Spring 2023: The Health Humanities Journal of UNC-CH

THE HEALTH HUMANITIES JOURNAL

UNC-Chapel Hill | SPRING 2023

MISSION STATEMENT

The Health Humanities Journal of UNC-CH aims to inspire and facilitate interdisciplinary thinking and collaborative work while developing and embodying a variety of ideas that explore the interface between arts and healing. This publication allows for dialogue, meaning-making, and multiple representations of the human body, medicine, and illness.

To learn more about the publication or to submit, visit the following website: https://hhj.web.unc.edu.

DISCLAIMER

The Health Humanities Journal of UNC-CH adheres to legal and ethical guidelines set forth by the academic and health communities. All submitters maintain patient privacy and confidentially according to the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act (HIPAA). The University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill and The Health Humanities Journal of UNC-CH do not endorse or sponsor any of the viewpoints presented in this journal. The opinions presented in this journal are those of the corresponding authors.

SPONSORS

Spring 2023

The Health Humanities Journal

of The University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill

exploring illness, caregiving, & medicine

Editor-in-Chief

Managing Editor

Art Director

Treasurer | Editor

Secretary | Editor

Layout Editor

Marketing Director

Lead Podcast Editor

Assistant Podcast Editor

Podcast Marketing

Director Editors

Editorial Team

Iris Kang (Class of 2023)

Miranda Almy (Class of 2023)

Ellen Hu (Class of 2023)

Malik Tiedt (Class of 2023)

Su-Ji Cho (Class of 2023)

Yan Zhu (Class of 2026)

Alicia Equan (Class of 2026)

Edwin Parker Savage (UNC School of Medicine: Class of 2024)

Kate Brown (Class of 2023)

Sabrina Shaw (Class of 2026)

Tess McGrinder (Class of 2023)

Joseph Kargbo (Class of 2023)

Penelope Alberdi (Class of 2024)

Ryan Phillips (Class of 2024)

Iris Chang (Class of 2025)

Lydia Meltonlane (Class of 2025)

Rotem Olsha (Class of 2025)

Heidi Segars (Class of 2026)

Aaron Stepp (Class of 2026)

Gruaduate Editors

Cate Hendren (UNC School of Medicine: Class of 2023)

Olivia Davis (UNC School of Medicine: Class of 2025)

Anameeka Singh (UNC School of Medicine: Class of 2025)

Jacqui Zanders (UNC School of Medicine: Class of 2025)

Faculty Advisers

Jane F. Thrailkill, Ph.D. (Co-Director, HHIVE Lab |

Department of English and Comparative Literature)

Kym Weed, Ph.D. (Co-Director, HHIVE Lab |

Department of English and Comparative Literature)

Jane F.

Sananda

Daniel

Grayson Sword

Cloris Huan

Sophie L. Schott

Vanya Bhat

Jessica Jones

Sophie L. Schott

Lauren Pomerantz

Brianna Veres

Catherine Malden

Tiffanie Lee

Viswanath (Veesh) Swamy

Jacoby Grayson Smith

Jacoby Grayson Smith

Dear Reader,

What makes a landscape breathtaking? Is it the ______ dotting the horizon? The ______ color of the evening sky? The smell of ______ and salt carried by the ocean breeze? The ______ along the shoreline? Or the feeling that there is something in it beyond what the eye can see?

Each semester, I’ve sat down to write these editor’s notes with much anticipation, excited to explore the pieces in further depth. I’ve felt like an explorer on this last stretch of the publication journey, writing down everything I’ve seen in my trek through the pages. And each trek has made me ponder whether there is a thread tying all the pieces together. In previous semesters, it was fairly easy to glimpse these threads. Two falls ago, it was the lonely highway of illness; a spring ago, the promise of hope; and last fall, the idea of rest.

But this spring, it was harder than usual to tease apart a theme. As I leafed through the pages and surveyed the pieces, I had trouble seeing the thread because—I’ll be honest—I veered off toward many side roads along the way. That is, my original aim of finding a theme took a backseat and I became immersed in something completely different: the scenery.

Many times, the world around me would disappear as I stepped into each lush landscape created by the authors. Like a museum exhibit, each story was unique, a standalone world from the one before. My senses were flooded with rich imagery upon the opening of each page: monks on mountains, jungles of elusive beasts and an unknown animal, purple hues and bright lights, masks, city metros, ellipses dotted with uncertainties, kitchen tables, car rides, a cold porch, the Rocky Mountains, a starfish on the beach, a cold Michigan lake, the river, the rain. It was the abstractness of these elements that really captured my attention. During our team’s submission reviews, discussions would often be marked by a plethora of questions, usually regarding the meaning behind each element. Is it a figment of the character’s imagination? A physical manifestation of illness? Whose is it? Is it supposed to hold as much significance as we think it should? How should we interpret it? These are all questions that remain unanswered today, but I believe that is what makes this issue so gripping.

Like landscapes in nature, it’s not only the view from afar that makes these stories so absorbing—it’s also the elements dotting the scenery that take our breath away. For each of us, there’s a unique object standing out from the rest that other surveyors might miss. It might be the pine trees or mountain ranges dotting the

horizon, the crimson or indigo color of the evening sky, the smell of seaweed or PB&J’s and salt carried by the ocean breeze, the seals or tumultuous waves along the shoreline. This is what makes the health humanities as riveting as it is: two explorers can be looking at the same landscape, but to each of them, there is a singular object that captures their attention.

Our hope is that you will come to ponder and enjoy the sense of ambiguity that permeates the elements of this issue’s stories. The health humanities is a field that teems with contemplation, second reads, and unanswered questions. It gives metaphorical meaning to objects that at first glance don’t seem so ambiguous but are actually more than what meets the eye. What others see, you may miss, while what you easily recognize, others may not. And this ambiguity is what makes the landscape of health humanities so breathtaking.

This semester marks many of the staff’s and my last semester at The Health Humanities Journal. This journal has taught me so much, not only about how to run a publication or work with a team of amazing staff, but also what it means to appreciate “dialogue, meaning-making, and multiple representations of the body, mind, health, and illness.” And gratefully, I walk away from this final trek, my eyes opened to the richness of this mission thanks to these Spring 2023 stories.

Importantly, this issue would not have been possible without the dedication of many individuals during the past four months. I would like to thank the graduating staff for the legacy they leave behind at The HHJ, including Miranda, Ellen, Malik, Su-Ji, Cate, Tess, Joseph, Lydia, and Kate. I would also like to thank the new generation of staff who will carry on the publication torch and bring more stories to our readers in years to come. The team and I are immensely grateful to our advisers and mentors—Dr. Thrailkill, Dr. Weed, and Dr. Kopp—who have guided our vision for this publication and inspired us to start tilling the journal’s next season. We would also like to thank our sponsors for supporting this undergraduate journal and allowing our team, authors, and readers to hold the tangible product of this semester’s work. And lastly, thank you to our authors for writing these landscapes and offering a glimpse into the elements that truly make them breathtaking.

- Iris Kang, Editor-in-Chief

Faculty Adviser’s Note

In the fall issue of The Health Humanities Journal, a good doctor in one of the poems asks the speaker a simple question: “What’s been going on?” This question is worth pondering, for each of us as individuals and for the communities that we belong to, as we reflect on the tumultuous past three years since the coronavirus pandemic began.

“What’s been going on?” The poems, artwork, and narratives in this issue of The Health Humanities Journal offer a collage of responses. The beautiful, evocative drawing “Unmasking” shows a pair of hands twisting the strings of a crumpled mask around ungloved fingers: a reminder that face coverings, for two years the source of furious debate, are once again innocuous, mere slips of paper. The image is equivocal, however, reminding us we live in a transformed world, with millions dead from the pandemic and hundreds still dying every day in the United States.

