It is Guardia for one month and the administrators sentence the Wracks to a month in obstetrics gynecology downtown.   After an unanticipated snafu of one half of a year, the Wracks finds himself in the center of Guadalajara in a government hospital, after a long bus ride with one transfer.  Built of stone and bricks like everything in Guad, the hospital is an open-air affair with rooms situated like huge stadiums cordoned off with a wall.   Naked women in gurneys’ line up in the room and the Wracks is told to stand behind the surgeon and do whatever he asks.   Unlike the states where women get their own room for anything, Mexico is a catholic country and women cannot be in a room with a man without an escort.  In gynecology here, a medico works with a nurse with the sole intention that the patient cannot declare violation because another woman is present.  And so, it goes.   The doctor swabs a woman’s fourchette and places it in saline for a wet mount, and another goes to Microbiology for a culture.  The doctor does the work and hands the swabs to the Wracks who puts them in a labeled tube and sets them in a test tube wrack.   A nurse stands aside and brings supplies and helps physically manage the patients.  After the ladies are done, Wracks is told to leave and sit outside with his blue Harrison’s book and read and wait for the next batch of patients.   This is assembly line medicine in Mexico and it works and is safe.  This edifice is a downtown government hospital and stands close to the government building for the city of Guadalajara.  No one else is around, the patients load from the back of the arena and the Wracks is there for insurance.

Occasionally a tall man walks by the Wracks and looks at him.   He is a slender six feet three, in a grey silk suit with a lanyard for a tie.   His shoes are black leather custom boot, sort of a cross between a tuxedo shoe and a western boot, affluent cowboy Mexican style.   What arouses the Wracks attention is the fact that this tall man has two European body guards, also in suits. that stand one on each side of him and from their looks and serious demeanor, they are all book and mean business.    This tall, elegant evidently rich man never says a word but he takes a Mexican flan desert in a plastic custard cup and with a wooden spoon, eats it in front of the Wracks and disposes the plastic in the nearest trash can.   Not daily but occasionally, he and his bodyguards walk up to the Wracks, show him the cup of Mexican flan which is one of the most delicious deserts the Wracks has ever enjoyed, eats it and then walks away.  His eyes are not brown but uncommonly grey and the Wracks feels the ominous vibrations whenever he appears.   Like a guardian angel, he looks at the Wracks, evaluates, eats his flan, signals to his bodyguards and leaves.   A nurse briefly sticks her body out of the stadium and wags her index finger from side to side as is the Mexican beware signal and whispers “LASARO”, and then she is gone.   The Guardia ensues, the Wracks assists in some birthing, then more gynecology and then he sits with his book, the physician tells him he can leave and he takes his double bus ride to his reduvid infested adobe room in plaza del sol.    Then as soon as it started, the Guardia ends and the Wracks is back at the clinical campus in respiratory medicine looking at x-rays of pulmonary tuberculosis, and discussing treatment options with the doctor doing his social service at the clinical campus. 

They say Lasaro Cardenas died a long time ago.  I have to disagree with that because people with a heavy vibe about them are not normal, they are exceptional and Lasaro had a pretty fair granddaughter that the Wracks never had enough money to date.   Maybe he was evaluating the Wracks for talking with his granddaughter.  It really does not matter anymore and it never has.  Great men do not die; they simply fade away unmercifully.   The Wracks is honored that such a spectacular historical figure would take some of his precious time to deal with him.   Time moves on and the Wracks never had time to attend his graduation because his residency starts in one week and he has to be in New York to secure lodging.  His oil rich friend who drove the Wracks around in his car eventually moved to Texas and practiced there and the next epic in the saga starts.   It has been a long time, and the Wracks is in his room with an energy efficient Qualcomm processor that lasts 16 hours.   He doesn’t like the Mac operating system and he wishes he did, because it lasts 16 hours or more on a charge.  A cup of coffee and a candy bar are subjects of mirth and happiness and the clock goes round and round eventually.   

Magnetic resonance imaging is the new technique for 21^St century medicine, The eighty percent when they come to the hospital for illness say- “I want an MRI to diagnose me because it is new.”    Do they know any better?   Are they inundated with pedantic diatribe by people whose only aim in life is to make money?   Are they serving humankind or annihilating it?   A long time ago, when the United States was one nation under God, a good history and physical combined with a chemistry panel could diagnose 99 percent of all maladies under the sun.   If an x-ray and or CAT scan was thrown in, this figure approaches one hundred percent, why do we, the eighty percent need or want an MRI.  Are they better?   Do they demonstrate occult processes not viewable otherwise?   Is this a low-cost economical technology that certainly will revolutionize medicine and improve the health status of the nation?    Let us the 80 percent look a little closer.

If a low-income person walks to the receiving side of an imaging center, they see a huge transformer with a myriad of wires hooked up to the power lines.  MRI uses a huge amount of electricity and this cost passes on to the public and is paid for by one third of the GNP of the United States.   What the dang is this newfangled thing they call MRI?   According to the ivory tower elitists, when a person passes under a magnetic field of awesome magnitude, the ions in the body align with the magnetic field.  When the power turns off, the ions realign to their former states emitting a signal.   Sensors pick up the signal and the result is processed by a computer to reveal an image and a radiologist can choose any color they want to display on their QLED computer screen.  The question is, Is the signal conglomerated by the computer processor real, or an artifact of no physiological significance?   Does this expensive representation relay information that is not available otherwise at on hundredth of the cost? MRI scanners cost millions of dollars to make, transport and install and the electricity costs all come from the GNP and the trillions of dollars that wage earning taxpayers pay.   I have a stark realization for all unfortunate souls reading these lines.

Lenz’s law of electromagnetism states:

The direction of an induced current is always such that it opposes the change in magnetic flux that produced it.

In other words, intense magnetic fields induce a current in your body that burns the DNA.   This fulgurating current destroys cellular DNA and induces cancer.    It is already known that people who work with high power lines have an increased incidence of leukemia and other malignancies and this is topping on the cake.  Magnetic fields induce a current like the plug in you living room that powers your computer and television set.   Just because someone is of the twenty percent and has a high IQ does not mean they are ethical.  Ethicality is what human medicine is all about and all states require licensure after a rigorous education to practice healing human beings.   Do doctors need to read anymore?   Are the intuitively exceptional and politically correct governing body exempt from national testing and subjective licensure?   A person, man or woman does not have to be a genius to practice medicine, they have to be ethical!    Isn’t this what civilization being all about?   Brother helps brother and shares the bounty so we by the grace of God can live together.  

Tinsley Harrison, one of the last vestiges of decency in the United States stated in his special edition of “Harrisons Internal Medicine”.   “Let us not discard the old just for the sake of the new” This is the preface of his special edition, and all the medical geniuses out there can go fuck themselves.   

