Near the Adirondacks stands the 10th Mountain Division. In combat, when they hear a cry of "Medic!" "Corpsman!" or "Doc!"-a hysterical cry that like "Help!" "Man overboard!" or "Fire!" pounces on everyone's senses like a Doberman pinscher, generating adrenaline, dilating carotid arteries, pounding on everyone's heart like the kettledrums in Day of Wrath, by Berlioz-when they hear a cry of "Medic!" "Corpsman!" or "Doc!" it comes from one of their buddies, someone they've lived with, trained with, partied with, someone they love as they love their blood brothers.
Imagination aside, no doctor in the Adirondacks (or anywhere else in America) has had the unbearable heartache such a cortege would occasion, but in the American infantry lots of medics have had it. And knock, knock, knock on your door come your beloved brothers, sisters, close cousins, come all morning, afternoon, evening, come in the throes of some dreadful disease-imagine it, I ask you. Bad enough, but your second patient today is your sister, and the Pap smear shows terminal cervical cancer.
"I have this cough," he reports, and the X ray reveals he has lung cancer, clearly terminal. Imagine you're a country doctor up in the Adirondacks, and your first patient today is your brother. Originally published in the August 2002 issue.
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