Letter to Myself

Aug 9, 2009

Sunday

Day six of being an Island Doctor.

Needless to say, I came here on a whim. Whether it is God’s whim or mine, it doesn’t matter. What matter’s is I’m here. I wanted to be Independent and I don’t think it’s fair for me to be always blaming other people for the restraints I’ve put on myself. so I needed to break free. I don’t know from what. Fromsomething. So when I packed my bags and finally got here, I couldn’t explain the freedom. I couldn’t explain the fear. I couldn’t explain the explosion that burst inside me when I saw the bluest ocean and felt the sea breeze whisper against my face like a welcoming committee that’s been waiting for me for a long time.

I made a choice. And I’m sticking to it. And telling myself that made me feel just a little bit assured that everything’s going to be just fine.

On my second day, an American guy asked me my favorite color. I told him it was a rather strange question to be asking his doctor and he didn’t pursue it anymore. But when he left, I knew my answer: the color of coffee, freshly brewed from the pot. You know those few seconds when they’re suspended in the air while they’re being poured into a cup? They get a particular color. A little amber. A little midnight. A little gold. And amlost transparent, like a dark window pane of colored glass… the color of Tope’s eyes when he looks at me.

Mostly my patients here are either trying to confirm (or disconfirm) their preganancies, or local ladies and their benefactors with STD. I also get a lot of the commom fever and flu and cases of dehydration. Mine is basically an out-patient clinic. A few house calls here and there. Some difficulty with Koreans who can’t speak English. Some disputes between couples who suddenly discover that their partners are midnight butterflies scattering pollen the kind that leads to painful pee and an even more painful antibiotic injection.

It seems that everyday, so far, brings only cases I could handle. but even so, it’s quite different when you have a lifeline to tug nearby. i find that even when it’s the simple case of a tinsillitis, I discover how fervently I pray that the Almighty Healer might guide my choices. That nothing bad would happen to the little boy who fell off his bed and bit his lip, or the young lady who was obviously pretending that the positive result of her pregnancy test was okay. I don’t know what it is that makes us so afraid of endless possibilities. I suppose it’s the knowledge that some things are just beyond our human control. And yet, no matter how frightening it is, you find yourself yearning for it with an unquenchable thirst.

My mother’s parting gift was a prayer booklet. One of many she has already given in the past. I’m not so fond of reading prayers. I always thought that reading prayers was like asking someone else to pray in your stead. Tope and I always prayed with our own words, finding it can stitch us together more than any romantic date ever has. But I suppose I’ve never been in this situation before, where the uncertainty of what’s to come brings us to that moment where we are utterly speechless in front of the Almighty, and the need for the comfort of prayer is undeniably there, and all you have in your hands are someone else’s words in a prayer book.

Is it not true that there has never been a true measure of prayer except for the sincerity with which it is done, regardless of the words?

Last Friday, my old friends Joe and Eva arrived. I couldn’t go with them on thier escapades becuase I’m on 24 hour on call duty at the clinic. But it was wonderful having them here. when Joe hugged me the day they left, I had to try not to cry. Old friends going seperate ways. Again. It’s like a snippet from a movie.

We meet people in the journeys we take. Some of them just passing by. A few will remain etched in our hearts even after they’ve disappeared for thier own paths. And we discover that even if we belong somwehere, or with someone, in the end, well be by ourselves, still. Like the stars. Together in the sky but light years away from each other for all of eternity….