A winter wonder land greets the imagination on Monday morning.  The snow is ten feet high.  How this much snowfall can occur in two days remains a mystery.  One of the residents who is a retired pitcher from a minor league team throws a packed snowball at Wracks head.  A good reaction time saves the day and a medical book takes the damage.  The blow stings the fingers exposed to the missile.  “Thanks for nothing,” Dr. W says.  “I like you,” says Dr. A.  He then proceeds to bean another helpless doctor in a white smock. “I love snowball fights,” he says.   The rest of the team hurries to the main building before Dr. A can pelt any more of us.  At the doorway is Dr. Lecter.  “Give me my key back,” he states with his hand outstretched like a beggar.  “I have it with me,” says Dr. Wracks.  “Here it is nice and warm from around my neck.”  Thank you he says.  Dr. Beck storms into the room and says. “You bastards left on Friday without finishing interviewing the in patients.”  “I am going to flunk the lot of you,” he promises.  “I was here,” says the Wracks.  “Shut up, I was not talking to you.”   “We had to get out before the storm,” said the rich Dr. who drives a Lincoln town car.   “Your first duty is toward the patients,” stammers Dr. Beck.  “You have not heard the last of this.”  Dr. Beck then spins on his heels and vanishes in a flash of anger.   “After taking role, go to your respective wards and interview your patients,” says Dr. Lecter.  Back in the lockup Dr. Lecter and Dr. R. go to interview Mr.  Shine. Shine sits in the padded cell in a hospital gown and underwear.  “Mr. Shine, a person cannot run around hurting people and get away with it.” Says Dr. Lecter.  “I have my reasons,” says Mr. Shine.  Mr. Shine appears to be a Caucasian of average height and build in his early forties.  Brown hair and a fair complexion do not reveal that his job in Viet Nam was to interrogate prisoners and cut them with a Kbar knife for information.  Wracks thinks, I pity the poor slob who gets in a knife fight with him. He has traumatic stress syndrome and when put under pressure has a breakdown and beats up everyone around him.  This could number up to ten people in an episode.  “Mr. Shine,” says Dr. Lecter, “I hear you stopped taking your medication”.   “The medicine makes me restless and makes my jaw stiff, “says Mr. shine.   “We will change the medicine to something else that does not make you restless.”  Says Dr. Lecter.  “However you must stay here until you are stable.”  “When you are stable, you can go home.” “I understand,” says Mr. shine. “Hello Mr.,” I Shine I am Dr. W.  “I remember you.” says Mr. Glitz. “Nice to meet you,” Dr. W. says.  “Today you will administer Psychological therapy to Mr. Heim.  He is a paranoid schizophrenic who used to be a financial genius. See what you can do with him.  “I will,” says Dr. W.  “But first you are to interview Mr. O.  Your rotation nears its end.” I will be in my office.”  Dr. Lecter turns and disappears into the corridor.  “Be sure to maintain distance. He regards proximity as an affront and will break your nose.”

     “Hello Mr. O. “says Dr. W. “Can I sit down?”  “Silence” Dr. W pulls up a chair in front of Mr. O.  Mr. O sits in the recreation room in the Pookipsie VA center.  He wears a long red dress and a string of pearls around his neck.  His dark black curly hair sets close on his head.  He wears a big grin on his face. “Mr. O, how are you doing today?  Do you like your medication?” “Silence”  “Would you like to relay any concerns to Dr. Lecter? I will see him presently.”  “Silence.”   “Before I go, is their any thoughts that you would like to share with me.”  “Yes, he says.”  “Can I have two cigarettes?”   “Sure,” says Dr. W.  As Dr. W. hands the cigarettes to Mr. O, he keeps the distance between Mr. O and himself to a maximum and pays particular attention to Mr. O.’s hands.   “Thank you.” Says Mr. O.  “Good day. “Says Dr. W.  Dr. R then looks for Mr. heim.  Mr. heim locates in his room.  He is not so sociable.  “Can I interview you in the consultation area,” says Dr. W.  “Yes,” says Mr. Heim Dr. W leads Mr. heim to the consultation area.  He decides to use Rogers’s sounding board implosion therapy.  Mr. Heim is a small man with dark black hair and not muscular and should be easy to dodge should he decide to strike.  Rogers sound board implosion therapy translates to mimicking what a patient says or does just as they do it and locate the mimicry temporally so the patient sees for themselves what behavior they manifest simultaneously when they exhibit it. Mr. heim sits down and starts telling Dr. R about the stock “Chock full of nuts.”  Dr. W mimics him.  Mr. heim finally discovers that Dr. W repeats what he says like a tape recorder and starts making animal noises.  Dr. W mimics the animal noises.  Finally Mr. Heim leaps up on to the table, pulls down his pants and exhibits himself.  “That is enough.” Says Dr. R.  “Pull your pants back up.”  Do you understand the content of your verbal discourses?  They make me angry too.” “Some of what you say has no basis in reality.”  Mr. heim sits back in his chair and thinks about it.  The revelation becomes so awesome to his psyche that he sits their dumbfounded.  “Thank you for the interview. I must leave now. ´” Dr. W gets up from his chair and with his eyes still on the patient fluidly exits the consultation room. Mr. heim sits their dumbfounded.  Dr. R moves on in his rounds. 

     Unless a person stirs the muck and becomes intrepid, nothing really happens in a Chronic Psychiatric facility.  The patients come and take their medication and sit like dazed animals in house until the Psychiatrist dischargers them.  Some patients stay forever.  Some patients return periodically as they lose the ability to cope with the environment.  Mental illness stigmatizes human beings. Mental illness is a self-fulfilling prophecy in the sense that if a person can not be trained in a new line of work they become slaves to the system and permanent part time inmates.  The urgency with mental illness remains to try to get the person back to reality in the workplace as soon as possible.  This maneuver becomes inordinately expensive.  Money has been and is the power to drive reeducation of a person with a shattered existence.  Without money to send a person back to school, to retain competent health advisors and physicians who monitor the chronic medication and to house mental patients, mental illness penalizes  human beings and converts them to useless appendages of society who die alone, unhappy.  Most people can not afford the cure.   The cure comes from money, honesty and the undying care from health science personnel.   “Time for my plus three dinner,” thinks Dr. W

     On the last day of the rotation, Dr. Beck approaches Dr. Wracks.  He asks, “What did you do to Mr. Heim.”  “Rogers sounding board reverberation therapy,” says Dr. R. “Sounding board therapy becomes efficacious when used with a high functioning schizophrenic who can learn from his behavior what works or not.”  “What ever you did cured him,” says Dr. Beck. “He is going home tomorrow.” “I guess I am really lucky,” says Dr. W.  “Thank you for the rotation.  I learned much about Psychiatry.”  “After you finish your fifth pathway, come back here if you want a job,” says Dr. Beck.  “Thank you very much, I will certainly keep your offer in mind.” says Dr. W.    