None of these works names Covid-19, but together they reflect a palpable, everyday awareness of life’s precarity and transience. A child prays as her father’s leg snaps in a skiing accident. A young boy wrestles with conflicting emotions of guilt and longing as he watches his mom’s features lose their familiarity from chemo, wondering each time if it is really her that he sees. The works within these pages, in the words of one writer, “listen and bear witness to so many messy, gentle, heartbreaking things.”

Many of the pieces speak to the existential experience of living in turbulent times, of struggling with fear, anxiety and depression. The pervasiveness of psychological and moral distress on college campuses is headline news. At the time of this writing, the National Education Association reports that over 60% of college students “meet the criteria for at least one mental health problem” (Flannery 2023).

While statistics such as these are sobering, numbers alone don’t convey the texture or lived experience of suffering. For this wisdom, we turn to poetry, to art, and studies that enlist “qualitative” evidence—a term rooted in qualia, meaning the internal and subjective elements of sense perceptions. The works collected in this issue of The HHJ attend to the texture of what it feels like to experience “midnight melancholia,“ in the words of one contributor from our last issue.

Casting into language difficult human experiences—whether profound losses, or daily dismays—helps to repair the torn fabric of our worlds. As the poet Mary Oliver writes, “Poems are not words, after all, but fires for the cold, ropes let down to the lost, something as necessary as bread in the pockets of the hungry.”

As we try to reckon with the losses of the past three years, we do well to listen to the voices within our community—especially our students. The writers and artists who contributed to this issue catalogue our current sorrows, to be sure, but they also discern what William Butler has called “the terrible beauty” of human endurance and aspiration for a renewed world. In spite of what’s been going on, they keep going. Mary Oliver affirmed the importance of beautiful acts of creation, which begin with imagination: “A mind that is lively and inquiring, compassionate, curious, angry, full of music, full of feeling, is a mind full of possible poetry. Poetry is a life cherishing force” (Oliver 1994).

- Jane F. Thrailkill, Faculty Adviser

References:

Flannery, Mary Ellen. “The Mental Health Crisis on College Campuses.” NEA, March 29, 2023. https://www.nea.org/advocating-for-change/new-fromnea/mental-health-crisis-college-campuses.

Oliver, Mary. A Poetry Handbook. 1st ed. Orlando, Florida: Harcourt Brace & Company, 1994.

Conditional Sananda Jagannathan

I drink warm lattes to miss you and eat a chocolate chip cookie, to think about how you’d complain that everything was sweeter in the States. I think of you when I sit in the passenger seat because you would drive me around until I fell asleep.

When it rains, I stand outside to think about how you wouldn’t leave the house. And even though caffeine makes me a live wire, sugar churns my stomach, and the rain poofs my soan papdi hair, I think of you.

Now, I stick out my bottom lip when working on a particularly challenging problem and your dimple forms when I laugh. I resemble you when I swallow my tears, and as I fall silent when I’m sad.

And you, with your quiet demeanor and metal frames, had flown across the world to the monk on the mountain to avoid those little pills because you carefully computed that if I could sleep through the night, I would go back to being your daughter.

But when they cured my mind, they must have forgotten to reconnect my heart because now when I think of you, I think only about how you said to stop crying, before you gave me a reason to, as though the puddle at my feet might absorb into your skin.

Every morning as I slip those little pills, your eyes appear in the mirror, judging me for succumbing to pain as I think of the coffee, the mountain, the rain, and how you love me. You an angel of the gods, and me a congenital miscalculation,

Lurking in your image of me, I hand you a blank check on my being, as I shelter you from my reality and relearn how to live.

And still, I could never blame your stern gaze for I was simply the collateral of the orange, white, and green of your blood and the red, white, and blue of mine.

Sananda Jagannathan is a sophomore majoring in Chemistry and minoring in Medicine, Literature, & Culture and Spanish for the Professions at UNC-Chapel Hill from Charlotte, NC.—

Deep Diagnosis Jungle: Besting the Beast of My Orphan Disease

Daniel Meng-Saccoccio

As I awake from restless slumber, my parched lips stick together in protest of my empty water flask. Fortunately, I sleep near rivers; how else would I survive when I need seven liters of water each day? Sighing, I sit up and pivot to face a rustle in the nearby vines. I shake my head after seeing nothing, refill my flask, and chug from it as I read my devotional. Water and word sustain me amidst a vast and unfamiliar medical jungle: the land of the beast.

Upon finishing this routine, I walk to the river and observe the stinging wounds scattered across my reflection. My body’s ailments fuel my quest to track down the fiend that ambushes me before disappearing. The stealthy assailant evades my searches, always striking from behind and vanishing before I can catch a glimpse of its face. The invisible being veils my undiagnosed wounds to passerby with a magical mist. I gaze at the beaten, battered man in the river, eyes filled with memories that are difficult to remember, but impossible to forget.

For those with orphan diseases, victims of the beast, the medical jungle poses a challenge like none other. The less than 200,000 patients nationwide are born with a mist that conceals their true selves. The beast can strike as it pleases, and without a diagnosis, its victims may be unaware their issues even exist. To fight past the mist and see reality, every victim must battle an adversary as formidable as the beast itself: doubt.

Discovering my underlying symptoms exacted a heavy toll on my body. In high school, I fell from tall vines and trees as I chased vibrant macaws singing of the benefits of hard work, no matter the cost:

“Do more.”

“Suck it up.”

Despite the pain, I continued to pursue the flock and fall, time and time again as others—as I— questioned the existence of my medical issues due to lack of diagnoses. Their nests promised the envied golden eggs of success and happiness. One day, I fell and inevitably landed in the quicksand of medical doubt—my heart rate dropped to the thirties and my oxygen saturation plummeted to 85%.

I battled to stay afloat, determined to pursue the enticing macaws. But as I watched them fly away, their allure began to fade. I realized struggling through life to keep up with “normal” expectations only made me sink more quickly. When I accepted the need to rest, breathe, and care for my body’s needs, I was finally able to wriggle free from the quicksand and see through the mist, prepared to abandon the wild macaw chase of what others found fulfilling.

How many of my wounds were simply concealed, and not caused, by the beast? How much of myself had I lost in a reckless pursuit of normalcy?

As dew drops from overhanging branches fall on my face, I am reminded of my good fortune: I am alive, against all odds. Escaping the quicksand inspired me to map out the expansive medical jungle: to unveil my mist, and ultimately, to hunt down my beast.

Taking out my map, I gaze at the viridian and crimson markings that indicate where I can find allies to assist me and avoid those that misdirect me. After pondering, I choose to remain put, lacking time and energy for travel. I put the map away, toss my flask in my backpack and unsheathe my sword, bestowed upon me as a reward for confronting my mist.

Rare sunlight glimmers through the canopy and illuminates the inscription upon the sheen of my blade: “medical warriors need rest.” I remind myself to put my health first and to advocate to those who resist that decision. Slow progress is still progress, and I am most vulnerable to the creature when I overextend myself.

A tree frog croaks nearby and snaps me out of my thoughts. Since my encounter with the quicksand, I know to allow myself time and rest to grow from and recuperate from my new adventures, even today’s simple quest of napping. Although I have not seen it, I will identify and defeat my elusive pursuer. At least now, with my mist gone, I have a fighting chance. Whether the beast followed me through all the trials of my past or not, it no longer matters; I twirl my sword and grin, knowing I am far better prepared for my next encounters.

Looking around me and seeing no disturbances, I lie down, sheathe my sword, and admire the macaw-free treetops above as I fall back asleep.

