Dr. Regina Dickerson was sitting on the aisle side
at St. Stephen’s
Catholic Church on Mount Pleasant Street in La
Jolla, California, listening
to Father Yarderos delivering the sermon on a cloudy
Sunday morning.
“In the letter of St. Paul to the Corinthians from
today’s second reading, St. Paul teaches us one thing”— Father Yarderos’s
piercing voice interrupted Dickerson’s deep thoughts—“that there are people who
rejoice at others’ misfortunes. We see this every day in our daily life,
especially in this competitive world. Mind you, there is nothing wrong with
competition— after all, competition is the fabric of American society, but the
Lord will not take kindly to those who feel glee when their neighbor is
suffering. What ever happened to Christ’s teaching of loving thy neighbor as
thyself?”
Immediately Dickerson thought about Dr. Peter
Millons. That jerk.
She remembered the conversation they had had on
Friday, when Millons appeared to be rejoicing at her misfortune.
“How
is Manuel?” Dr. Millons asked in the crowded
doctors’ lounge at the university
hospital.
“Peter,
I’ve told you for the tenth time, we are no longer together,” Dickerson
responded, while still flipping through the morning newspaper.
“I
didn’t know you’re divorced.”
“We’re
not divorced yet, but we’re planning on it.”
“I
like that guy; I thought it was a marriage made in heaven.” Millons smiled
sarcastically.
“Well,
then, you should have married him.”
“Come on, Dickerson, I am strictly pusa-
bagged,” Millons answered, using the new California subtle slang for a
nonhomosexual male.
“Whatever
that means . . . and for your wife and children’s sake I hope you remain that
way.”
“I
thought you were a Catholic?” Millons persisted.
“So
. . . and . . . ?”
“They
don’t believe in divorce, do they?”
To
mask her obvious anger, Dickerson very noisily sipped the hot coffee she was
holding, and then replied, “You know what, Peter, if they sell brains at Sears,
yours must have been purchased from the Idiot Department.”
She
got up to leave, heading back to finish rounds with the residents.
“Well,
I’m still married.” Millons was hoping to sneak in the last word.
“You
call that marriage?” Dickerson replied, in obvious reference to the rumor
circulating around the hospital that Mrs. Millons enjoyed one- night stands
with young residents.
Dickerson
couldn’t help but ask how Millons could be so naïve— or did he just
surreptitiously choose to ignore it?
Driving home from church, Dickerson thought about
her life.
Here she was, a forty- something, still- attractive
medical doctor, and one of the top research scientists at the University of
California,
La Jolla Medical School; she had no children, no
obligations, yet her life appeared to be in shambles. However, she got along
very well with her patients. She had long figured out that her patients were
the key to her success.
Treating patients the way you would like to be
treated, regardless of each patient’s status in life, she thought, was the key.
She could communicate with patients in ways no other doctor could.
Those difficult, know- it- all, Internet- educated,
question- every- test patients were her most treasured. She delighted in
explaining to them in her most simple verbiage the hard- to- comprehend medical
terminologies and tests, and those patients loved her for that. They knew they
could talk to her and be able to get an understandable answer.
Her marriage to Manuel was wonderful for a while,
but then a major crisis had erupted.
Manuel was the senior sales representative for Atira
Pharmaceutical, in the San Diego region. Mike Smith, the drug representative
who normally called on Dickerson, had brought his senior manager along on one
of his details.
Dickerson always liked to challenge the drug reps on
the merits of whatever article they quoted in support of the use of a par tic u
lar drug. Dickerson, a published researcher herself, loved these exchanges.
That day, however, Manuel volunteered to answer all Dickerson’s questions.
The exchange was a little testy at first, but
finally, Manuel asked,
“Can I invite you to an evening at a medical
conference in the Hilton La Jolla hotel, sponsored by University of California,
Los Angeles Medical School? The conference may shed light on some of your
concerns.”
Dickerson accepted.
At the conference, Manuel was surprised to see Dr.
Dickerson drink as much as she did without getting drunk. Eventually the
conversation turned personal.
“Are you from San Diego?” Manuel asked.
“No, I’m from Vermont,” Dickerson said, “a little
town called Bellows Falls.”
“I’ve heard of it,” Manuel said, excited.
“How?” Dickerson asked, looking at Manuel askance.
“When we were at the company headquarters in New
Jersey for training, one of the guys came from that town, and they used to
tease him by calling the town . . .”
Dickerson did not let Manuel finish, for she had
heard that joke several times. “Fellows Balls,” Dickerson matter- of- factly
finished. “Yeah, we know.”
“I’m sorry, go ahead,” Manuel urged.
“After my medical school training at Tufts
University in Boston,
Massachusetts, and residency at St. Elizabeth’s
Hospital in Boston, I did a fellowship in Immunology and Ge ne tics at San
Francisco General Hospital. From there, I was hired in San Diego.”
“You like it here?” Manuel asked.
“Yeah, I love it.”
“What do you do for fun?”
“Oh, nothing. I had my marriage annulled after
sixteen months because my ex-husband, who wasn’t Catholic, refused to convert,
and like a typical man, no offense intended, also refused to zip up his pants.”
Dickerson paused. “Since then, I’ve buried myself in my work, and I’m near a
breakthrough in a new HLA- antigen and its linkage.”
“That sounds interesting,” said Manuel.
“Yeah, it is.”
“Do you like Mexican food?”
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