     In life luck is everything.  Beginners luck is even better.  Chalk one up for the gipper.  Victory is sweet

The train in Pookipsie looks like the train in Harry Potter’s “The sorcerers Stone.”  The train rambles slowly downstate and eventually ends up at Grand Central Station.  On the train sits Dr. W, in a suit and tie, with his bag of medical books bound for Amityville and the surgical rotation about to begin the next day.  The scenery in the country side after a late winter storm swims by slowly.  White juxtaposed on evergreen, separated by skeletons of ash and birch. Connote the scene.  Dr. W reads from one of his books and occasionally looks up to view the panorama.  The train rocks and sways, slows and lurches and rumbles with a knocking vibration heard and felt at the same time.  He will probably do simple stuff like wound suture and suture removal.  This will give him time to review for the California board Examination.  The train rumbled on and darkness slowly permeated the scene and the interior lights of the train card turned on.  The seats were comfortable enough and the comfort is the day drawing to an end.  Dr. W thinks he is on easy street.  Just a little cutting and tying in surgery and checking outpatient bandages, thinks Dr. R.  Amityville hospital is about to administer a surprise to Dr. R like he has never been surprised in his life. The hospital staff will also throw in the ICU as a bonus prize. Before he left, Dr. Lecter floated into view, long jet-black hair in a white smock.  When you get your license, stop by.   By the way my name is Hannibal.    “Tis folly to be wise when ignorance is bliss,” muses Dr. W.  “Amen.”  “…..and so it goes.”

     On the bulletin board in the staff area is a notice. The notice reads, “All residents and fifth pathway students report to Dr. Beck’s office at 0700 today.”   The whole gang of Doctors crowd into Dr. Beck’s small room with a huge brown desk.  Dr. Beck reports, “Everyone must leave the complex by 1500 today or stay here the weekend. A huge winter storm will drop at least eight feet of snow tonight and leaving otherwise will be impossible and dangerous.  Make all preparations for evacuation now.  The clinic will resume on Monday or Tuesday when the snow blowers clear the roads.  Any Questions?”

“What if you have no place to go?”  asks Dr. Wracks.   Dr. Beck says, “Anyone staying will assume the duties of the regular staff and remain in general quarters.  The cafeteria will be open at a reduced level on standard meal times.” 

      Working in a Psychiatric hospital is boring. As long as a person integrates protocol into a mindless act, the rigmarole gets boring. Open the doors and make sure they are closed as a person exits.  Genius experts evaluate each patient individually and place them on appropriate medication.  What a clinical Psychiatrist does is watch for side effects of a particular medication and administer antidote or note overt change.  Any dramatic change of a patient’s behavior in any way indicates failure to take the medication or evolution of florid psychoses mandating a change in pharmacotherapy.  Most patients after evaluation and medication do not change very much and the evaluation of these patients becomes automatic and quick.  The main exceptions are split personality, catatonic schizophrenia and undifferentiated Schizophrenia.  A clinical physician treats all patients with these conditions gingerly, as stress precipitates psychoses with a violent outcome. Once a patient becomes violent he or she must be restrained, paralyzed with medication, and if no remission ensues ultimately terminated. To be a clinical Psychiatrist a physician must be highly intelligent to memorize the pharmacology of the medications and recognize symptoms, the side effects of the medications and the antidotes or remedies for treatment failure.  A clinical Psychiatrist must be religious because mental patients in a high percentage are doomed to a precarious existence for life.  Once a patient confines to a mental hospital, he or she most likely returns periodically until they die in an abbreviated and shortened life span. To realize most of your patients will die in a filthy or sordid way sobers even the most optimistic of human beings.

         Most young doctors come from rich families.  Only rich families can afford the lengthy and expensive medical education.  By 1400, all the residents and fifth pathway interns are on the train out of Pookipsie or hook up into carpools to take them downstate. These people will have a tremendous weekend because New York City never sleeps.  A bar, a nightclub or restaurant remains open 24/7 somewhere in the city, usually on the upper-class side.  All it takes is mountains of non-olfactory money spent in a casual and frivolous way.  Money remains the rate limiting factor in a Gibb’s free energy equation.  Probably if Dr. Wracks had money he would float on a surfboard somewhere in the sun. Dr. W makes his rounds and heads to the cafeteria for the one plus one plus one meal.  “It’s so you do not get fat,” she says.  Dr. Lecter finds him there.  “Why aren’t you gone,” Questions Dr. Lecter.  “I have no where else to go.” says Dr. W.  “I did not have anywhere to go either,” says Dr. Lecter.  Here is the master key to all the wards.  This key opens everything, anywhere on the complex.   I want you to do morning rounds in our ward and again at 2300 hours before you turn in.  We have a new patient from a wealthy family.  He was a Viet Nam Veteran and forced to kill people with his bare hands.  He was one of the last out at Da Nang.  He has become violent   and lies in a strait jacket in the padded holding cell.  Pay particular attention to him.  Remember; do not let chronic schizophrenics get between you and the door.  I live close by and will remain in touch. Wear the key on your neck and sleep with it.  If it is lost, all the locks in the whole veteran’s complex have to be changed.” “Goodnight,” he says as he walks off into the long corridor.

     The Pookipsie Veterans Hospital is a huge apparition set in a park like arcade. The buildings link by means of catacomb tunnels with locked doors at each end.  Large fluorescent lights hang in the long, cold, grey, concrete tunnels and sound echoes eerily and reverberates into nothingness.  The environment is kind of like a Lon Chaney Frankenstein movie.  It must be here where Lon got the settings for the movie.  The Wracks walks alone here late at night in the tunnel leading to Ward 4.  He sings and says words to see the ramifications of the reverberations. “Spooky,” Dr. W. says to himself.  “Real spooky.”

