WHO IS YOUR DOCTOR?

And why is she crying? In an effort to raise awareness of the healthcare crisis facing New York and twenty other states, I have shed my anonymity and started a new blog that I will share with my patients. Please visit I AM YOUR DOCTOR at (www.iamyourdoctor.blogspot.com) to follow our efforts and with a few clicks join our fight against a broken malpractice insurance system.

WHAT DREAMS MAY COME

Last night I had a great dream. I was attending a large poetry reading. Thousands of chairs. My husband (already you can tell this is a dream) and I choose a couple of seats in the middle, near enough to see some of the literati assembled. I pointed out to him a fabulous young poetry star friend up front who looked like a cross between Shelly Long and Meryl Streep. My youngest brother shows up, and since there’s no room in our row, my husband joins him in a pair of seats a row behind. They start some typical (for my hubby) anti-poetical banter, and who should show up to ask if the seat beside me is taken, but Derek Jeter, of the New York Yankees?! He chuckles, self-effacing and adorable at once, and mentions to me that he’s not sure why he’s here, they just told him to come. I laugh along and agree, that obviously I would have expected Bernie Williams instead, but reassure him that I am delighted they chose him, starting to realize that this is a dream, that “they” are “me.” My brother and husband are agog. Someone asks us to get up for a picture and the dream ends. The someone is my husband telling himself to get up to get the kids ready for school. I try to go back to sleep to resume the dream, but all I can conjure is navigating through a crowd (still at the poetry reading?) with my daughter, looking for a bathroom, and bumping into Thurman Munson with his three little ones.

The reason this was a great dream was that it differed from dreams I have had lately. Finally, a dream that was not about complications of a complicated case, losing my way, purse, family, and identity at the medical school where I teach, sending out the wrong Christmas cards, forgetting to see a consult, defaulting on bills, loans, mortgages. I woke up happy this morning, not anxious, depressed, or burdened. My morning prayers were filled with gratitude and blessing, rather than pleas and petitions. Maybe “they” aren’t “me,” but whoever “they” are, whoever sent me or wished me poetry friends, family, Derek Jeter, and a good night’s sleep, Happy New Year and thank you.