My Dearest Mum

Yesterday I recieved my final birthday card from my Mum. It was postmarked February 25th, Australia (my birthday). As she always does, she filled every bit of blank space on the card with her neat, characteristic cursive. As usual, the front of the card displayed a piece of God's creation - in this case a Frangipani flower. She described the weather (dry), the extent of the honey harvest from my Dad's beehives (large), and how she and my Dad fed each other wedding cake (a first for them) at the celebration of their 46th anniversary only days before. She sent her love, always so tangible despite the distance between.

Yesterday she was gone. Within the span of less than a week she suffered a brain hemorrhage and passed into eternity early yesterday morning. Losing a loved one is never easy, but her death is an extremely difficult pill to swallow. So sudden, so unexpected.

Yet by all reports she suffered relatively little during her last days. She shared a few lucid moments with my Dad, a complete gift in light of the severity of her condition at the time. She left this earth surrounded by family and friends who loved her deeply, completely at peace and no doubt overjoyed to meet her Maker and his Son to whom she had given her life.

I could not have asked for a better mother. Her example of unconditional love for all living things is one that I will forever attempt to emulate. I thank God for her, her life, and her memory that will be with me always. What an incredible witness to the power of faith. Mum, I'll miss you.

All The Way My Savior Leads Me

All the way my Savior leads me, what have I to ask beside?

Can I doubt his faithful mercies who through life have been my guide?

Heavenly peace, divinest comfort ere by faith in him to dwell

For I know whatever befall me Jesus doeth all things well

All of the way my Savior leads me and He cheers each winding path I tread

Gives me strenght for every trial and He feeds me with the living bread

And though my weary steps may falter and my soul a thirst may be

Gushing from a rock before me through a spirit joy I see

And all the way my Savior leads me, oh the fullness of His love

Perfect rest in me is promised in my Father's house above

When my spirit clothed immortal wings its flight to realms of day

This my song through endless ages, Jesus lead me all the way

- Rich Mullins

A BIG day

Today we bought airplane tickets. LOTS of airplane tickets.

Julain has to travel to take the USMLE CS (a big, important test) because they only have 5 centers in the country. One of those centers just happens to be Houston, where his sister Marion and her family live. I'm going to tag along on the trip and we'll spend 5 days there. It also just so happens that some mutual friends will be passing through Houston at the same time. We're so excited to get to see everyone!
2 round trip tickets

Now the rest of the tickets have a bit of a story to them.
I've been wanting to go on one of the Sierra Club trips with my dad to Italy to hike in the Dolomites for a long time now. When we went to visit my parents in New Mexico for New Years, they made us an incredible offer. They told us that they would take care of the costs of the trip if we took care of airfare. We were blown away!



We had to wait to get Julain's schedule for next year to start looking for tickets. During this process it dawned on us that we probably won't be in Europe again for a long time. Why not go visit Julian's sister Jess in England. Jules hasn't seen her in years, and I haven't met her yet.



When we first started looking, it seemed that the side trip to England from Italy would be expensive. Then, after getting some great tips from my dad, we figured out that buying round trip tickets from Denver to London, then buying round trip tickets from London to Milan was actually cheaper than buying tickets from Denver to Milan. Crazy!
So that's what we did!!
4 round trip tickets.

Total - 6 round trip tickets in one day

I think I'm in shock. A very happy shock!

A-Basin

The wife's been able to hit up the white stuff a few times this year, but until last week I had yet to do the same secondary to 3rd year schedule craziness. The fact that the Basin has had less snow than Vancouver "looks like it's summer aside from the patches of machine-made snow" lately hasn't helped things. However, I got President's Day off (hallelujah!) and there was a coincidental 2-day 8-inch A Basin snow accumulation over the preceding weekend so we took the chance to ski together for the first time this year. Remarkably, we managed to get up early enough to get a prime parking spot in view of the lifts, spent about 5-6 hours on the slopes, then got back to town ahead of the worst of the I-70 traffic. Good times.