—Daniel Meng-Saccoccio is a sophomore majoring in Quantitative Biology and minoring in Medicine, Literature, & Culture at UNC-Chapel Hill from Chapel Hill, NC.—

Comatose Awakening

Grayson Sword

The room was bathed in a deep purple haze. I saw the skyline through my window—nighttime.

The nurses floated noiselessly around me, outfitted in white dresses that seemed lavender in the glow. Their eyes were trained on anything but me.

What time was it?

I felt my throat constrict.

The tubes are falling back in my throat, I screamed. But nothing came out. The nurses continued to ignore me.

Water, I croaked. I need water.

Every bone in my body yearned for it.

The tubes. Water. Need it. Time. Falling. The tubes. Water. Need it. Time. Falling.

I felt my vision go black, my veins filling with lead.

Is this what dying feels like?

I clawed at the tube, attempting to wrestle it from my throat. I heard screaming, but it wasn’t me this time. Someone’s hands gripped the tube and yanked .

I opened my eyes. White hospital light. Freed.

—Grayson Sword is a senior majoring in Public Policy and minoring in Business and Biology at UNC-Chapel Hill from Asheville, NC.—

Unmasking

Cloris Huan

Despite its prominent impact, mental well-being is often overlooked in the clinical and social evaluations of illness. This piece reflects the anxieties and still-to-be-discovered impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on people’s mental health and well-being. By displaying a subtle gesture, such as the fidgeting of a mask around one’s finger, this piece seeks to depict the experience of mental health in society while simultaneously drawing a sense of suspense, through the tension of the string around the hands, over what is to come. This work aims to capture the fear and anxiety of “unmasking,” re-adjusting, and re-entering into an unknown and uncertain future in which the world has inevitably changed.

—Cloris Huan is a junior majoring in Health Policy and Management at the UNC Gillings School of Global Public Health from Chapel Hill, NC.—

Waiting Room

Sophie L. Schott

“The whole earth is our hospital” –T.S. Eliot, Four Quartets

“There are names for what binds us: strong forces, weak forces. Look around, you can see them.”

–Jane Hirshfield, For What Binds Us

Another burst. Intense pressure, heat. The tracks buckle and hiss beneath our feet, threading through the steady pulse of city traffic like a slick glide wire, pushed straight into the throbbing heart of the Texas Medical Center.

There are so many ways of getting here. Patients, students, and their attendings arrive each morning, expectant. I watch them pour in: pedestrians and cyclists, beaded with pearls of sweat, swipe their eyes. Drivers scowl at the garage prices or grapple with kids in car seats. They are well and sick, young and frail, educated and untrained.

I know this because I am one of them.

Every morning, I crowd onto the metro, the red line on Fannin, southbound to the TMC. I notice the bobbing hospital badges and read: a registered nurse, a researcher, another trainee. A woman without a badge coos to her baby, bouncing and healthy. Another mother, with exhausted puffs under her eyes, leans against the sticky carpet chair cushions, eyes closed, with one child sprawled across her lap and the other staring out at the whir of Hermann Park. I wonder where they came from, where they are going. A well-child visit? An appointment with a pediatric subspecialist? The Houston Zoo?

There are so many ways of getting here: an ambulance, an embolism, another asthma attack. Others arrive at the hospitals borne by a strange love, the kind that burns midnight oil and draws near the whole mess of humanity. I see them at the station. Night shift nurses, chaplains who know the midnight joys and terrors of strangers, students of every healing profession. I imagine what it would be like to join them, to listen and bear witness to so many messy, gentle, heartbreaking things.

To hear where patients come from, to know where they are going.

Where do I come from, where am I going?

My junior year of college, one of my favorite professors asked our class to write poems about where we came from as a way of introducing ourselves to each other. I wrote mine about medicine, about the way life winds like a double helix: one half history, one half experience. In my imagined helices, there were no kinks or breaks. I aspired to relentless progress, never imagining the many fractures and foibles before me.

There are so many ways of getting here. My clinical biochemistry professor jokes about her bumpy commute on her electric bike. Her lecture today is about cells, the most basic unit of life. She reminds us that weak forces can aggregate to make strong ones. We wonder at the profundity of tiny proteins skating in sync, hammering together the scaffolds that protect us from pathogens.

Impatience makes my veins run hot. On the metro, I count every stop: Burnet, Bell, Memorial Hermann Hospital. I look at my fellow passengers, read their bobbing badges. We are still and still moving, caught in the tension between the already and the not yet. Sometimes it feels like the whole city is our waiting room: something you have to do before healing, before knowing, before going. I have felt this before.

The waiting room was my laptop. I remember the way I pounced on my keyboard every Friday evening, sifting through my inbox for a medical school acceptance letter that never arrived. In those long months of waiting, I alternated between depression and determination. I would become a doctor—but not yet. Still and still moving, I applied and was accepted to the post-baccalaureate program at Baylor College of Medicine.

Every morning on my way to class, I crowd onto the metro, the red line on Fannin, southbound to the TMC. I notice the bobbing badges and read—then imagine my name, my image, printed on the same surface. I feel the familiar friction build in my chest, the ever-present tension between who I already am already and what I am not yet.

Sometimes I struggle to believe that I belong in this buzzing place, but then I remember: there are so many ways of getting here. Acknowledging this reality helps me to understand what it means to care for another person, to consider what life might look like from their view of our waiting room. Each morning as I watch patients, students, and attendings pour into the Texas Medical Center, I am reminded of the role we all play in the human story—our lives like tiny proteins skating in sync, hammering together scaffolds of connection and meaning.

As a post-bacc student, I know little of how medicine works, but curiosity about the human condition is something that I can always offer my fellow travelers. On the metro, I inquire:

“Where are you from?”

“Did you make that soup?”

“What are you reading?”

“I like that dress. Where did you get it?”

“Where are you going today?”

When I wonder aloud about these things, I do not mean to be intrusive. Conversation is my way of showing care. Asking questions, cultivating curiosity, remaining open to the world as it whirls around me—this is not only what I do, but who I am.

Where I am from, where I am going. Sometimes it feels like the whole city is my waiting room, this metro car nothing but a sticky chair, a shuffle of paper: something that must be done before I can begin to learn and practice medicine. But there are rare mornings, moments when the weak forces between us feel strong. Moments when all my wrestling with tension and meaning gives way to a glimpse beyond the waiting room—I imagine my fellow travelers, healing, knowing, growing.

As the tracks buckle and hiss beneath our feet, a lone speaker screams:

“Memorial Hermann Hospital, Texas Medical Center. Next stop!”

—Sophie L. Schott is a first year graduate student in the Graduate Certificate in Biomedical Sciences and Health Equity program at Baylor College of Medicine from Houston, TX.—

Critical

Vanya Bhat

Outgoing Call from Sathvik to Dr. Arcott at 6:00 pm on Saturday

Hello, Sathvik? What’s wrong?

We’ve been here for 3 hours! They won’t take us in! They just keep saying that the doctor will let us in eventually, and Aarav is- is- isI’m on my way. Stay there, don’t move… keep pushing. I’ll be there soon.

I’m on my way. Stay there, don’t move… keep pushing. I’ll be there soon.

Outgoing Call from Sathvik to Papa at 6:02 pm on Saturday

He-

We’ve been here for 3 hours! They won’t take us in! They just keep saying that the doctor will let us in eventually, and Aarav is- is- isI called Dr. Arcott… he’s coming here—to Greenville.

I called Dr. Arcott… he’s coming here—to Greenville. And Aarav?

Not better… Nina’s trying her best, but these bloody fools won’t do anything! 3 hours! He’s only 46 days old and in the ER. They’re not listening to us!

Not better… Nina’s trying her best, but these bloody fools won’t do anything! 3 hours! He’s only 46 days old and in the ER. They’re not listening to us!