When Dr. W.I arrive at Ward 4, everything is mundane. Drugs medicate the patients and they are asleep.  The nurse, who looks overworked, stressed and tired, beckons to me from behind the glass blast shield.  Dr. W waves back.  Dr. W moves to the restraining cells and removes the shield from the glass porthole.  As Dr. Looks into the cell Mr. shine looks him back eye to eye in the glass.  Only one inch of hardwood door separates the two faces.  Mr. Glitz looks more frightened then mean.  He must be frightened because he knows that payment is expected for his violent behavior. He stands in a strait jacket in hospital bed clothes.  Dr. W. introduces himself.  “I am Dr. W.  I will check on you periodically this weekend.  Do not be alarmed, nothing changed.  Dr. Lecter will see you Monday morning.  Get some sleep, it is late.”  Dr. W. then looks into the room of the catatonic schizophrenic.  Mr. M sits in his chair, wrapped in his usual sheets facing away from me.  Dr. R looks away down the hall and looks back in through the porthole.  Mr. M does not sit in the chair; he moved out of view.  Dr. W.  instinctively checks the door to make sure it is locked.  In ten milliseconds, Mr. M. senses the Wracks appearance and moves out of view.  He could be juxtaposed behind the door if it is opened.  Dr. W does not open the door and walks on.  “Make a mental note,” Dr. W

 says to himself. “Mr. M can feel me.” Dr. W.  leaves Ward 4 and enters the tunnels.  He walks alone through the tunnels. He makes sure the doors lock behind him. He enters the Residents lodging and his cubicle.  Dr. W. hangs his white smock on the door. Dr W. heats water with his tourist prong and makes instant coffee. Dr. W.  makes sure the key is around his neck.  He adds powdered creamer to the coffee.  Dr. W.  lights a cigarette, opens his books and reads until sleep overtakes him.

The heat waves rise from the steam radiators inside the Veterans Administration graduate student housing. Revelry and reverie occur at 6 AM and the public showers lie too far away.  The Wracks settles for a sponge bath, a shave and then a tooth brushing.  The white smock covers the clearance clothes no one sees anyway.  In line at the cafeteria with patients in bedclothes and ragged edges for the sumptuous military repast.  One egg, one piece of toast, a pat of butter, a cup of coffee, and a glass of chocolate milk for desert exists as the morning fare. “Can I have another egg?” asks the Wracks?   The food server looks at him and she says, “No, it will make you fat.”   The Wracks moves on with the other residents in the cafeteria at a bunk table in a large hangar room converted to restaurant. Everyone smokes.  A patient dressed in a bathrobe and jeans comes over to Dr. Wracks and begs for a cigarette.  He gives   him two. He lights one up in front of Wracks, smiles, sticks the other over his ear on the side of his head, blows a smoke ring and moves on.  We meet today in the main observation area at seven hundred hours.

       Schizophrenics do not seem so bad.  For the most part they look the same as normal people, smile and wave to the Doctors as we come in.  There are exceptions.  The exceptions have private suites for everyone’s safety.   Dr. Lecter introduces me to a Viet Nam Veteran who is cross dresser and sits immobile for prolonged periods of time.  He is the one that broke Dr. Sheldon’s nose.  This patient is an afro American on the gaunt side.  He wears a long evening gown with a pearl necklace and earrings.   His hair is cut short Marine style.  Mr. O, this is Dr. W and he will be interviewing you today.  Should I have an absence, he will be the one interfacing with you. 

    “Hello Mr. O.   My name is Dr. W. How are you today?”

Silence

“Mr. O, be at liberty to tell me if your medication is correct and you feel well each day.  Should you desire more or less, let me know.  If your jaw clenches tight, let me know.  If you can not sit still, let me know.”

Silence

Mr. O smiles at me and says “I like you.  I hear you have good hands.”  Dr. W says, “thank you for the compliment.  If you have anything else to say or want me to write in my notes please speak now.”

Silence

“Good day Mr. O, I will see you tomorrow around the same time.”

“Bring me some cigarettes,” he says. “I like Marlboro too.”  “I will not forget,” says Dr. W.  Dr. W slowly, slowly, slowly rises from the interview chair and moves backwards keeping an eye on the patient at all times without maintaining direct eye contact. 

“What do you think about Mr. O?’ says Dr. Lecter.  “Undifferentiated, with catatonia and lack of affect.”  “That is what I think too.” Smiles Dr. Lecter.  “Now I want you to meet Mr. M.  Mr. M. is a chronic patient with catatonic schizophrenia.  He rarely moves in the presence of anyone.  The reason he is a chronic patient is because he likes to hang from the ceiling and fall on people.  He is a violent offender.  In his presence, move slowly and never ever take your eye off his body until you lock the ward door with your key.  Back away from him and never let him get between you and the door. When the lock clicks on the door, then you can turn away.”   Mr. M. sits in a chair, alone in a room covered with white bed sheets.  One arm hangs down low and the other is wrapped around his neck.  He does not move.  Like a statue, he sits there and does not move.  His breathing is imperceptible and his eyes never blink.   “How are you Mr. M.,” says Dr. Lecter.  Silence.   “If there is anything, I can do for your please let me know.” Says Dr. Lecter.  Silence.  “We are leaving now.  See you tomorrow.”  Silence.  We both back away to the door and Dr. Lecter takes the key hanging on his neck while the Wracks view the patient and opens the door.  As we slip outside the Wracks hears, “Goodbye.” From Mr. M.  When the door lock clicks he looks into the room from the observation window above the door handle.  Mr. M. has moved.  Both of his arms lay at his sides as if in preparation for a leap.  The chair has moved a quarter of a circle towards us.   All this happened in ten milliseconds of time.   “Let me remind you to never let him get between you and the door.”  The wracks nods and say, “I understand.”   “Let me now introduce you to a football player who occasionally becomes violent. He is a famous defensive lineman.  When he gets mad he picks up whoever angers him and throws them through a window like a softball.  Do not make him mad.  The reason he is here now is because he threw his wife and her family out a three story window into the street. I maintain him on an indoleamine alkaloid antipsychotic agent called Moban.  Use this drug for violent patients.  Moban works well.”  Mr. G. is a large afro American about six four or six five in height and extremely muscular.  He is famous for tackling fast running backs and hurting them.  “Hello Mr. G. how is you today?”  Mr. G says, “Fine, I like my Moban.  When can I go home?”  “When you are stable, we will send you home Mr. G.” says Dr. Lecter.   “I hope that is soon,” says Mr. G.  He pulls a cigarette from a package on his front pocket, lights it, takes a long inhale, blows it out and says. “See you later.”  He then walks towards the television set and watches the broadcast standing while smoking his cigarette.  “Interview your patients every day, write notes and advise me if a change occurs.”   “Do not change their medication without asking me.”  Says Dr. Lecter.   “See you tomorrow. I have to meet some private patients in my in town office says Dr. Lecter.  He walks off seamlessly and disappears into his office as the door clicks shut. We have missed lunch so the wracks go back to my room and review his notes and read again the notes Dr. Lecter presented to the group. He will see my comrades at six in the dinner line.  We all are dispersed in the many wards and places around the Veterans facility. Dr. Wracks locks himself into my little room and smokes.  I do not want to miss dinner.  Winter still exists outside and the cold seeps in through the cracks in the insulation.  The steam radiator radiates heat and a light mist escape from the relief valve on top of the unit.  Dr. Wracks has learned to quick dry shoes and underwear on the steam radiators. he pulls the reading lamp close to his face to illuminate the pages of my notes, his notes and medical texts.  Time goes by quickly and it is time to get the one plus one plus one dinner.  Main course plus a vegetable plus a starch and cool aid from the huge beverage coolers.   Food tastes good and tastes even better when a person is hungry.  Tomorrow will occur soon enough. He does not want to provoke it.  Now at night in Pookipsie, upstate, ensconced on the road to a career and maybe a new beginning, Dr. R sits by himself with his reading light and cigarettes.