Jeep!!

So I've wanted a jeep for years, but it was just a dream car for someday. Then Julian and I realized that if we don't buy a jeep now, we might not get another chance until we retire. Now is the time to have a car that is awesome, but might just have some troubles. Besides, my car has had problem after problem recently, but the kind that mean the car is only going to have more and more problems. If we have to do some work on a car, which would you rather work on, a Taurus wagon or a jeep? You don't even need a jack for the jeep!

a classroom conversation

I really need to write more of these conversations down, but here's a great first grade moment.
I know it's probably silly, but I changed the names of my students anyway.

Me: What continent is this? (Looking at google maps)
Sue with her hand waving frantically: ...I forgot
Me: Would you like to ask a friend for help?
Sue: Yes, May
May: um... I don't know
Me: Would you like to ask a friend for help?
May looks around at a class full of raised hands: Sue?
Sue: long pause I forgot.

Oh first grade!

Grays & Torreys

It had been two years since we did our last 14er together. That changed yesterday when we knocked off Grays and Torreys peaks. Also along for the fun were Amy's co-teacher Nicole, her husband Eric, and four other friends. We started hiking at 6:40am, arriving back at the car around 2:00pm. At 8.25 and 3600 respectively, the mileage and elevation gain weren't as impressive as some of our previous 14ers, but any time you have to summit, drop 600 feet, then summit again it carries with it a nice sense of accomplishment. It was a good thing we left as early as we did, as by the time we got to the top of Torreys an ominous looking cloud bank was moving it. We noticed some lightning on the way down, but by then we were off the more exposed parts of the route. All in all a beautiful double-whammy of a climb.

Grays summit

Our group on Grays

L-R: Sarah, Nicole, Amy, Jenny

Grays summit looking across traverse to Torreys

Torreys summit

Torreys from the descent - see cloud comment above

lesson 2

I read somewhere that Sierra Leone is considered the poorest country in the world.

Stop and think about that.

The poorest country in the world.


Then think about the US.

We have so much.

And what do we do with it? Does it make us happier, better, closer to God?

So then, what do we do with that?

Starting to Process

There's no easy way to summarize my time in Sierra Leone. The easy thing to say would be that I had a great time and the food was great. That doesn't even begin to describe my time their.

Especially in the last several years I have been a quiet, shy person that never knew quite what to do in social situations. The whole culture in Sierra Leone is very interpersonal. I think the one of the lessons I learned is that I need to work on being more relational. I don't quite know how to interact with friends much less people I have just met, but I shouldn't let that stop me.

car trouble

First of all, I'm home safe and sound. I'll write more about Sierra Leone. I need more time to arrange my thoughts on that particular topic before I write about it.

Having said that... my car...

I wanted to drive down to Cortez to visit Jules, which is a 7 hour drive from Denver. About 2 hours into the drive I stop at a gas station in Pueblo. When I'm walking back to my car I notice a ton of coolant on the ground around my car. My car has a history of overheating and I have to add coolant occasionally just because the car is a beast. I decide that it must have been from another car because my car hadn't been that hot when I pulled in and there were no other signs that I had overheated.

About 2 miles down the road, my temperature gauge is ALL the way up.

A tow and 6 hours later, it turns out I blew a hose and now I'm all patched up. Ok, I'm back on my way.

I stop at the Wallmart in Alamosa because I forgot to return a Redbox movie I have in my purse. I notice coolant dripping out of the bottom of my car. I look under the hood and a cap in the system hadn't been tightened properly, so I tighten it and add some duct tape for good measure.

Sweet reunion with the husband in Cortez.

On Saturday we decide to go visit Mesa Verde.



On the way back at an intersection at the entrance to town I hear profanities from the driver seat. We are overheating. We made it off the road. Jules starts taking my car apart with his leatherman. We're not quite sure what happened. We're tightening everything up when we hear an aweful gurgulling sound in the system. I blew another hose!