Okay, okay… How long until Arcott gets there?

Okay, okay… How long until Arcott gets there?

Not sure, it takes about 40 minutes from Wilson,

but he said he’d be here soon… It’s going to be okay, Sathvik. God will help us

It’s going to be okay, Sathvik. God will help us… have faith…

Not sure, it takes about 40 minutes from Wilson, but he said he’d be here soon… ... Yeah… bye Papa.

Outgoing Call from Sathvik to Papa at 7:43 pm on Saturday

Hel-

Papa, they’re transferring Aarav to the Children’s Hospital!

Papa, they’re transferring Aarav to the Children’s Hospital!

There’s some–Sathvik?! One second… slow down… say that again, slowly. From the beginning…

There’s some–Sathvik?! One second… slow down… say that again, slowly. From the beginning…

They’re transferring— No—tell me what happened… Dr. Arcott got there?

No—tell me what happened… Dr. Arcott got there?

They’re transferring—

Huh? Ah, yeah… They wouldn’t take Aarav in at first, but after Dr. Arcott told them he was a doctor and every

Huh? Ah, yeah… They wouldn’t take Aarav in at first, but after Dr. Arcott told them he was a doctor and everything that was wrong—like all of his symptoms—they finally took him.

Then?

They checked him and found out that there’s some thing wrong with some muscle. It’s not letting him digest anythinwhich was causing the dehydration. He needs a really serious surgery, bg wut they don’t have the

They checked him and found out that there’s something wrong with some muscle. It’s not letting him digest anything which was causing the dehydration. He needs a really serious surgery,

but they don’t have the surgeon here, so they’re transferring him… they were talking about airlifting him in the helicopter, but they stabilized him, so they’re using an ambulance.

surgeon here, so they’re transferring him… they were talking about airlifting him in the helicopter, but they stabilized him, so they’re using an ambulance. Nina’s riding there; I’m driving.

Ok, I’m coming with you— What?

What?

Ok, I’m coming with you—

I’ll come too. Arjun and I will drive to the hospital and meet you there.

I’ll come too. Arjun and I will drive to the hospital and meet you there. What about Vedya?

What about Vedya?

Your daughter will be fine, the rest of the family and your Ma are staying… plus she’s too busy playing dolls.

Your daughter will be fine, the rest of the family and your Ma are staying…plus she’s too busy playing dolls.

Okay, good… I don’t want her to know right now.

Okay, good… I don’t want her to know right now.

Ok, we’ll see you soon.

Outgoing Call from Papa to Ishan at 11:53 pm on Saturday

Hello? Papa?

Ishan… how’s everything back there? They’re fine… Mama’s sleeping. The girls are still up—watching a movie. What’s happening there?

girls are still up—watching a movie. What’s happening there?

Ishan… how’s everything back there?

We just got here. Aarav’s getting prepped for surgery. And big brother? …

We just got here. Aarav’s getting prepped for surgery. He’s in no shape to talk right now…

He’s in no shape to talk right now… … Nina?

Nina?

God will help us overcome this.

Crying… she hasn’t stopped since they took Aarav.

Crying… she hasn’t stopped since they took Aarav.

Yes, he will… I’ll call you back soon. They’re taking him now.

Yes, he w

Okay, keep me updated.

Outgoing Call from Ishan to Arman at 1:00 am on Sunday

Hel-

Brother! He’s fine! The surgery went well and–One second, Arman? Why do you–

Brother! He’s fine! The surgery went well and—

My phone died. Papa is with Sathvik and Nina! Aarav’s going to be fine! He’s going to be fine! He’s going to live!

Thank God! When is he coming home?

My phone died. Papa is with Sathvik and Nina! Aarav’s going to be fine! He’s going to be fine! He’s going to live!

Not sure yet. They want to keep him overnight so Nina’s going to stay here. Papa, Sathvik, and I are coming home.

Not sure yet. They want to keep him overnight so Nina’s going to stay here. Papa, Sathvik, and I are coming home.

Okay, good to know. Are the girls finally asleep?

Okay, good to know. Are the girls finally asleep?

Vedya’s still awake. She’s watching something on the computer. I tried to get her to sleep, but she’s—

Vedya’s still awake. She’s watching something on the computer. I tried to get her to sleep, but she’s—

It’s fine… I think there’s been enough stress for one night. Once she sees Sathvik and he explains things to her, she’ll be fine.

Incoming Call from Nina to Sathvik at 6:34 am on Sunday H-Hel—

And his food?! Is he eating?!

His blood pressure is high! It’s not stabilizing Sathvik! He’s—

His blood pressure is high! It’s not stabilizing Sathvik! He’s—

Y-yeah, I fed him about 1 hour ago, he didn’t throw-up. Just, his blood pressure— Give me 5 minutes to get dressed. I’m on my way.

Y-yeah, I fed him about 1 hour ago, he didn’t throw-up. Just, his blood pressure— Give me 5 minutes to get dressed. I’m on my way.

Outgoing Call from Sathvik to Papa at 8:34 am on Sunday H–

They’re monitoring him, Papa. They’re really worried.

They’re monitoring him, Papa. They’re really worried. Do they know what’s wrong?

No, they’re just monitoring him. And keeping an eye on him after Nina feeds him.

No, they’re just monitoring him. And keeping an eye on him after Nina feeds him. Okay, keep me updated. … I will.

… I will.

Sathvik, have faith… he’ll be fine. Just have faith.

Sathvik, have faith… he’ll be fine. Just have faith.

Outgoing Call from Nina to Mr. Davis at 8:47 pm on Sunday Hello?

Nina–

Hello, Mr. Davis. I’m so sorry to disturb you this evening; however I won’t be able to come into work tomorrow…

Hello, Mr. Davis. I’m so sorry to disturb you this evening; however I won’t be able to come into work tomorrow…

My son is still in the hospital sir. He’s recovering from the surgery and he’s had high blood pressure all day, with the doctor’s monitoring him. They’re not sure what’s going on, but they’re keeping him here another night and— Nina, it’s okay. We’ll find a sub for you. Don’t worry about it and take care of your family.

Nina, it’s okay. We’ll find a sub for you. Don’t worry about it and take care of your family.

My son is still in the hospital sir. He’s recovering from the surgery and he’s had high blood pressure all day, with the doctor’s monitoring him. They’re not sure what’s going on, but they’re keeping him here another night and—

Thank you, Mr. Davis. Thank you so much.

Thank you, Mr. Davis. Thank you so much.

Outgoing Call from Sathvik to Papa at 12:30 pm on Monday Hello, Sathvik?

We’re all coming home.

Bhat

—Vanya

is a senior majoring in Neuroscience and minoring in Chemistry and Medical Anthropology at UNC-Chapel Hill from Wilson, NC.—

The Animal

Jessica Jones

Jenn put the change in a bag because she was tired of the pennies slipping through the crack in the side of the cup holder. She considered bringing the change inside, but she thought she might need it in the car, along with the nail kit, thermometer, and bottle of water also kept in the cup holder; the box of condoms, unopened, in the glove box; and the gingham blanket wadded up with two more water bottles in the backseat.

She took the change out of the bag to use at the vending machine in the doctor’s office. Her throat was on fire; she hadn’t had anything to drink all day. She could have taken one of the bottles from the car instead, but she wanted her water cold and fuzzy to the touch.

Obviously, she knew fasting for the test meant that only food was forbidden, but without a meal, she had forgotten to drink.

After she left the office, absconding with a pen (an unintentional theft), and a People Magazine (an intentional theft), she drove ten over the limit to McDonald’s, then shoved the brown paper bag in the passenger seat. It pushed the thermometer to the floor.