Remember says Dr. Lecter, Proscribe your anti-Psychotic agents with side effects opposite to the patient’s overt behavior, not their diagnosis. If a patient gets violent administer 100mg of Benadryl I.M.   See you tomorrow.

The train to Pookipsie is a slow easy ride beginning in Grand Central station.  Underneath the huge coliseum of trains, the engine snakes and skittles across classic upstate countryside. Brownstones come into view and vanish and there is some green in-between the snowdrifts slowly melting in the end of a late winter and beginning of a beautiful spring blossom.  Somewhere near the classic town of Pookipsie, lies the biggest Psychiatric facility in the United States of America.  At least it was.   Now I hear the huge veterans’ facility near Pookipsie is closed down, shut up and the subterranean tunnels filled with snarling rodents and slithering serpents.  The classic tunnels were devised to connect the buildings for communication and transportation even during the heaviest winter storms. Now the Wracks is here and the Head of Psychiatry at the Veterans administration welcomes us for a ten-week tour of duty at a Psychiatric facility lockup. The chief of the facility is a tall handsome man with silver hair.  His looks are marred by Popsicle sticks protruding from his nose splinting it securely.  Unfortunately, the chief had a mental lapse and got too close to a florid patient.  The patient was a black belt in Okinawa Karate and smashed his nose to pieces with a powerful back fist strike. He could be our next president.   The Popsicle sticks did not impair his diction as he welcomes us.   He says he will be in and out of his office during the week and that our liaison and mentor during our intern rotation will be Dr. H. Lecter M.D. 

     We meet Dr. Lecter at his office.  He sits in a space with a huge desk, a couch and a library of a thousand books.  The books are like a bullet proof barricade shielding him from the outside and reality.  He turns to us and passes out lecture notes.  He says these notes will help us identify neuroses and Psychoses before the behavior eludes us.  We are to memorize the notes because the knowledge might save our lives.   The Veterans facility is a Psychiatric lockup.   At the end of each hall is a huge oak door with a large deadbolt   the interns are to enter a corridor and close the deadbolt before proceeding further.  During the week huge wrestlers acting as Psychiatric aids will let us in and out of each level as we identify ourselves at the small window in the middle of the door.  It is our responsibility to make sure the door is locked behind us as we progress and transgress the environment that will soon be ours. Any failure to maintain security overtly will result in instant termination as some of the patients are violent with criminal records. The majority of patients are Veterans of foreign wars.  The minority are horrible curiosities too dangerous or too strange to be allowed to live in the community. Dr. Lecter is a man of average height like the Wracks.  He has long straight jet-black hair, like the wracks.  He moves and floats across the room.  He assures us that what we learn and see here will remain with us for the rest of our lives.  We are to eat with the patients because they have to see us to trust us.  Other wise there exists no reason why they shouldn’t attack us.   In the main cafeteria, we eat in the Doctors area, immediately next to the patient area.  We are to wear our white smocks everywhere as they identify us as professionals.  We are to shave or trim our beards neatly and keep our hair short.  There can not exist any interaction with the patients in public.  All communication must be in a public area or consult where the cameras can watch and alarm security if a patient becomes homicidal. Dr. Lecter assures the group he will be near should some excitement ensue. He introduces Dr. Beck.  Dr. Beck has black hair but is tall and lean.  He must be the protégé of Dr. Lecter.  Dr. Beck looks too serious to fool around with.  I note this instantly and file the anagram in the dominant temporal lobe.  Dr. Beck states that if we have any problems to come and see him during weekday hours. Now we will meet the staff.  Two huge psychiatric technicians patrol the unit.  The nurses sit in a guarded station with bulletproof glass and a ticket terminal to distribute psychiatric drugs to inmates.  Both aides are wrestlers but work only nine to five during the week.  On weekends the staff is skeletal and the interns must patrol the unit to insure all patients are present and that no one is hurt or killed by another patient.  During the day in the winter most patients sit in the recreation room and play ping pong, deal cards or watch TV.  Most of these people are normal looking except for a cross dresser who sits inordinately still and a huge African American football player who plays on a national championship team as a defensive lineman. Most of the patients turn to the interns and wave in validation.  They are used to being surveyed, assayed and evaluated for their behavior that really is not their fault. These people are casualties of society and their behavior is too violent or exaggerated for them to continue to lead functional lives in the community.  Some are Viet Nam veterans who have a disorder called traumatic stress syndrome.  The affected patients have flashbacks to situations the soldiers encountered in the jungles of Viet Nam.  Psychologically the reason for the traumatic syndrome is the psychoses induced by being forced to witness the killing and torturing of hundreds or thousands of civilians close at hand.  Some of these soldiers were forced to kill thousands of innocent people because they harbored the Viet Cong.  Some soldiers who served our country in Viet Nam could never readjust to civilian life because of what they witnessed or were forced to do.  The soldiers with traumatic stress syndrome come and go in this Veterans facility and it is their second home and the Nation pays for the burden of the horrible destruction of a thankless war.  The interns move on.  Soon lunch arrives and we head to the cafeteria.  The long hours of internship are broken by a meal. Army style the interns get in line with the patients and we are given a ration of provisions that will maintain our health.  A sandwich, potato chips, and some raw vegetables are it but we can get refills of orangeade or lemonade from the coolers.  I ask the distributor of food why we are given so little.  “So you do not get fat.” She speaks.  A patient grabs my sandwich and walks by.  We eat together, the eight of us and then move to our quarters to move in.  We each have a little nook with a bunk bed like the quarters on the “MASH” show on television.  The wracks are expecting Hawkeye to appear out of nowhere and make him look ridiculous.  This never happens and he resigns himself to books, cigarettes, and packets of instant coffee to be used sparingly.  The facility sells cigarettes at the canteen for Armed services prices.  The quarter master, who looks like Napolean Bonaparte says he will sell me several cartons at this price because he likes me.  He looks like the general in the 20^th century and the wracks does not react and accepts the gift with humility and rancor.  Back in the pigeon hole, the wracks light up a Marlboro and begin to memorize the notes.  The Wracks is up late and his niche fills with smoke and he put out a butt and falls  asleep by himself, waiting for reverie at 6 hundred hours military time tomorrow.