We pulled it out and walked to the parts store, got a new hose and installed it.

I hope that's the end of my car troubles for a long time.

Clerkships and Sierra Leone

Given that the title of this blog is plural and that the wife is currently on the other side of the Atlantic, I thought now would be an appropriate time to throw the husband hat of opinion/perspective/news into the ring.

Today I finished my first eight-week clerkship of third year. The subject was general surgery, the location St. Joe's hospital here in town. My daily schedule began on arrival at 5:30am for patient rounds, after which I would spend most of the day in the OR, and generally ended around 5-6pm. Throw in at least one call night at the hospital every week, and additional weekend call (i.e. come in Saturday morning, leave Sunday afternoon) and you get the picture. In any case, I enjoyed the rotation considerably more than I had anticipated I would, and depending on my final grades for the block will consider doing a general surgery sub-internship next year (much to Amy's chagrin, - a general surgery residency is two years longer and demonstrably more intense than one in family medicine).

Monday I leave for Cortez, CO (7+ hr drive away from Denver) to begin my family practice clerkship. The first four weeks are rural, the last four here in the Denver area. Should be quite the change from what I've been doing the last eight weeks, but I'm looking forward to it. The caveat to that last point is that when Amy gets back in a week and a half I probably won't see her for a few more days after that. Hopefully she'll be able to drive out to Cortez and we can do some camping etc. over the weekends that I should for the most part have free.

Speaking of the wife, I managed to reach her today via choppy, delayed, but viable phone connection. She and the group are doing fine and in good health, and their teacher in-service sessions have for the most part been well recieved. Tomorrow they will hike three miles to a neighboring village, something that appears to be a recurring theme as their appearances are apparently quite popular and everyone wants to meet our Denver contigent. Word has it that the woman who prepares their meals there does a stupendous job with both American and African cuisine. I'm hoping to reap the osmotic effects of the latter on the wife's return.

Well, that's about it for this spousal report. I'm going to enjoy the next two days with no obligations other than to get the house back to looking respectable (reversion back to bachelor habits has been alarmingly swift). Going to hit up a Rockies game Sunday with a friend coming up from Alamosa. After that, back to the third year med student grind, albeit hopefully a tamer and less abrasive one when compared to the previous eight weeks. I'll leave you with a quote I came across recently that seemed appropriate in regard to the obsessively heirarchical and goal-focused nature of Western medical education:

"Since most of us would rather be admired for what we do, rather than for what we are, we are normally willing to sacrifice character for conduct, and intergrity for achievement."

Please kick me if I ever give that impression.

tick tock

I leave for Sierra Leone tomorrow afternoon. It doesn't quite seem real. Probably because the night before a trip I am just starting to think about what I am going to pack, and this time I'm already packed. Very, very impressive for me. I usually finish packing at 3 in the morning for my 7 o'clock flight.

I can't believe it, but I'm kinda bored. I am rereading a favorite book to pass the time while Jules studies.

I also took my first dose of Doxy this morning which got me thinking. I am so thankful that we have the access to health care that we do. I am in general not a fan of our system, but when I stopped to think that I can get Doxy at little cost from my local pharmacy to keep me from getting malaria (hopefully), I realized how wonderful that is. I actually don't know much about the health care in Sierra Leone, but I can't imagine they have the same access to drugs, doctors etc that we do.

tick tock, tick tock...

Auction

So the team I'm going with to Sierra Leone is holding an auction on our blog. We're still trying to raise the money we need. Take a look, there are some fun gift cards and art. It's a win win situation. You get something and we get your support.

Thanks!

Score

Julian got his score!!!! 216

The avg. for people applying to family medicine residencies is 210 and the overall national avg. is 222.

I'm so happy for him. This is a big weight lifted off his sholders. To celebrate he will be working 30 hours striaght this weekend. Doesn't that sound like fun?

