and the equipment. The trailer I mentioned is the one that looks like a cage on wheels.

Mid-July is the first cutting, as it's called, in Southern Maine, and we'll get two before the snow flies. Down South, where there's a much longer growing season, they'll get three or four. In the high mountain valleys of Colorado, the second cutting can literally be cut short by early snowfall.

A few years ago a band called The Byrds had a hit song, Turn, Turn, Turn that you may have encountered on a classic rock station. It's about times and seasons, waiting and watching, knowing when to move and when to stand still. Learning to wait and follow the lead of another can guzzle patience faster than a Hummer guzzles gas (no offense to Hummer lovers), but the change we undergo, becoming a person who can appreciate the process of life in someone else, is worth every drop.

(Image by the author)