A very successful man once told the author that the key to success in business is-the ability to turn chicken shit into chicken salad.   The guru of nuclear physics also said-get a map of all the bagel shops in New York state.  This verbal utterance leads the reader to the photoelectric effect.  This effect which won Mr. Einstein the Nobel prize of physics in 1925.  In the photoelectric effect, light of varied wavelengths that impinge upon alkali and alkaline earth metals of sufficient wavelength and magnitude, cause an electron to leave the outer orbital and fall to a lower energy state liberating energy.   In essence, light shining upon a pure metallic element creates a current when the substrate is hooked up to a circuit.   The wavelength and the metal chosen, in a pair, create an endless battery.   For example, visible light and metallic lithium in a circuit produces electricity.  The electricity can be used to power electronic devices.  In this study, radioactive waste, notably cesium 137 and Strontium 90 which are strong gamma emitters produce gamma photons that can cause a photoelectric effect in an alkali metal, when in circuit, and this becomes a natural battery.   High level radioactive waste, emitters with a half-life 30 years, can power spacecraft and other applications with an almost endless array of electricity, suitable for deep space missions. 

Like Thomas Edison said- genius is one percent inspiration and 99 percent perspiration, the correct metals can be matched with the appropriate wavelengths that liberate electrons and mankind has a battery that does not need to be recharged and last thirty years.  Battery powered robots can pioneer new paths in scenarios where the common man cannot live.   This gift might lead humankind into places thought unknown and uninhabitable.  Just like anything good, it takes a lot of work.  Just do it.  Start working.

Battery technology is not just lithium in a colloidal gel that explodes when it is overcharged.  Battery technology is more and in front of everyone’s face on the periodic table.  We just have to try and never give up, and an angel might speak the secret of the universal wave equation into someone’s mind and the human race can move to a new planet once the sun burns out.  

The temperate forest is green and un- impenetrable and blends into huge mountains and hidden valleys.  The sea undulates in greens, blues, greys and browns and boiling whites and seems to move on endlessly.   The vast deserts and plains lead to cities and nowhere under a tumultuous sun.  With all this beauty that surrounds us, it might be time to play with lasers and high energy electrons.  It gets old getting drunk and smoking pot and dreams exist on an expansive event horizon into eternity.    Gee Whiz, what’s on YouTube tonight?

At eleven P.M the nursing night shift arrives.  The charge nurse enters through the main door and the four nurses sit in the nursing stations and discuss the seven patients in the ICU.  The charge nurse leaves and within the next fifteen minutes the night shift evaporates to a small kitchen at the front of the unit near the main door.  They lock the door and draw the shades.  The fluorescent tubes glow within and the smell of coffee permeates the ICU. Dr. Wracks is alone, and on call as a surgical resident at the Amityville general hospital.  The clock shows 12 A.M. and his orders are to cover the surgical floor, the obstetrics gynecology surgical unit and the pediatric oncology unit here.  No one is in the ICU except Dr. Wracks. Sit with the comatose patients and watch the heart monitors. Watch intently.  Adverse reactions evidence on the EKG.  The heart monitors display their green lines and a red-light pulse with each heartbeat for each patient on the verge of life or death. The respirators puff at inspiration and gasp at the expiration as a filmy foggy mist exits the respirator regulators.  Dr. Wracks orders are to survey the patients and report any neurological disturbances that might herald death such as decerebrate posturing and agonal respiration through the thoracic muscles.  Normal breathing is diaphragmatic and using the accessory muscles of respiration signals anoxia and a consequent cardiac arrest.  Decerebrate posturing happens when the brain does not receive blood any more. Then the patient curls unto themselves and dies. Alongside the most critical patients is a crash cart. The crash cart is a metal box full of syringes, needles of varying sizes and a myriad of heart drugs, mostly epinephrine. The lights are low and one fixture pulsates with a dying light.  Dr. Wracks has to note this and tell physical plant at first light.  Dr. Wracks never really felt at home at the ICU because everything, all parameters were taken away and placed in God’s hands. During the day Dr. Wracks would have to rush in and take an arterial blood gas of a respirator patient and bring it to the cigarette smoking technician locked within a little room down the hall with three machines and a coffee urn. He would take the blood, blow smoke at Dr. Wracks, say thanks and then close the door.  The rest was in God’s hands.  Tonight, the fifth pathway student is alone, as he is always alone and left with a thankless job.  Every man must know his limitations and his limitations are that this body requires much sleep that he has not gotten in six months. He is on call every third night and call begins at 11 P.M. He must visit all units at least once during the shift and catch what sleep he can.  Dr. Wracks never really sleeps because fate wakes him up before he enters REM sleep and he is never satisfied.  Most surgical patients require a sleeper medication and those pre-operation and post- operations are at risk for respiratory arrest if Dr. Wracks give too much.  The anesthesiologists caution him before to be prejudicial and withhold medication. The patients moan and look at Wracks with wide scared eyes and beg to be put to sleep.  Oxacepam does not work as the books state.  Dalmane is the only thing that works and 5 mg may not be enough and the patient begs for more; Dr. Wracks signs a requisition and give five more.  The nurse administers it in his presence.  Wracks leave and try to get more sleep. He is tired of smoking cigarettes and drinking coffee, especially at night because he becomes irritable and short tempered. he exits to my call room, close the door, and barricade it with furniture so no one can enter silently.  Sleep is always short and a nurse bangs on the hardwood door until Wracks emerges. Now is the second run through the hospital and the Wracks enters the ICU.  It must be two AM, and the lights are dim, and the respirators puff, the monitors skew and the red lights blink.  Sometimes He imagines a dying patient turns to me and smiles out of the corner of his eye. He turns around and they are asleep once again. The quiet deafens, the red lights blink and the respirators puff.  The nurses lock themselves in the kitchen. Another patient seems to open their eyes and beckon to the Wracks but when he turns around, they are asleep.  Once a human being is at deaths door, they ask everyone around them not to bring them back, and when there is an arrest, a surgeon moonlighting in the Emergency room appears and starts the procedures.  They inject epinephrine, calcium and more and use the shockers to start the heart beating again.  When the patient dies, they all seem to have a wan smile on their face because they know their will be no more, pain; anguish, despair, or disappointment and Dr. Wracks says a prayer and wish them God speed. Nothing is going on in the ICU tonight.  Dr. Wracks has not met God and he does not think he wants to.  The eerie glows and the shadows and the weird feeling that appears at night here are an effect of hopelessness and finality.  He exits the unit through the front door and wait in the hall for someone else to come out or enter.  No one does.  He is told to use the stairway at night.  The wracks do not know why. He does not want to know why.  Entering the pediatric Oncology section, he lingers as to make sure the poor children condemned to suffering are comfortable and not vomiting.  If they are, Dr. Wracks contacts the oncologist attending by hall phone and waits until they arrive. The kids are at rest and a single nurse sits in the station reading a book. She smiles at Dr. Wracks wave and walks by.  Back to the surgical ward on floor three Dr. wracks looks for a bag of tea and put a traveler boiler probe in the cup with it.  A tall man with a small black book enters the unit. He is greater then six feet and wears an expensive suit.  He looks at the book, then at the room number and enters a suite. Dr. Wracks follows him in.  He is sitting next to a surgical patient.  The Wracks walks over and examine his badge that he wears on his left lapel.  Everything seems to be in order.  He is a bonafide licensed member of the hospital. He looks at the wracks and gestures as he looks at my badge too. He does not know what he does but the credentials are in order.  Rocking the boat will get him trashed. He departs.  He enters his call room and barricade the door with furniture.  the watch says 3:30 A.M. He takes his pager and pulls the batteries out of it and set it on the bureau.   He hangs his smock on the door and crawls into a small bunk bed.  He pulls the covers over his head and says a prayer.  Now I lay me down to sleep……  Surgical rounds begin at seven A.M and dr. Wracks will be in surgery from eight A.M. to at least 2 P.M. non-stop.  he wonders if this is the life He really want and if he will make the cut. Sleep overtakes him again.  As he drifts off, he imagines he hear a hand trying to open the handle on the door. Then he is asleep.  The silence, the unduly silence pervades and detracts, the nurses hide, red lights blink, someone dies, someone lives, and in the quiet life begins again.  The ICU can wait, and the chief of staff who chose Dr. Wracks to command the ICU during his sabbatical is a fool.  

