June 29, 2014 Sunday "Rainbow"

First Words

      …thoughts of an anachronistic, solo pediatrician

                            by Glenn Feole, M.D.

"Be careful too that the reading of your story makes the melancholy 

        laugh and the merry laugh louder," Cervantes, Prologue to Don Quixote

Contact: ishmaelish36@gmail.com

Blog site: ishmaelish36.blogspot.com

June 29, 2014 Sunday

Chief Complaint: (written on the chart before I go in the room)

     “His feet begins to curl over.”

Interesting Name:

     Rainbow

Anecdote:

     Brad was five years old and was very excited to be at the doctor’s office…since it was his two year old brother’s check-up and not his.  

     My every move was accompanied by Brad's dramatic explanation in a shouting voice as he would explain to his wide eyed brother what I was about to do to him…and every word was greeted by more frenzied crying by his brother.  Brad was happy and excited, caught up in the drama of this moment.
     Finally, after the shots were given and the volume of his brother's wailing temporarily overtook Brad’s frenzied explanations, the door slowly cracked open.  Brad’s head poked out and he had a remorseful worried expression on his face.   
     He quietly informed me, 
     “Tommy needs a sticker and some chocolate.”

               April, 2007, South Carolina

Poetry:

                         

Coup d'essai:

PART VI of XX: Migrant Health Care Journal

     To get to this satellite clinic, I have to drive through Spivey’s Corner.  That is where they have the annual “hollerin” contest, and the top three children go on David Letterman’s each year.  It now makes sense to me.  I’ve actually started hollerin at the cows for directions.  I might try out for the contest next year.

8/28/02: 

     A nurse at the satellite clinic said she was going to bring in some ‘whomp’ biscuits for everyone tomorow.  I looked puzzled so she explained what a whomp biscuit is: you take the cylindrical canister filled with uncooked biscuits from the refrigerator and you WHOMP the lid on the counter to open it.  

     We had just shared some delicious soup that one of the staff brought it.  It had everything in it that you could think of…except one.  One nurse said in horror, “I hope you didn’t put boiled ochra in here again.  I only like friend ochra, not boiled.”  A new cooking concept for me to digest.

     Connie, in helping me pick areas to consider living in, got a wistful look in her eye and said, “Benson.  Ah, you should consider Benson.  That’s the best little town to live in around here.”  I asked her what went on in Benson and it was like a dream that my Irish Leprechaun Father-in-law would have loved.  She explained, “Once a year, they have Mule Pull Day.  You know, they see how far some mules can pull a large weight."  I looked down at my stomach.  

     "Everyone gets dressed up in cowboy hats, boots, and over-all jeans.  Well, my son wears that any way.  I just put a straw cowboy had on him.  They have a rodeo and parades all day.  People come from all over the country.  They have blue grass music and dances at night.  I used to do those dances when I was younger but those days are gone.  And then they vote for Miss Mule Pull.”  An image  was pulled through my mind.  

Favorite Musician/song:

Cat Stevens, "Moonshadow"

    Like Paul McCartney's bass playing, exquisite in it's simplicity and beauty.  1970, Freshman year, surrounded by friends, with all the bright future to come.  Love and peace (aka "The Peace Train").  That's what his songs mean to me.  That alchemist's chemistry when everything comes together and transforms...everything: the voice, the touching lyrics, the melody, rhythms, guitar, bass and drums.  

Favorite Book/author:

The New Yorker  

    I have had 100's stacked up in my closet at different points in my life.  Files filled with my favorite cartoons and articles.  Incredible fiction, dry cartoons, amazing non-fiction that would take me on a journey of discovery and self-forgetting.  I could devour unknown pages and explore the hidden crevices that I had missed at random future times and never be disappointed.  I would always be rewarded with great delight: even the descriptions of new restaurants, the events around town, art exhibits, movies, music…all done with the highest intellectual and aesthetic tone.
    Here is a quote I just found from one of John Updike's collection of essays called Picked-up Pieces He was asked about how he felt being associated with the magazine (he was a Talk of the Town writer  for two years after graduating from Harvard): "…their acceptance of a poem and a story by me in June of 1954 remains the ecstatic breakthrough of my literary life.  Their editorial care, and their gratitude for a piece of work they like, are incomparable.  And I love the format - the signature at the end, everybody the same size, and the battered title type…"

Favorite Movie/DVD:

The Doctor, with William Hurt

     As a physician, I wish every medical student could watch this DVD.  Maybe it is Dr. Schweitzer's idea of the "mark of the wounded" that transforms a doctor into a more caring, compassionate person.  It is a gradual, subtle, sometimes painful transformation.  First the struggle to become knowledgeable with the vast amount of data to learn, and eventually to see beyond that and actually see the patient as a fellow suffering human being.