She wouldn’t get the results back for several days. As she sat in the parking lot, she prayed hard, not only over the food but also herself.

At home, Mike was watching another rerun of Wildin’ Out, laughing to himself. Jenn had never found the show funny.

“I’m home,” she called out as she rushed to the bedroom with the food. She hadn’t thought to get him anything and didn’t want him to be upset. She locked the door behind herself, though she knew he wouldn’t be getting up from his brown easy chair until the episode was over.

The food was gone in an instant, the bag tucked in the bathroom trash can under tissues and used pads. She unlocked the door and thought about going back into the living room to watch TV with him, but thought better of it. Instead, she lay down on their queen-sized bed and stared at the ceiling.

I have a fever again, she thought.

The awareness made her stomach ache. She pulled the plump brown comforter around herself and up to her chin.

She felt a bit better after a brief nap. The digital alarm clock read 6:37 PM. Dinner would have to be late tonight. He was asleep on the couch, snoring in 2/4 time. The TV still played in the background. Dishes were piling up in the kitchen; they would need to be washed before the chicken could be made.

Through the window above the sink, Jenn looked out on the dark backyard. She could just barely distinguish the shadowy trees that covered most of it. They shook gently, their forms skeletal and spindly like the legs of a huge spider. She looked away and focused on the soap, the sponge, the plates and bowls. Twice, she had to sit down and wait for the nausea to pass.

As she was rinsing the final plate, she looked up once more. Two yellow eyes floated in the dark. Her skin tingled as if she was standing in an industrial freezer. She let go of the dish slowly.

The eyes did not blink. Neither did Jenn’s. She assured herself that they must belong to a raccoon or a deer, but against the faint outline of the trees, it was apparent that the animal was way too tall to be either.

She inched back from the sink and moved quietly toward the sliding glass door. The eyes remained in place. She lifted her hand to the switch for the backyard light. Her heart felt like it was kicking her ribcage.

She flipped the switch.

The halo of light from the small bulb just barely reached beyond the edge of the porch, but the figure of the animal could now be dimly imagined. Its eyes shone even brighter than before.

Her eyes traveled from the silhouette of its antlers to its beak, then to its two giant, taloned feet gripping the grass. It must have been eight feet tall, without taking its antlers into account. It watched Jenn, head tilting slowly to the side.

The creature moved toward the door, and she stepped back. A scream buried itself in her throat. Her mind was already racing with how to keep it from breaking down the all-too-thin door separating the inside from the outside. It crept closer. Slowly, curiously. The bottom of its brown, furry leg had just come within the full reach of the lightbulb, a foot away from the edge of the porch, when it stopped. The thing looked off to the left, to the yard beyond the light, as though it had heard something. Its eyes blinked rapidly for the first time.

It was much faster than a creature of its size should be, its posture horrifyingly human, long arms swinging as it leaned into a sprint. It leapt over the fence and was gone.

Jenn stood without moving, looking out into the yard, expecting anything, something. Eventually, she willed her hands to lock the door. Her head hurt worse than before.

When Mike woke up, she was still standing there.

“Hey, what’s wrong? When’s dinner?”

She wordlessly drifted back to the kitchen, finished cleaning the last plate, and cooked the chicken. They sat together at the table, and he asked about her day and the doctor’s visit. If he noticed that she spoke less, he didn’t say so. After, when he went to bed, she followed instead of staying up like usual. Again, he asked if anything was wrong.

“Just not feeling well.”

He rolled over and looked at her, “It’s gonna be okay. The results will come back soon, and then we’ll know, right?”

Jenn nodded.

She didn’t sleep at all that night.

—Jessica Jones is a senior majoring in English and Psychology and minoring in Creative Writing at UNC-Chapel Hill from Fayetteville, NC.—

House Calls

Sophie L. Schott

We ate all of our meals around the operating table. Some families might have found such an arrangement strange, a subversion of the usual separation of medicine and mealtimes. But my siblings and I noticed nothing unusual about this. Our home was a halfway hospital, our kitchen table the place that all of the neighborhood kids ended up after splitting their bones in the nearby park or twisting ankles during flag football games. While my father started practicing medicine long after most physicians stopped seeing patients in their homes, these house calls in our home were a regular part of his practice.

For much of my childhood, the membrane between medicine and magic was impossible for me to discern. On many occasions, I watched my father effortlessly set bones in makeshift splints, restoring crying children to laughter with his gentle humor and goofy smile. As I grew older, I realized that his playful bedside manner likely benefited hand-wringing parents as much, if not more than, the many pediatric patients he treated with Ace bandages and Tylenol on our kitchen counter.

Some of the happiest moments in my childhood were spent at the hospital, where I belly flopped on the adjustable office chairs behind the nurses station and spun until my dad finished rounding on his patients. My favorite nurses always smuggled me peanut butter crackers and lemon wafers from the break room. Sometimes, they let me answer the phone when their friends called up from another unit or took me upstairs to examine the stiff plastic skeleton hanging by the front office. As much as I enjoyed these escapades, my favorite hospital memories involve stealing paper green surgical shoe covers to wear as I chased after my father, his white coat billowing like a friendly ghost as I skated behind him across the spotless linoleum floors.

When he spoke to his patients and his colleagues, his voice transformed. It carried something softer, something stronger, something different than the voice he used at home, as he tumbled with us through blanket forts or called out lovingly to my mom. On the rare occasions when I heard my father use his “doctor voice,” as we came to call it, I felt invited into something that was somewhat sacred, somehow elevated above everyday experiences.

Perhaps I felt this way because I recognized the importance of the only other relationships that my father changed his voice for. There was his dad voice that I knew well and his doctor voice that I also grew to understand. But it was his hometown voice that remained a mystery to me, the voice that he only spoke in when we drove the eight hours from Texas to Missouri, where cornfields grew higher than my line of sight and everyone spoke with a bit more Midwestern twang and a lot more profanity than I was accustomed to.

Why was it okay for my father to say so many bad words when we visited my grandparents? My mom explained that he was not trying to be crude, but rather was concerned with making everyone else feel comfortable. Looking back, I imagine my father felt an enormous pressure to connect with his siblings, none of whom had ever really left the tiny, dying town in which they were raised.

Growing up, the only physician my father knew was a man named Dr. Henry Rzonca. He lived across the park from my grandparents and, as my father later practiced, was in the habit of caring for neighborhood kids who scraped themselves up on the playground. As a child, when my father developed wrenching abdominal pain, Dr. Rzonca kept vigil with my grandmother at his bedside late into the night. In the morning, he returned with the sun to make sure his smallest patient was doing alright. The only compensation he expected for this care was a cup of hot coffee. On many occasions, when my Uncle Bobby had a few too many drinks and got beat up by the farmer kids, he stumbled into the Rzonca kitchen and slept on the dining room table, where the kind country doctor always stitched up his wounds before heading off to work.

Like the Rzonca home, ours was steeped in medicine. As a child, I fought with my siblings over who got to play with the extinct pager my father gave us, wore my own pair of miniature green scrubs around the house, and pretended to deliver babies for my dolls. Despite this, I never really suspected that I would become a physician until college, when I started to understand what it was that made my father’s profession so compelling, the community that made his “doctor voice” so sacred.

Good medicine, as my dad learned from the example of Dr. Rzonca, and I later learned from him, is all about open doors, caring for your community even if it might be inconvenient for a half-drunk high school kid to show up on your kitchen table every other weekend morning. Growing up in our home was one testament to this, as was the humility in my father’s voice whenever we visited our family in his hometown. I suspect that living so many lives—one in a forgotten farm town, one as a medical student at one of the most elite schools in the country, one as a devoted parent, and one as an exacting surgeon—gave my dad a keen understanding of community and how it is created. Whether he knew it or not, this is what he taught me by caring for scraped-up kids on our kitchen table and letting me slide behind him through the hospital halls on his weekend rounds.

