The Ironman

“I’m crazy,” Dr. Klion says. “I jogged in from West Chester this morning.” “What!?!” “Yeah, I’m doing the Grand Canyon Rim To Rim in five weeks. 46-miles, five-thousand feet up and down, then back again.” Now, the whole reason I go Dr. Mark Klion is because he’s the best kind of crazy. The walls of…

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House Call

The city never seemed more hostile. My office phone rang at 5:47. Caller ID indicated it was my wife calling from her cell phone, unusual for that time of day. I was knee-deep into a twice-delayed annual appraisal, but begged off to answer. “Hi honey,” I said, noting the sound of the street in the…

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Doctor, Doctor

It’s Monday morning in Dr. Lisa Libertore’s East Side office. Four boxes of medium, sterile, powder-free latex exam gloves crowd the Victorian-themed waiting room here on 85th and Lexington. Eight of us wait restlessly, shifting in our chairs, evading eye contact, and tapping at our respective devices. I fill out a clipboard lousy with forms,…

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The Recovery Room

So… the bill for last months emergency appendectomy surgery came yesterday. $30,445.16. Thirty grand!!! Abbi and I could go scuba diving in Belize six times! We could buy a brand-new Jaguar X-Type! We could put a 5% down payment on a $600,000 house! The bill’s full of interesting stuff, though, like a $219.19 “specimen bag”…

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The Dust Cloud Disappears Without A Trace

Two weeks ago this afternoon, I was in surgery. This morning, I was back on the road, running 4.87 miles in just over 51 minutes. Abbi and I rose in the dark, stretched, and started slow. We ran west towards the river, north along Hudson River Park, then up into Riverside Park. It felt great…

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Bee Season

For a few hours before my whole emergency appendectomy ordeal, an entirely different health issue was at hand. Pun intended. See, I like fire. Always have. Just ask our former neighbor, Ron Wells, who nabbed my brother, Christofer, and I behind the hedges with a can of gasoline, a box of matches and a few…

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Discharged

When I woke, my wife, mother, and doctor stood over me like a Holy Trinity. I tried to speak, but could only gesture to Abbi for a kiss. I didn’t remember anything prior, or have any idea where I was. Through the fog, I heard Dr. Dawson report that the surgery went by the book.…

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Patience

The Lenox Hill’s ER was manned by a slight, Russian-speaking security guard. “Name, age, and ailment,” he said handing me a pink slip of paper. Benjamin Wagner. 37. I paused at “ailment,” puzzling over how detailed I should be. I wrote, simply, “APPENDIX,” then took my seat in the dank, crowded waiting room. An elderly…

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Patient

In some strange way, I felt relieved as I strode towards Lenox Hill Hospital’s Emergency Room with my plastic bag full of still-wet CAT scans; at least I knew what was wrong, and what had to be done. It was a strange day from the start. I’d slept scarcely a wink the night before, dragging…

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The Miracle Of Suffering

“I think you’re gonna’ have to throw up to feel better,” he said matter-of-factly. The morning began at the iTunes music store. Such is my voracious appetite for substantive public radio podcasts that I’d already burned through “This American Life,” “Studio 360,” and two episodes of “Fresh Air” on my twice-daily, fifteen-minute commute — and…

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