Wil opened the email addressed to the ‘Wil, Lil and Vi survivors’ club.
‘I’m a medical student,’ she read, ‘and through a relative of a doctor by the name of Mary Verghese I have come to learn the difference between being a competent, good doctor and a brilliant one.
I’m retelling Mary’s story as she has empowered me to want to search for brilliance in MY future career as a doctor.
Mary apparently almost died in a car accident but eventually triumphed in a way that was exceptional.
She was a newly qualified surgeon and her glittering future gleamed like a jewel ahead of her. She was already making a name for herself when disaster struck.
A group of medical people were in a mini bus returning from a picnic when the driver became irritated with the slow tangle of traffic ahead. He swung the vehicle out to pass and within seconds was face to face with an oncoming vehicle. He swerved recklessly and crashed through a barrier and down a steep bank.
Mary was eventually rescued.
She was the only one in that bus not to recover fully and nearly gave up her fight to survive when she realised that she was paralysed from the waist downwards. A top medical facility finally gave up and told her that she would never walk again. Confined to a wheelchair her dream of continuing as a surgeon seemed impossible.
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However, a doctor by the name of Dr Paul Brand became her mentor and nagged Mary out of her intense depression. He believed in her and took her out of her environment of a general hospital and taught her how to operate on victims of leprosy……………from a seated position. It was an incredible lesson in courage and fortitude and without Paul’s expertise and belief in Mary as a surgeon she would have retired before she had really got started.
She herself had to be rehabilitated before she could rehabilitate others. She underwent extensive surgery and therapy.
Gradually under the expertise and understanding of Dr Paul Brand she began to operate on people with leprosy, particularly their hands.
These patients were noted for their self-pity, hopelessness and anger at the cruelty of this dreaded disease.
Nurses on the ward began to notice a change in the attitude of the patients when Mary wheeled herself in her chair on her rounds checking their progress. The dismal sadness and negativity began to lift as this woman who was worse off than most of them who could walk, tended to them, talking quietly and even laughing with them.
She carried with her a spirit of optimism that lifted her patients out of their despair.
She realised gradually that her affliction was her greatest asset.
She had instant rapport and acceptance with disabled patients. They loved, trusted and related to her knowing how she had fought to overcome her handicap. She acknowledged that she probably had achieved more than she ever would have than if she had not been crippled in that accident.
Instead of becoming a shrewish survivor who railed at her dreadful broken body she was able to overcome through the foresight of Dr Brand and the grace of God, into someone who could give to those who needed her.
She went on to head up a physical therapy unit in her homeland in India and she won many awards.’
Wil finished reading Mary’s victorious story sent in by a medical student and took off his reading glasses and breathed deeply.
‘What a woman, what a doctor!’ he muttered. ‘Truly a survivor’s tale.’
His thoughts turned to another woman who he was looking forward to seeing that evening. His heart beat a little louder in his chest and he smiled foolishly.
His admiration for Vi had escalated from the moment she had cut him free of his seatbelt in the bus accident that they had survived with the third member of their ‘survivors’ group’, Lila.
As the driver of the coach up the South Coast of Kwa Zulu Natal to Durban he had swerved to avoid a head on collision and he had been trapped upside down pouring blood.
He remembered being wary of the grumpy bossy woman who had crawled onto his bus earlier that morning. Even the other passengers had avoided her and no one asked her to remove her bag from the seat next to her!
He had watched her as the 3 of them met in the months after the crash as she had emerged into a well-groomed, piano playing, amusing woman who he found very attractive. She bubbled with personality and she could cook! Also a hobby of his he thought cheerfully.
That evening it was her turn to host their bi monthly meals together celebrating their survival. Instead of extended counselling they had made friends and confidants of each other.
Now Wil faced the fact that he was falling for retired Vi and this evening he would discover if she in any way felt the same way about him.
He felt slightly sick with dread and shook his head. ‘Here I am, a mature,’ he smiled broadly at the word, ‘man of 67 next birthday in 3 weeks’ time, behaving and feeling like a lovesick boy.’ He wondered if his feelings were any different from when he had invited his beloved Kathleen to marry him. ‘Do we really change? Yes,’ he decided, ‘Vi has finally got me over mourning for Kath……..in a lovely way,’ he thought as he remembered being able to share his story of his wife’s battle with cancer and her death, with Vi.
She’s a remarkable woman and tonight will tell me if there is any possibility of a future with her.
‘I do hope with all my heart that it won’t just ruin the good friendship we have developed between us,’ he mused. ‘ And Lila, so much younger than Vi and me……….how will it affect her?’
With these thoughts in mind and feeling faintly depressed he went off to shower and put on the new royal blue shirt that he had bought for ‘supper at Vi’s’ in 3 hour’s time.
'She told me that blue was my colour,' he muttered clutching at straws of comfort as he looked helplessly at the shirt .
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