A career in medicine is a call to community, meals shared with family around makeshift operating tables, and a tender, steady voice saved to shepherd patients through their most vulnerable moments. Someday, when I call home and my dad picks up the phone, I hope to not only speak as his daughter, but also as his colleague, caring for my community and carrying others’ burdens as I speak with a “doctor voice” of my own.

—Sophie L. Schott is a first year graduate student in the Graduate Certificate in Biomedical Sciences and Health Equity program at Baylor College of Medicine from Houston, TX.—

Don’t take it home with you

Lauren Pomerantz

As a medical student, I’ve been frequently told that no matter how distressing or traumatic my experiences in the hospital or clinic may be, I can’t take that pain home with me to my family. This piece is not meant to question the validity of compartmentalizing these thoughts, but rather to convey the frustration and difficulty of trying to uphold this guidance over the past few years.

—Lauren Pomerantz is a fourth year medical student at Penn State College of Medicine from Great Neck, NY.—

Brianna Veres

Oh no. The urge enters your mind yet again the urge to go back and check if your front door is locked.

You thought you got away with it this time… maybe you still can. You walk forward, down to your car, and open the car door. Maybe you can get away with it.

Oh no.

Go check. Your mind urges. Well, not urges. Pressures.

You shake it off and climb into the driver’s seat.

You won’t be sure until you check again. What if it’s not locked? What if someone breaks in and steals your journal? What if someone comes in and kills your dog?

Your mind no, correction, your illness will not leave you alone. Some people get the chance of remission, the joy of full recovery, the enjoyment of never ever worrying about EVERYTHING. But you don’t. You always have to deal with the lingering thoughts of “what if?” You always have to debate with yourself whether an action is normal or a compulsion.

You can never tell if your thoughts are your own or the disorder’s.

You worry about what parts of your personality would still remain if you did not have OCD.

You believe you have overcome the desire to check your front door, so you turn on your music and drive up the driveway. You got away with it!

Wait. What if it’s not locked?

You shake your head and drive out onto the street. Your therapist told you that working through the anxiety, not giving in, is the right way to beat the compulsions.

Oh no.

The urge bothers you throughout your entire day. When you get lunch with your friend, you miss the entire conversation because you imagine someone stealing your journal. When you are in a meeting, you can’t form your words because you can almost see the image of someone killing your dog. All because you didn’t check the front door. All the worries of the day could have been avoided if you just checked the freaking front door.

You drive home that evening and can barely focus on the stoplights. You decide that it’s not worth avoiding this compulsion. It doesn’t hurt anyone. It just helps you feel better.

You need the assurance.

The next day you let yourself check the front door again. And again. And again, and again, and again before you leave for work.

Oh no.

You didn’t get away with it after all.

—Brianna Veres is a freshman majoring in English and Psychology at UNC-Chapel Hill from Cary, NC.—

Prayers

Catherine Malden

My father’s femur snapped when I was eleven years old. Until that point, I believed the winter to be warm, to be nourishing, to be welcoming to our fragile human bones. I grew up in the silken snow of the Rocky Mountains, dusted with the glory of a god who also rode the Imperial Lift and snagged the last run before 4pm. We skied each Sunday. It was our church, our religion, our substitute for the Christianity that my father so clearly countered. We went to synagogue on Friday night, religious school on Saturday, and Breckenridge on Sunday.

When my father’s femur snapped, I prayed really prayed for perhaps the first time. A mere child, I could not conceptualize or understand the agony such an injury implied. I could only imagine his magnitude of pain. The Hebrew scribbles and scriptures poured into my head as if his voice was whispering them. Separated by the stark white face of a stalwart mountain, I did not know from where they came.

Yisrael, Adonai Eloheinu, Adonai Echad.

I was marooned with my ski school class, insufficiently subdued by my instructor’s promise that despite an emergent situation (no further details), my father would be alright.

Baruch shem’kvod, shem’kvod malchuto l’olam va’ed.

Fitting, of course, that my brother would be on the exact same ski run when our father fell. His ski school class was just nearby, as if waiting, as if watching. Yet when my brother skied by my father, prostrate upon the ground, he merely waved. Waved, and continued onward. Fitting, that my brother would be in the vicinity, and he would not realize the gravity of the circumstance. Years later he claimed that my father was collapsed next to a catwalk, contrary to the seven foot fall that resulted in a broken bone. How could he possibly have known there was an injury? Clearly, my father was just resting.

Sh’ma

When my father’s femur snapped, he refused to enter the ski stretcher the litter, as we later learned it is called. Despite a descending hive of ski patrol, red jackets trying to sting him into submission, my father rose to his feet. He fell. Again, he stood and, once again, he fell. That’s the thing about a broken femur: healthy, it can hold one’s bodyweight thirty times over. Broken, it is a clipped wing, a lack of loadbearing, a death sentence to mobility.

Eventually, ski patrol was able to chorale my father, limp leg and all, into the litter. Their black and red suits like divine ladybugs, tugging their tow, fluttering down the mountain while a life hung in the balance. When they reached the base of the mountain, they tried to call a helicopter. Medical care for a fifty-year-old’s broken femur meant airlifting to Denver, moving as quickly as possible, calling in specialized surgeons on their day off. But my father, again, refused. Rather, he took an ambulance, two hours in the sleet and snow and excruciating pain, to the capital city.

And while my father was admitted to the hospital with a snapped femur, I was still praying. My brother was still skiing, somewhere else on that expansive mountain that became our second home, skiing still unaware. So too did I ski, but so too did I pray. No longer was I praying to a god who loved snow days and fresh powder and perfect bluebirds. I was praying to my God, to Adonai, who held the surgeon’s hand and fixed my father’s femur, screw by screw and rod by rod.

Sh’ma Israel Adonai Eloheinu, Adonai Echad. Baruch shem’kvod, shem’kvod malchuto l’olam va’ed.

The Sh’ma, a prayer mentioned in the Mishnah (Berachot 2:2) is a core tenet of the morning and afternoon prayer in the Jewish faith. It is recited by the Jewish community as a profession of their faith and belief in one God, often in times of trouble or distress. Historically, it is also recited prior to death as a final declaration of faith.

—Catherine Malden is a junior majoring in English and Computer Science and minoring in Creative Writing at Duke University from Denver, CO.—

How to be a starfish thrower

Tiffanie Lee

1. Every year at UNC Hospital’s volunteer orientation, new volunteers hear about the Starfish Story. After a storm, a person walking on a beach sees a child throwing stranded starfish back into the ocean. He asks her why she’s doing this when she can’t save all of the starfish, and she replies that it made a difference for that one.

2. I have a friend who says she chose a career in medicine because she hates math. Even if you don’t need calculus in healthcare, I find that numbers are most significant where people are involved. The number “one” holds more value when you’re counting lives. I lost one pipette tip. I lost one dollar in the vending machine. As of February 14, 2023, the World Health Organization’s Coronavirus Dashboard stated that we lost six million, eight hundred and forty one thousand, one hundred and fifty two lives to COVID (World Health Organization 2023). Is it even worth trying to save one when the numbers suggest that you’re constantly losing the battle against death and illness? I don’t know. I’m not a doctor. But as a patient, I sure hope my providers think that my friends and family and I are each worth fighting for.

3. I’m learning a song on the piano. It’s six minutes long and is called “Nuvole Bianche” by Ludovico Einaudi. It’s really beautiful. I practice sometimes after my volunteer shift, at the piano beneath the staircase by the kinetic sculpture at UNC Children’s Hospital. I was practicing a few weeks ago and I heard someone call for the adult rapid response team over the hospital speakers. For a second, I let myself imagine what playing with the band on the Titanic felt like. I hope the person was okay, but as a pianist, I know that outcome is out of my control, no matter how worried I feel. But someone stopped by and told me that they really enjoyed the music—it totally made my day.

