Three Beautiful Things 08/11/14: Reunion, Williams and Whitman, David's Passenger

1.   I witnessed a former patient have a reunion with his doctor and the doctor, well, she was warm and gracious, the model of a humane professional taking time to bring joy to a former patient.  Their interaction made it clear that a physician's deeds of healing are as much (or more) spiritual as they are physical.

2.  Friends and family mourning the death of Robin Williams posted favorite clips and favorite quotations  from movies Robin Williams appeared in.  Several cited Dead Poets Society, a movie that came out when I was living out in the countryside and rarely seeing movies.  I remember renting it and watching it late at night and my mind was preoccupied with the pressure of a failed marriage and with general fatigue.  It was as if I never saw it.  Well, until tonight, I had forgotten that Williams' character in Dead Poets Society loved Walt Whitman and tonight I thought back on the few times I got to teach Walt Whitman and how much I loved reading his exuberant poetry aloud and how I would go into a zone, much like with Shakespeare, where I didn't know if any of my students were with me in feeling the passion of Whitman's poetry, but I let myself be transported and, if they wanted, they could watch me falling in love right before their very eyes. 

3.  In case you missed it, the Deke posted this picture of a model car of David's with a pair of fingernail clippers in the passenger seat.