Doctor,
My eastern medicine doctor for a couple of years in my adolescence. He was an old old man who reminded me of my grandpa and he spoke the same dialect. Such a resemblance, so kind too. And he liked to play chess (the Chinese kind). And they both were practitioners of eastern medicine. Well, he passed away recently, of some problem with some organ. Not too long after he was diagnosed too. Old folk tend to do that. And I can’t say I’m too sad, I mean I am sad, but I easily came to terms with it. He was old, and he’d lived a good life, helped many people, cured many diseases, and I can vouch for that.
What I’m really curious about is his last days. I am not sure if people see their lives flash before their eyes when they go, but maybe if they know their time is short, will they take the time lying in whichever hospital bed or hospice bed or home bed and reminisce about the things they’ve done, the people they’ve met? And if so, did my face pop up? Probably not, right? But I think he really liked me. Almost like a granddaughter? Maybe not that much, maybe the granddaughter of a brother. I’d be a tiny tiny sliver of a piece of the pie chart that made up his life. With some 80 odd years behind him, and memory enough to fill a football stadium, would he remember one of his patients with whom he shared some candy with on occasion? It’d be like trying to recall Seat #2 in Section 401 Row 17. Will I remember him when I’m 80? I hope I do. I can still remember when I first met him, and how I’d visit him less and less after the needed year of his medicinal guidance was over.
