PRE-SURGICAL TESTING and THE MODERN LIFE OF THE SOUL

Thank you to all those who have come to visit me at The Wounded Surgeon. I am overwhelmed by the response…and you know who you are. In the past week I’ve visited with an angel on ice skates, an orthodox Jew, a nurse whose husband is being treated for squamous cell carcinoma of the tongue. Neighbors and cousins, a classy lady who sells wine, a writer, a priest, and the surgeons…oh the surgeons, one, an inventor, another who offered me food (“It’s a Jewish tradition, in times of need we throw food at people,”) another who’s entertained me with pictures and stories of Holy Week in Peru, one I’ve lived with, and one who I’ll love forever.

Great news from Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center. They just completed a gazillion dollar renovation of their operating suite, and apparently it’s just that – sweet. Twenty-something OR’s fitted with state of the art technology for minimally-invasive surgery, beautiful family waiting areas, and (all my pals in the OR will salivate like me) over 300 lockers in the staff locker rooms. And they do their first case in the new suites on Monday.

All this from the ebullient nurse practitioner who took my history and did a physical at MSKCC on Wednesday at my Pre-Surgical Testing appointment. Kudos again to everyone at Sloan, who made me feel wonderful and special and whole, even as they were taking my blood, doing and EKG, or shooting a chest xray. The NP actually knew my history before she took my history…soup to nuts, she even told me what my hemoglobin was the morning I had to return to the OR for bleeding! When I mentioned my surprise at her strangely complete fund of knowledge, she explained that she always reviewed records completely before interviewing a patient. She thought at first it would cut down on the amount of crying at these interviews, but now has accepted that people will cry no matter who told the story. She had joked with the patient before me that it was actually her job to get people to cry while she wrote their H & P. She cried anyway. I assured her in my most authoritative surgeon’s voice that she was NOT going to make me cry. No way. Instead we dished about how kind Dr. Abu-Rustum was with his patients and how penetratingly blue Dr. Weiser’s eyes are.

My sister and I made a day of my trip to the city, visiting the Edvard Munch exhibit, The Modern Life of the Soul at the Museum of Modern Art. His work is haunting, deep, and sad. The figures in his work wander through a vibrant, boldly-colored landscape featuring orange skies, moonlit waters, or monstrous green shrubs. Their clothes are somber and dark. Their faces (the ones lucky enough to have faces) stare zombie-like, expressionless, except for the rare expression of sheer terror (The Scream, 1893) or angst (Jealousy, 1895). My sister thought she saw a smiley face hidden in the shadows of a rock, and insisted that it was intentionally the only smiling face in all of Munch’s work. I told her she was nuts and we’d better leave or I’d be late for my appointment. As we left, we had a plebian discussion over whether the word modern means contemporary or only work from the early 20th century, and what happens when modern art becomes centuries old? Can artists get kicked out of the MoMA for being too old fashioned or traditional?

During the train ride home I wondered how Munch would have painted today’s modern soul. Two guys in Rangers jerseys got in. Sad and dejected – check. More people in dark suits boarded – check, check. Not a smiley face in the bunch. Perhaps today we are just as zombie-like and faceless, still dealing with Munch’s century-old principal themes of (lost or frustrated) love, anxiety, and death, just now with iPods at our hips and cell phones to our ears.

My family picked me up at the Stony Brook train station. My son couldn’t wait to tell me about his baseball game. Before I tucked him in, he read me a bedtime story about a little house in the country that watches the country turn into the city around her, until she is finally rescued by the great-great granddaughter of her original builder and brought back out into the country on a flat-bed trailer. I kissed him goodnight. I tried to apologize for missing his game. I wanted to tell him how proud I am that he can read as well as he can pitch. I secretly thanked him for rescuing me, and bringing me back out to the country where I belong. He was already asleep.

I got into bed, and finally let myself cry.