4. I think there will be times when you’re going to feel like certain negative outcomes are inevitable and everything is out of your control, but that’s really not true. Patient-centered care isn’t only about figuring out what the issue is or determining what medications or treatments one can give to help. I shadowed a cardiologist the other day. I don’t remember what the diagnosis or the treatment plan was, but at the end of the exam, I remember the physician helping an elderly patient safely move off the exam table and offering to hold his items while he put on his jacket. For another patient, she recognized that he was hard of hearing and made a point to enunciate and SPEAK VERY LOUDLY so that he could participate in the conversation about his

health. I also shadowed a neurologist-researcher. In addition to making his patients laugh, I saw him also draw a diagram to help a patient understand why the electrodes implanted in her brain could be causing her tremors. He explained the improvements that had been made to the design of these electrodes over the last decade to prevent these types of problems and made sure she understood exactly what the replacement procedure was, as well as the potential risks and possible benefits, before referring her over to a neurosurgeon who could further answer her questions. They both also took the time to sit down with me to explain what was going on, made the time to answer all of my questions, and gave good advice. These providers—they are my role models.

5. So I’ve learned that you’re never just anything in healthcare. You’re also a team player, a mentor, an educator, a friend if someone needs a friend, another human who wants to be their best and to do good. I’m not just an EMT-in-training doing her clinicals—my work can mean holding a senior’s hand on an ambulance ride to make their trip less scary. I’m not just a volunteer in the pediatrics unit—my role can mean playing with a child who was stressed waiting for mom to come so they can go home. I spoke with another friend today who volunteers through UNC CPALS and he told me about how he and several physicians, nurses, and providers attended the funeral for a pediatric patient—it absolutely broke my heart to hear how much that one life meant to him. To be present and in a position where you can help someone out on their best and worst days is a privilege and an honor. To practice medicine in any capacity means that you should strive to be someone, who even in the face of overwhelming helplessness and difficulty, makes the decision to do one right, over and over and over again—to be like the child who decides to throw one more starfish back into the ocean.

Acknowledgements:

I would like to thank all 19 of my ENGL 138: Intro to Creative Nonfiction classmates for workshopping the essay with me and Professor Kendra Greene for her continued support and helpful suggestions.

Reference:

World Health Organization. 2023. “Global Situation: Deaths” WHO Coronavirus (COVID-19) Dashboard. Accessed February 14, 2023. https://covid19.who. int/?mapFilter=deaths.

—Tiffanie Lee is a sophomore majoring in Quantitative Biology and minoring in Creative Nonfiction Writing at UNC-Chapel Hill from Cary, NC.—

Hands in Translation

Viswanath (Veesh) Swamy

It took me many winters to understand why nature crafted your hands in that way. Even in December in Michigan, they were soft, supple, always summery. It seemed that your hands were infused with elements of the earth’s core itself. The hands of a healer, so they say.

When nature began to reclaim you, I shut my eyes and clenched my fists. It began with color. Then form. Then function. Soon you no longer held your glass. And strangely enough, you started saying Float like a butterfly, sting like a bee. More floating than stinging, of course.

These days my hands feel colder. Although they’re pale and rigid and often trembling, my memory of New Year’s Eve still brings warmth to my hands. When we had looked over Reeds Lake, you placed your hand on mine, and we watched the ice patches grow stiller, as you slowly slipped into delirium.

In the creases of your palms I tried to follow your teaching. Energy is neither created nor destroyed; it is translated, transformed, from the work of one’s hands to another. And so, I wonder, sometimes, if you overheard my patient when she told me I had the hands of a surgeon,

and I wonder, sometimes, if she said that out of kindness, or if it was your energy, translated.

—Viswanath (Veesh) Swamy is a MD Candidate at Michigan State College of Human Medicine with an MSc from Columbia University Division of Narrative Medicine from Flint, Michigan.—

- The Rock & The Bottle -

Jacoby Grayson Smith

Most of the time I accepted life for what it was. I refused to ask questions which resulted in the repetitive intoxicant answer. I could have inquired, I could have said something, but the bitter truth only mirrored sorrow. I thought most of that would change as every year I grew a little taller, a little stronger, and a little wiser. However, each year only extended the pain and eventually snapped to the point where I took it all for granted.

The Gospels said thou shall not idolize—but he was my idol. It was an unconscious sin that eventually filled my soul with fire, but as a child, it was worth every ember.

He was a strong man, with dusty overalls, calloused hands, and all. Boots so large they could never be filled. His love was nonetheless vanilla. The scent was rich and soothing from afar but sharp and bitter to the taste. He objected and despised our help. Yet, that never stopped her from sacrificing her well-being to see him live another day.

Paralysis affects more than just one area. It infects daily activities, storybook memories, and relationships. Rheumatoid arthritis attacks more than its own tissue. It invades personal will, freedom, and choice. Congestive heart failure prevents more than just adequate pumping and reduced blockage. It impedes long-lasting embraces, sunset sighs, and late-night outings. She tried her best, her absolute best, but sometimes enough was enough.

Saturday mornings were beautiful. They always began with morning walks along the river. He had spent years as a mining engineer in Botswana and China and never missed an opportunity to hold my arm back as I tried to out-skip his impressive throws.

“Damn!” I rebelliously exclaimed.

He would chuckle, dismissing my adolescent profanity and instead examine the rocks and minerals closely. I was always amazed. How could my own backyard be full of metamorphic mysteries and such precious gems? He often referred to me as “Chert”, although I did not bear resemblance to any petrified wood or diagenetic replacement. Though he truly believed my heart was as rare as his prized Botswana rock. So, I accepted it beneath my arrogant, smart-ass remarks.

Every walk was pleasant, but each Saturday tradition slowly faded. He did not slap my hands in between every skip. He failed to check my footing before every throw. We still examined the rocks and minerals, but sometimes his words just sounded like noise.

As time passed, rocks dropped in skips and miles turned into meters. He refused to show pain. I began picking the rocks and pebbles up for him, but he threw them right back. He criticized my selection regardless of the time and detail I dedicated to my shoreline selection. I started to think it had nothing to do with rocks. Nevertheless, he would always clasp my neck on our walks back and mutter, “What’s next Chert?”

“What’s next” was usually waiting on the counter.

Instead of playing in the yard, as the living room pictures suggested, he resorted to his Waterford Marquis glass. His wife, tattered and defeated, tried her absolute best to ensure that he was happy. She was always present, never missing a moment to fulfill his urgent needs. Despite my irritation that he interrupted her stories, I remained amazed how quickly she responded to the one she loved most.

The following months felt like years. She herniated multiple discs and endured constant migraines to please his dying needs. I could never understand why the hugs and walks faded. He could pick up that glass so why could he not pick up that rock?

Saturday visits faded into displays of chronic misfortune. I did not want to watch him struggle. I did not want to reach for another glass. Gosh, I hated those things. I hid them, but Dixie cups were a flawless replacement. The trash cans were no longer brimmed with his wood carvings and projects. Instead, they were filled with tattered cups, bandaids, and smashed bottles. It was almost a masterpiece the way the blood, paper, and glass weaved together into the despicable mosaic of a dying man.

I had told him for years that I would bring him a piece of obsidian I had found on the Nez Perce Reserve. He asked, and I answered, but for some reason I never brought it to the man on the hill. Holding out was a mechanism of want. If I held out, he would keep asking and that was another excuse to return hoping his conditions had changed.