Boards Step 1

Jules is taking the 1st step of the boards on Friday. He is now is super-cram, freak out mode. Actually is dealing with the stress pretty well. Prayers would be great though!

Newest Member of the Family

On Sunday (I think) Julian's family got just a little larger. Julian's brother and wife had their first child, Jaqueline Kathleen. They sent us pictures and she is adorable! We are so happy for them. What a blessing!

Here are some of the cellphone pictures alluded to earlier by my blogster wife. Peruse with abandon!

A nice picture of Amy, her friend Sarah, and a stray bear cub named Nigel.

Camping

We love to camp. The last two weekend we were able to go up to Guanella Pass and camp with our friends. It was so good to get away from the city and all the stress. I think I could just sit and stare at a campfire for hours! The first weekend, we sadly did not have a camera so Jules took some pictures on his phone that we can't figure out how to download.

Here are some shots of the second weekend with my co-teacher Nicole and her husband Eric. That weekend happened to be labor day weekend so we thought that there would be people everywhere. Oddly, there weren't very many people around where we camped. That picture of the beautiful stream... well you should know that those rocks are VERY slippery! I decided that if Jules could make it across the stream, so could I. I made it onto one of the rocks in the middle but when I shifted my weight to go to the next one my right leg slipped right off and into the stream. We decided that we would try to dry my shoe and sock over the fire. That's my shoe in the top right hand corner.

It worked pretty well except until I noticed my shoe was smoking. Then we turned it over and after a while I noticed that the sole had two large bubbles. My shoe is still wearable, it just has more character now.

Here are some more pictures.

Homesick

We went to Alamosa this weekend and I realized how much I miss it. Even though I grew up in Denver, Alamosa is definitely my home. The pace of life is so much slower there. I can't even express why I love it or what I love about it. It's just everything. Getting to see Mt. Blanca everyday. Being able to drive from one end of town to the other in 5 min. A church where we feel like we belong. Sigh

Now I'm back in the city. As if that wasn't depressing enough, in our training at school today we found out that we didn't do so great last year. Well that's putting it mildly. A lot of our kids lost ground last year. We new that would happen with our crazy curriculum, but it's still not fun to see.

My light at the end of the tunnel - Jules is applying for a scholarship which would require him to work 2 years in an under served area i.e. Alamosa.

1 year down... 6-7 years to go. Big Sigh.

More Links

Our wedding pictures are online! And so is a highlight video of our ceremony.

Video - http://www.vimeo.com/1446703

Pictures - http://www.pictage.com/449810

I'm so happy with how everything turned out. I can't wait to see the whole video.

Wedding Pictures

So here is a link to some pictures that a friend took at the wedding. http://www.flickr.com/photos/brooks1986/sets/72157606292048042

We're still waiting on the professional pictures. Here's one of my favorites that she took from the ceremony. Hopefully anyway. I'm still trying to figure this whole thing out.

So for the honeymoon we were fortunate enough to go to Mexico. We were on the Yucatan Peninsula in Playa del Carmen. We had an amazing time. We were only a few hundred yards from the beach.

We spent a lot of time lounging on these chairs. Surprisingly, there weren't that many people and we always got a front row seat.

Our room was amazing! It also had a little balcony we we could go out and sit. This is the view we enjoyed while eating room service. We got very spoiled!

My favorite adventure was going to a cenote. There are these underground rivers in the Yucatan and occasionally the ceiling gives out so you end up with this whole in the ground and about 30 ft down there's water. So kind of like a cave but the entrance is through the roof. We went on a tour thing that took us to one and some mayan ruins. The Mayans used to swim in the cenotes because they believed they had healing powers.

We were supposed to repel down but Jules and I decided to jump instead. It was awesome! Jules climbed out (using a ladder) and then repelled down. Our skin was so soft after our dip.

So I'm having a heck of a time trying to format this with the pictures. Someone is going to have to explain to me how to do this.

Why Not

So we finally gave in and decided to create a blog. We probably won't be good at staying current, but what the hay, it might be fun.