Benjamin Franklin said- One thing is inevitable, death and taxes.  Now, in the twenty-first century we have medical plans.  Human beings live a long time if they eat right and aren’t poisoned, and the only thing that curtails a lifespan is infectious disease.  Then came sulfa, penicillin and a myriad of fungal based antibiotics that help humankind extend their lifespan into the hundreds.  We should be in good stead, all of us, is this true.  The oldest of our kind who saw the nineteenth and twentieth century, before they died stipulated that life was of better quality in the nineteenth century than it is today, because of the rise of cancer and degenerative diseases.  In Cotrans’ Clinical Pathology, he extrapolates the rise of cancer on a graph on an exponential basis because everything, foodstuffs, pharmaceutical drugs and health food additives are laced with oil-based chemicals, courtesy of the organic chemists graduated by major universities.  What appears now are medical plans.

If a citizen of the United States, of the 80 percent, the wage earners who are the substance of the nation, the salt of the earth need medical care, their employers through the federal mandate of universal medical care,  and up to one half of the hourly wage earmarks to medical plans and if the citizens are lucky to be employed in a union affiliated segment, the employer matches this amount and designates it to a plan to be reimbursed to the employed if necessary.

These plans are corporations set up by the 20 percent to provide medical care to the wage earners.   The plans feed from government subsidies and as everyone knows, and is published and admonished, one third of the gross national products ends up being allocated to health care and its subsidies.  The plans exist by the staffing of administrators that make upwards of 100K a year and do nothing more than shuffle papers and deny wage earning folks’ medical care.  Of course, the plan is free, with free dentistry, opticians, gyms, perks and more that access by the given of a copayment in addition to any medicine incurred during the outing.  The main design of plans is to give the 20 percent easy jobs that earn 100k a year and keep them employed and happy in wealthy suburbs.  The type of professionals that serve in the plans are minimum and the administrators choose the cheapest professionals in the area that they can find.   Good medicine costs a lot of money!  If a patient needs a specialist, they often have to travel one hour or more by car to another area to get the advanced treatment they deserve, and the reason patients have to travel is that these specialists are the cheapest the plan can hire in an area.   Excellent physicians in town cost an arm and a leg. 

Presidents and politicians, every day elaborate how dedicated and humanitarian they are by supporting health care but health care plans offer minimal health care and are at their best supporting the 20 percent.  As already said, health care is an enormous burden and one third of the national budget goes to health care.  The medical care the working class gets is not worth a grain of salt, and they have to pay for it anyway, directly or indirectly. 

If a United States Citizen makes it to social security by paying a third of their income taxes into the health care system via SSI, they get social security income and hospital care as defined by part A.   To get access to an outside specialist, he and she must buy part B which permits them to pay twenty percent of the hundred percent debited to the health care system.  It is interesting to note that most people who need part B are wage earners with degenerative disease due to their occupations and they simply cannot afford the 20 percent! Then the administrators give us part C, and part D for drugs and Medigap which covers all the ancillary costs not provided by part A and B, which the 80 percent have to pay for.  The plans provided by corporate health care businesses are free too, but like all other plans the money earned by the plan ends up in the pockets of the administrators, not the poor and sick who need them the most.  The medical care the 80 percent get for one third of the national budget is not worth the paper it is written on.   Excellent medical physicians become millionaires and they deserve the money for what they do but the poor do not have access to them because they can not afford it. A career insurance man told me once to buy all the health insurance you can afford because the hospitals which are a profit center eat up every cent. 

What the 80 percent get for their hard work, dedication, and perseverance is mal-diagnosis, physicians refusing to treat active disease and unnecessary surgery.  The plans pay for NMR, PET, diagnostic dye studies and biopsies, which for the most part are unnecessary modalities that help the patient very little but rack up billions of dollars for hospital and health maintenance corporations.  Most disease can be diagnosed by comprehensive blood chemistry, clinical appearance and an x-ray.   Most of the questions in the national board of clinical internists an eight-hour exam, revolve off of a single diagnostic x-ray.  Let this author make it clear that excellent physicians deserve to roll around in Cadillacs and Mercedes-Benz luxury coupes, but most physicians don’t.    

My grandfather told me that if you are not part of the solution, you are part of the problem so keep your mouth shut.   William Shakespeare capitulated that the pen is mightier than the sword so takes it for what it is worth.  The people who are this nation, the workers that maintain the infrastructure, and the veterans that give up their lives for the country deserve the best medical care that the government can provide.   The twenty percent should pay out of pocket.   Organ transplants last at best five years so is a transplant and ancillary health care worth millions of dollars debited to the federal government?

The cure is excellent accounting.    All people have the right of seeing the closest physician of their choosing and changing if necessary.  They don’t want a plan that sends them to a quack who makes his or her money and then farms these patients to a specialist one hour away.   The government does not need the private infrastructure to manage health care.   Each physician should handle their own billing or not get paid.  Lastly and not least.  Working people deserve to use the best physicians and the government should reimburse adequately for their services.  This matter is open to the physicians and the medical administrators of the government who are in their employ.   We the people of the United States…………promote the general welfare and secure the blessings of liberty for OURSELVES and our posterity.  Good medicine is not a business; it is a service under God.  