Illness does not work that way. It breaks your bones and turns you black and blue. It does not care how much a boy looks up to a man nor how much a woman can love her husband. It rips away every facet of love as you become a weary victim to its ruthless plague. It is sad, but it was our life.

Most visits ended with a hug on his chair. Sometimes I looked forward to it, other times I refused it. One day, he turned his chair away from the TV and smiled as we walked out the door. I remember pausing, thinking had I forgotten something? It was that hug. The hug I simultaneously hated and loved. I turned back and vividly remember the squeak my shoe made as it reversed course. But I stopped, certain I would see him again and continued my path down the stairs. That was the last time I could have hugged him.

The drive to the hospital was sickening. I had just seen him so why in hell was he there? I never got an answer.

She was right there sitting in a chair holding his hand next to that god-forsaken bed.

“Fuck,” I muttered as I walked through that door, hoping he would get mad as I perfectly imitated my idol.

He was practically motionless. Hardened into the bed and wired with tubes, valves, and lifelines. I opened his dry and lifeless hand and gently placed my long-lost promise. She clenched his fist shut and I just prayed he could feel it.

“I’ll see you somewhere over the rainbow,” I said. And those would very well be my last words to him. He could barely smile, but the small opening his mouth made would forever be embedded into that fiery soul as his final gesture of love and gratitude.

I was sitting on the river bank, too weak to skip any rocks, when Mum called me. I clenched a rock in my hand when she told me he had died from cirrhosis. I looked up at the sky and knew that he had died holding my heart, but on his deathbed—eyes closed, and soul hardened.

—Jacoby Grayson Smith is a sophomore majoring in Economics and Business Administration at UNC-Chapel Hill from Boise, ID.—

- The Plane & The Helicopter -

Jacoby Grayson Smith

I still hate the rain.

Growing up, I never paid much attention to my surroundings. But one time, one thing, never left my memory…

The typical overcast morning hid the sun on my way to school. Mum dropped me off and blissfully smiled as I trotted over to the playground attendance wall.

“... 21 ... 22 ... 23 … Jacoby!”

Mrs. Kroft’s raspy and aggressive voice scolded me as I hid behind Brooke Coyer’s magenta backpack. I had figured that showing Brooke my new sneakers was much more important than standing in line.

Her Florsheim heels inched closer each step impersonating a gunshot. Slowly, I raised my head. She pointed her gnarly nail directly at my face.

“You think this is a game, boy?”

Before I could mutter a smirking reply, rain poured down as if someone had flipped a switch. The entire class went wild.

“Order! Order!” Mrs. Kroft hollered.

We didn’t care. I was so scared that I ran to my mother’s Volvo in the congested exit lane.

“Mum, mum!” I yelled.

“What are you doing, love?” she replied. “Go to class before your sneakers get dirty.” But for some reason, I couldn’t. At breakfast, Dad had told me that today was an important day. He didn’t tell me why, but I vividly remember his hand shaking as he flipped the Statesman’s pages.

Whether I had been frightened by my own misdemeanor or Dad’s

failure to hide his anxiety, I didn’t listen. I reluctantly stood in the rain staring at my mother and signed a helicopter.

As a young child, my auditory defect limited most of my communication to sign language. As I got older and my condition improved, Mum and I used it as our “secret language.”

She responded by signing a plane and blew a kiss—my last grasp of bliss. …

I waited in the pick-up line longer than usual. All I wanted was Mum.

She finally showed. I ran to her car past the electrical box, skipping every opportunity to jump in a puddle, and tugged at the door handle. But Mum looked different. Her long brown curls were absent.

“Mum, what’s under your hat?”, I softly asked. Before I could say any more, though, I broke into tears.

“It’s me, love, it’s me,” she whispered.

“Where is your…”

It never came out.

I thought I had lost my mother. Who was this woman with the same eyes and soft voice rescuing me from Mrs. Kroft’s drill team?

Later that afternoon, my parents explained Mum had been diagnosed with triple-negative stage III breast cancer. The carcinoma had spread to her ducts and lymph nodes, requiring immediate radiation and chemotherapy. We children could not understand the complexity of her condition, but could feel the intensity of our parents’ words.

The once comforting and caring eyes were not absent, just hidden. My sister didn’t recognize Mum and cried endlessly. I couldn’t take it anymore.

I ran to my room alone and cold.

Mum nudged my door open just enough to slip her hands through. I moved my bear across my face, wiping away tears, and watched Mum sign a plane. I signed a helicopter.

It was still Mum.

…

The next few months were long. I didn’t sleep much. My little sister

escaped from her room one night during Mum’s first stage of Paclitaxel chemotherapy and asked, “Where’s Mum, Coby?”

“She’s downstairs!” I shouted. “Leave me alone.”

“Why are you yelling?” she replied in a soft, innocent voice.

I got even angrier. “I’m not yelling,” I said and began slurring my words.

She stared at me. She had Mum’s eyes; I couldn’t help but cry as I imagined her curls disappearing too. The more I cried, the more the rain poured.

Mum had heard our interchange and rushed upstairs.

“Now what’s this all about?” she asked.

I couldn’t speak again, so I signed a helicopter and she signed a plane.

It was still Mum. …

Those two signs became the foundation of comfort as we spent every week at St. Luke’s Cancer Institute. Mum endured four rounds of chemotherapy and underwent radiation five times a week.

With every visit, Mum grew weaker.

We couldn’t play like we used to. When I would put on my captain’s hat and fly around the house, she didn’t chase me for hours.

Every step tore her apart.

After her cancer refused to fall into remission, my time in the waiting room increased exponentially. Mum never outwardly told me she was in pain, but I began to wonder.

A nurse had told me my mother was a warrior, but I never understood why.

Was she dying? The tears before had been out of fear, not out of loss. I sat and pondered as I watched the rain fall through the lone thirdfloor window. It hadn’t rained in months.

When my mother walked out, I sat up quickly.

“Mum, Mum are you okay?” I ran over to hug her hip.

She didn’t respond. I looked up hoping for a soothing reply, but no reply came.

She smiled as a tear formed, lifted her hands, and signed a plane. I released my embrace, signed a helicopter, and caught the tear as it rolled off her cheek.

The tear was precious.

On our way to the car, I clasped my hands together. Determined to protect her tear from the pouring rain, I slipped and dropped my bear in the parking lot’s puddle. Mum looked back in shock and hurried over.

My elbows were bleeding and my bear was covered in sludge.

“Jacoby, are you okay?” she asked frantically.

“Mum, I’m okay. We are warriors just like you.”

She smiled and signed a plane. I signed a helicopter.

It was still Mum.

This car ride felt different though. The rain kept falling.

“Mum, are you in pain?” I asked softly.

She glanced back and replied, “Only sometimes.”

“Sometimes?” I questioned.

“Love, they can cut into my skin, cut into my body, but they will never get a piece of my soul,” she said valiantly.

The downpour eased to a sprinkle and I smiled. I didn’t really understand what she meant, so I signed a helicopter. She signed a plane.

It was still Mum. …

In 2015, when her 5-year interval neared its end, Mum had promised she’d pick me up from the first day of school.

“Jacoby, I’ll be a little late but meet me by the electrical box,” she said.

“Fine,” I responded with frustration. I couldn’t wait for the day to end. I ran outside and, of course, it was raining.

“Oh well,” I muttered as the water drenched my new sneakers. I looked up and there was the golden Volvo. I dodged the puddles and tugged at the door. Her brown curls were there.

She smiled and said, “It’s me, love, it’s me.”

I signed a helicopter. She signed a plane. It was still Mum.

And I still hate the rain.

—Jacoby Grayson Smith is a sophomore majoring in Economics and Business Administration at UNC-Chapel Hill from Boise, ID.—