I lost a mentor and friend this winter.
Betty Luse died on December 31st, after a sudden decline from renal and liver failure.
I am told by friends that she protested vigorously as she was loaded into the waiting ambulance, "I don't have hospitalization! I can't afford this!" But the lack of universal health coverage in a great nation is a topic for another time.
This is about the loss of a friend.
I visited Betty twice during her hospitalization, and one of those times she was asleep.
The 'awake visit', she was mildly encephalopathic, deeply jaundiced, and tired, although she did quip about the horrors of the cafeteria plate.
And then she died, surprising all her friends, colleagues, and companions-although not so much her medical friend.
It was said that Betty had the biggest Rolodex in Hampton Roads.
I don't know how I made it to her database, but first I was a guest on her acclaimed NPR radio program Hearsay, then a guest host, and then she offered me the host position on a new Friday afternoon replacement medical show, HouseCalls.
Betty was my mentor.
A lauded radio producer, she saw something worthy in me, and nurtured my drive to educate and amuse.
We batted around ideas- politics, religion, health care, current events-- for an hour before the show each Friday, and then I got her quips on the computer screen that links the studio with the control room during the broadcast.
Her rapier wit and hearty laugh enhanced the repartee of all about her.
She protected our show until her abrupt medically precipitated departure from the station, and continued her guidance from afar.
When HouseCalls left the air after a three year run, we had started collaboration on a new program.
Now she is gone.
Why so introspective about a month old event? I attended her wake last evening, and finally met Betty.
The back party room at Betty's favorite restaurant was packed.
After prayers in compliance with various religions were offered, as well as numerous toasts with varied alcoholic libations, we settled in for three and a half hours of friends, relatives, and others telling us of Betty.
Much of the room were those that Betty had mentored, in some fashion.
I discovered that while Betty was turning her attention to us, most were unaware of the many layers of Betty.
And while we peeled the metaphorical onion that was Betty Luse, the tears fell.
An Arabic Studies scholar.
An opera singer, who had seen success in Europe.
A woman so touched by a trip to South Africa at the end of apartheid, that she made it her mission to bring additional freedoms and education to the people-starting with wind-up radios.
Her plans to start a women's production company sans respect for any social proprieties, to be named "Luse Women".
A divorced woman, still best of friends with her ex-husband.
A mother figure to the adult children of her deceased best friend, and who was, I suspect, her own mentor.
A woman who hoarded mountains of books, in expectation of the day that she would retire and own a used bookshop.
This too, was Betty.
I was saddened.
I had held a jewel in my hands, and had noticed the sparkle but failed to appreciate all of its facets.
How many around you today have you failed to notice, to understand, to celebrate? My father has battled laryngeal cancer over the past three years.
After a recurrence following a hemilaryngectomy, Dad was scheduled for the whole enchilada last fall.
My dad is an expert storyteller-with stories from his early days in the Navy and the amazing experiences and characters he has encountered in his career.
I encouraged Pop to record his stories while he still had a voice; I volunteered to have them transcribed.
Dad vetoed (the recording would be, he felt, too creepy), but he did sit down and write his stories, and place them in the order they occurred.
The order that made him into my father.
Reading his stories, I can see how they shaped the man he was to become.
Do I know you? Have we met? My mission for you: Don't let today pass without reflecting upon your own mentors.
Who were these people who shaped what you are today? Now that you are standing on your feet, albeit perhaps with these mentors still ably propping you up, have you dared to dig deeper, to see your mentors in all their glorious colors? Beyond our mentors, it strikes me that although we work side by side with our colleagues in medicine daily, and share the day to day travails and joys, do we ever listen to one another's life story in chronological order? I'm afraid that my nurses are in for a surprise during our next days in endoscopy.
I want to know who they are, what lies beneath.
It's time to start peeling those layers.
Betty Luse died on December 31st, after a sudden decline from renal and liver failure.
I am told by friends that she protested vigorously as she was loaded into the waiting ambulance, "I don't have hospitalization! I can't afford this!" But the lack of universal health coverage in a great nation is a topic for another time.
This is about the loss of a friend.
I visited Betty twice during her hospitalization, and one of those times she was asleep.
The 'awake visit', she was mildly encephalopathic, deeply jaundiced, and tired, although she did quip about the horrors of the cafeteria plate.
And then she died, surprising all her friends, colleagues, and companions-although not so much her medical friend.
It was said that Betty had the biggest Rolodex in Hampton Roads.
I don't know how I made it to her database, but first I was a guest on her acclaimed NPR radio program Hearsay, then a guest host, and then she offered me the host position on a new Friday afternoon replacement medical show, HouseCalls.
Betty was my mentor.
A lauded radio producer, she saw something worthy in me, and nurtured my drive to educate and amuse.
We batted around ideas- politics, religion, health care, current events-- for an hour before the show each Friday, and then I got her quips on the computer screen that links the studio with the control room during the broadcast.
Her rapier wit and hearty laugh enhanced the repartee of all about her.
She protected our show until her abrupt medically precipitated departure from the station, and continued her guidance from afar.
When HouseCalls left the air after a three year run, we had started collaboration on a new program.
Now she is gone.
Why so introspective about a month old event? I attended her wake last evening, and finally met Betty.
The back party room at Betty's favorite restaurant was packed.
After prayers in compliance with various religions were offered, as well as numerous toasts with varied alcoholic libations, we settled in for three and a half hours of friends, relatives, and others telling us of Betty.
Much of the room were those that Betty had mentored, in some fashion.
I discovered that while Betty was turning her attention to us, most were unaware of the many layers of Betty.
And while we peeled the metaphorical onion that was Betty Luse, the tears fell.
An Arabic Studies scholar.
An opera singer, who had seen success in Europe.
A woman so touched by a trip to South Africa at the end of apartheid, that she made it her mission to bring additional freedoms and education to the people-starting with wind-up radios.
Her plans to start a women's production company sans respect for any social proprieties, to be named "Luse Women".
A divorced woman, still best of friends with her ex-husband.
A mother figure to the adult children of her deceased best friend, and who was, I suspect, her own mentor.
A woman who hoarded mountains of books, in expectation of the day that she would retire and own a used bookshop.
This too, was Betty.
I was saddened.
I had held a jewel in my hands, and had noticed the sparkle but failed to appreciate all of its facets.
How many around you today have you failed to notice, to understand, to celebrate? My father has battled laryngeal cancer over the past three years.
After a recurrence following a hemilaryngectomy, Dad was scheduled for the whole enchilada last fall.
My dad is an expert storyteller-with stories from his early days in the Navy and the amazing experiences and characters he has encountered in his career.
I encouraged Pop to record his stories while he still had a voice; I volunteered to have them transcribed.
Dad vetoed (the recording would be, he felt, too creepy), but he did sit down and write his stories, and place them in the order they occurred.
The order that made him into my father.
Reading his stories, I can see how they shaped the man he was to become.
Do I know you? Have we met? My mission for you: Don't let today pass without reflecting upon your own mentors.
Who were these people who shaped what you are today? Now that you are standing on your feet, albeit perhaps with these mentors still ably propping you up, have you dared to dig deeper, to see your mentors in all their glorious colors? Beyond our mentors, it strikes me that although we work side by side with our colleagues in medicine daily, and share the day to day travails and joys, do we ever listen to one another's life story in chronological order? I'm afraid that my nurses are in for a surprise during our next days in endoscopy.
I want to know who they are, what lies beneath.
It's time to start peeling those layers.
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