“Wracks we want you to come in at night at the ER because that is when the action happens.  Be sure to be here Friday or Saturday night on the Graveyard.  Every week we have a gunshot or a bludgeoning event.  We need the extra hands to tie sutures,” said Dr. Saber. “I will be here,” said the Wracks

“We have a stat on a fight victim coming in,” said the dispatcher.  “Wracks, bring him in and work him up. Then call me.” Said Dr. Saber.  The Paramedics brought the patient into the double doors of the ER.  The ER had double electric doors in case a murderer wanted to finalize an act not perfected.  We could lock them out.  The patient was of average height and average build Caucasian male.  He wore sweats and had no obvious odors diagnostic of metabolic conditions.  Upon neurological exam, I find the pupils fixed and dilated. The breathing is intermittent but not agonal.  There is no obvious bleeding from the nose, eyes or ear canals upon fundoscopic observation.  The patient is unconscious and does not respond to pain from needle prick or skin pull.  “Dr. Saber, I think we have a subarachnoid hemorrhage with antecedents of trauma to the face. “  Dr. Saber runs to console, grabs the phone and calls upstairs.  “Wait with him!” Dr. Saber commands.

They say it in hushed tones. N-surg.  It happens in the penthouse.  A nurse brings Wracks the key and puts it in his hands.  They want you upstairs.  Don’t forget to put the key in the basket when you enter.  The Wracks goes blindly unwitting to what is going to befall.  The elevator goes up and up, and the door opens.

     “Dr. Saber said you have good hands,” said the brain surgeon. “I want you to assist me in neurosurgery tonight.”  “I will teach you how.”   The patient was already upstairs.   The brain surgeon is a smallish man impeccably dressed in a suit and tie. His hair is wavy and reddish and has a curl to it and his eyes are gun metal gray just like his brother.  He gestures to me and says, scrub in and I will meet you at the stadium. Don’t stop and get anything to eat. The Wracks enters the surgical suite and the anesthesiologist has a water filled blanket on the patient, his head is scrubbed and affixed by metal hold fasts.  

“I will teach you brain surgery,” said the brain surgeon.  “First, the conditions.”   “Cool your patient to 90 degrees Fahrenheit with a water blanket.  This will slow the heart and make the neurons less irritable.”  “Then infuse urea to establish hyper osmotic equilibrium to prevent brain swelling. The urea extravasates in four hours.  Switch to mannitol post operative.  Now infuse solumedrol to prevent inflammation. There is an immediate naturistic effect and a long-term hormonal effect. When the patient is readied by the anesthesiologist then we will begin.  Anesthesiology must be light or the patient will stop breathing.  The patient will be conscious.  No matter what the patient says keep going. Learn to focus and block out everything but the job at hand.”

   The patients head was shaved and the brain surgeon looked at the x-rays.  Visualize in your mind where the lesion is from the x-rays.  Take the x-rays here before surgery.  Do not rely on anyone.  Do not let anyone but licensed surgeons into the room.”  “Now we will unearth the calvarium.” Said the brain surgeon. 

     The bone saw whirs at a high frightening screech.  The saw is a small stainless steel orb that glints under the klieg lights and comes from a sterilized package.   “Hold open the operating theatre for me,” he said.  “Do not let go.”  “The patient might move!”  The saw whirred with a horrible whine and the frequency dulled as the blade cut the bone.  Smoke arose from the cut and I started to vomit.  “Dr. Saber said you were good.”   “Are you good?”  “I am good.” says the Wracks and his senses came back.  He pulled of the top of the patient’s skull and snipped the tentorial ligaments with a small scissors.  “This is the durra mater and underneath the subarachnoid membrane. “  Under the durra mater, a skin like membrane stretched over the top of the brain was a mass of congealed blood.  The patient started to speak in a childish voice a language I could not discern. “Do not listen,” he said.  The brain then starts to swell like a loaf of bread rising in an oven.  It pushed out two inches high.   “This is a bad one,” said the brain surgeon.  “We will have to do a total lobectomy.”     “I Want you to hold the suck and turn the fulgurate on when I tell you to.”  The Wracks holds the suck stable.  The surgeon literally sucks brain matter through a stylet into a huge plastic receptacle.  The osterized brain matter is bright pink like Jell-O.   The neurons are a light grey and the supporting structure of glial cells and myelin is alabaster white.  The brain surgeon hit a capillary and the blood spurts two feet high like a small geyser.  He clips it with the forceps and says “burn it.” The Wracks presses the trigger of the fulgurates.  The smell of burnt brain permeates the whole operating area.  The Wracks starts to black out.  “I am going Doctor,” says the Wracks The brain surgeon commands, “Hold the suck.”   “I am going Dr,” says the Wracks.   The brain surgeon commands “Hold the suck.”   The Wracks slowly starts to come back. Slowly, surely the Wracks comes back to consciousness.  “Now we can continue.” He said.  Small hemorrhages would occur as he aspirated brain tissue.  The Wracks holds the suck and triggers the burner as he commands “Our father who art in heaven.”  And they continued.  “Hallowed be thy name.”  And they continue.  “Thy kingdom come. Thy will be done.”   “There” said the brain surgeon.   “The bleeding and swelling have stopped and the patient still breathes.”  He put the top of the skull back on the patient and secured it with staples.  Then he sutured the scalp back into place.   The clock says two A.M and I am spent.  “You can go now.” Said the brain surgeon.  “I am done here.”

      The elevator from the top slowly descends to moral reality and the Wracks walks back into the ER.   “Did he make it?” said Dr. Saber “He made it.” Says the Wracks.  “Good “said Dr. Saber.  “We have a gunshot wound to the abdomen in room 3 and I want you to wait there until the police arrive.”   “o.K.,” says the Wracks.

      They said the patient was alive on a respirator until he was transferred to another hospital.  The Wracks lost track of him.  Some say he died some say he slipped away.  Some say the event never happened.  He might be a billionaire of a dot com.   The Wracks never saw the brain surgeon again. He flies around the United States and operates on peoples’ heads. He looks like an inbred Englishman.  Instead, he does brain surgery with an African American who hated to do colostomies.   There was always action in the south, in the city, downtown, late at night during the summer externships at the citadel with a pretty name of a clinic when the Wracks was a medical student.

“Where were you,” said Dr. Saber.   We need suturing for a head wound in room two.  The Wracks went back to work for nothing in the days before the darkness during youth when achieving was so important and nothing else mattered.  He has to pay to learn the craft in a closed shop populated by eccentrics., If they don’t invite you to apply, don’t even bother and waste your life.