From Our Readers

Thanks for the many smiles from recognizing myself in “The Replacements.” Our daughter also could not believe the transformation from her mom to her children’s Nana. I am now accused of being a too compliant supplier of everything from princess dolls to remote control trucks and of course chocolate chip cookies! And then there is the fact that I seem to have completely forgotten the word “no,” but I’m having the time of my life! —Kathy D.

My wife and I were deeply moved by Dr. Turker’s essay (“Hippocratic Hypocrisy”) about the tragic death of a young mother unable to afford healthcare prior to the Affordable Care Act which our elected representatives seem so eager to overturn. As Dr. Turker wrote: “Many of us spend our weekends on hard back benches professing our love of God and neighbor, we promise to ‘Do unto others…’ but come Monday we do for ourselves.” Unfortunately, this observation of the gulf between our words and our deeds seems to extend to many other areas of our lives these days as well. How many of us are wearing masks to protect our fellowmen and women and all our children and their teachers? —Paul W., M.D.

An anecdote you might want to share with your readers. It set me to thinking. A friend was recently a passenger on a flight from Cleveland to Minneapolis and overheard the following conversation between two women in the seat in front of her, one of whom was holding a magazine opened to an article topped by a photo of our current president.
“What do you think?” asked her seatmate.
“I think he’s a kick!” answered woman #1. Then, noticing the silence of the questioner, she turned to her seatmate and asked: “What do you think?” The question was followed by a long silence and a sigh. “I think,” began woman #1, “I think we’re a long way from Reagan and Bush.”
“Yes,” her seatmate agreed quietly. “Yes.”
—Brenda D.

I’m an old guy now, but I have a long memory! Back in the late 60’s, my buddy and I took off the summer before our last year of medical school and flew to Europe to spend three months bumming around. Everywhere we went the Europeans treated us wonderfully—fed us dinners, gave us rides wherever we wanted to go, put us first in line to tour their art museums and palaces and gave their multilingual talks first in English. They loved us because we were Americans. Their memories of America’s support in WWII was in their hearts and minds and we benefited from their gratitude that we had showed up and done our part. Today, we are not only no longer welcomed in those countries; we are forbidden to enter them. Need I say more? What a sad state of affairs! —David P.

Thank you for the poignant poem by Kim Stafford. It is wonderful to feel words bring us together. —Andrea M.