I just came home from dinner with an old friend of mine; I knew him from junior high all the way to college and now lo and behold, we're both at at the same Medical Center.
He just told me that another really good mutual friend of ours from high school, well, his dad just died.
All of a sudden, his dad just...collapsed.
I stared into my ramen for the rest of dinner, just saying over and over, "Adam's dad died? He did?"
Because Adam's dad was only 65? And because Albert and I and Adam are only 30? And we are too young to have our parents die?
Because even as a doctor, no matter how much death we face everyday, there's a certain protective element in our psyche that makes us believe that we will NOT be the next body on slab. Because otherwise, the fear of living would make it much too hard to go on.
Life is fragile.
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
5 comments:
:(
today I watched the sun rise over the mills of law-town at the end of my last night float shift, and it struck me that when we go to sleep at night (or not!), we take it for granted that we'll see another day... it was very nice to see the sun rise...
We had a 26 year old die of an arrhythmia this week. It was really upsetting to see her face. There were no wrinkles or anything.
This has fucked me up so bad. What gets me is not my dying (I assume I won't care after), but the idea about how one of those terrible random things could (and someday will) happen to the people I love.
I'm afraid I love less, more cautiously now. I hate myself for that.
Ohhh, thanks, OldMDGirl. This after I told my mom that, no, I don't really want to get checked out for that fluttery feeling in my chest sometimes after I run, god, it's just a flow murmur and doctors don't know *shit*.
Anyway.
Seriously though is this the first friend's parent who has died on you? Because... I have an unlucky group of friends, apparently.
Post a Comment