Last week I became the dentist for a woman recovering from a stroke. I traveled to treat her in an assisted care facility in the Manassas area. Accompanying me was my doctor’s bag-actually a box filled with dental instruments, local anesthesia, a portable dental drill, gloves, masks and everything else necessary to place fillings. An hour so later I left having completed the decay removal and subsequent fillings. I was filled with a variety of feelings that kind of intermingled and coalesced into a feeling of satisfaction and wonder.
One feeling that I had is a little hard to explain. But, let me try. I am proud that this family had placed in me a trust, to treat not only this woman, who I’ve known only for a short while, but also her daughter and son-in-law, their children and their grandchildren. In short, four generations of this family have placed themselves in my care. I am very proud of that. My thoughts were of an interview at Ohio State prior to my acceptance into their dental program. When asked why I wanted to be a dentist, I replied, “because I want to help people!” It was a somewhat ambiguous statement. I don’t know if I was grilled on exactly what I meant by the admissions officers. I am not so certain what I meant at the time. But, after my visit to the assisted care facility I felt that not only do I help people with their oral health., I want to help them in any way I can. With time, and I’ve practiced in northern Virginia for 30 years now, my patients have become a part of my life. I really don’t want to retire as long as I am physically able-my practice-my patients are my life.
The other thoughts that ran through my mind as I drove home were of the Manassas area I was in and its relationship with the horrific struggle which is called the American Civil War. 150 years ago , in the second week of April 1861, Americans began to kill other Americans. Before the conflict would end, 625,000 Americans would be dead. The land surrounding the facility overlooked the Bull Run mountains. It was a beautiful sight in the spring sunshine. But, the surrounding area had once been drenched in American blood. The thought of so many dead left me with other thoughts. Why was political compromise so hard? Did so many have to die?
E. Porter Alexander
The third thought which moved in and out of my brain as I traveled down I-66 eastward to my office was of one specific soldier from that war. E. Porter Alexander, a man born on my birthday 121 years earlier, wrote a book called “Fighting for the Confederacy”. It was not meant for publication. It was meant for his children. It contained his personal thoughts and feelings about the Civil War. Published in 1989, 79 years after his death, it is an unvarnished view of a highly articulate, intelligent man. Unlike other military memoirs, which are self-serving and filtered, you really get to know this man through his book. My thoughts were on General Alexander, not so much for his military thoughts , as for commenting that he had spent much of the Winter of 1861-62 on the very ground where I had been treating the oldest member of the four generation family I discussed earlier. Alexander was recently wed to a relative of the famous patriot, George Mason. When winter approached in late 1861 and fighting ceased, Miss Teen-as he called his wife-joined Alexander on a Mason family farmstead. There they enjoyed domestic tranquility in the midst of civil war. So, I thought of Alexander and his wife , Miss Teen, taking walks to enjoy the panoramic vista of the Bull Run mountains that I had so recently enjoyed.
Bull Run Mountains
So, I drove on to my office with these thoughts all in my mind. This blog entry is not so much an informative entry about dental practice and oral health as it is about life and its twists and turns. Someone once said that life is a journey. I am trying to enjoy the ride.
If you would like to hitchhike along…visit my website, http://www.fallschurchsmiles.com/.
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