FOR THE BIRDS

Spring brings a return of migratory birds, but Michigan is on another plain. Our backyard appears to be ground zero, and I have seen and heard so many different species. There have been countless red-breasted robins and a few cardinals, which are absolutely striking. One is shown below. Sorry I could not get a close up, but he flew away when Cate got too close.

While we were playing frisbee in the back, we also heard some pecking. We quickly followed the sound to our neighbors' house behind us. We spotted a woodpecker hammering away at a tree. It was a beautiful sight!

I will miss these sweet creatures when they fly south next winter. Until then, I will take notice of them and enjoy their company.

QUOTES TO PONDER

Cate sometimes joins me at work and always finds something to keep her occupied. This past weekend she decided to pull her favorite quotes from a book of quotes in my office. Enjoy!

Quotes To Ponder

By Cate Alumkal

If plan “a” doesn’t work don’t worry because the alphabet has 25 more letters.

~Unknown

It’s not the load you carry that breaks you down it’s how you choose to carry it.

~C.S Lewis

The purpose of life is a purpose.

~Robert Byrne

Making a million friends is not a miracle…the miracle is to make such a friend who will stand with you when millions stand against.

~Unknown

Fall seven times stand up eight.

~Japanese Proverb

Courage is found in unlikely places.

J.R.R Tolkien

Shoot for the moon because even if you miss you will land among the stars.

~Les Brown

Life is not measured by the breaths we take but by the moments that take our breath away.

~Unknown

At the end of the game pawns and kings go back in the same box.

~Italian Proverb

The best things in life are not things.

~Ginny Moore

Believe you can and your halfway there.

~Theodore Roosevelt 

Courage doesn’t always roar. Sometimes courage is the little voice saying I will try again

        tomorrow.

~Mary Anne Radmacker

You don’t get any harmony if everyone sings the same note.

~Doug Lloyd

It always seems impossible until it is done.

~Nelson Mandela

A stumble may prevent a fall.

~English Proverb

Kindness, like a boomerang always comes back.

~Unknown

Sometimes rejection is just redirection.

~Travis Smiley

Don’t cry because something is over smile because it happened.

~Dr. Seuss

Normal is a setting on a washing machine.

~Unknown

Even the darkest hour is only sixty minutes.

~Morris Mandel

Good friends are like stars. You don’t always see them, but you always know they are there.

~Unknown

When life gives you lemons make orange juice.

~Unknown

My religion is very simple. My religion is kindness.

~Dalai Lama

If you’re lucky enough to be different, don’t ever change.

~Taylor Swift

Don’t tell me the sky is the limit when there are footprints on the moon.

~Paul Brandt

The best things in life are not things.

~Ginny Moore

The best way to make your dreams come true is to wake up.

~Paul Valery

Not all those who wander are lost.

J.R.R Tolkien

Be yourself everyone else is already taken.

~Oscar Wilde

Fate doesn’t decide- you do.

~Dominic

I expect to pass through this world but once. Any good therefore, that I can do or any kindness I can show to any fellow creature, let me do it now. Let me not defer it or neglect it, for I shall not pass this way again.

~Stephen Grellet

Give me a firm place to stand, and I will move the earth.

~Archimedes

Everything you can imagine is real.

~Pablo Picasso

Man can learn nothing unless he proceeds from the known to the unknown.

~Claude Bernard

To be loved, be lovable.

~Ovid

Whatever you are be a good one.

~Abraham Lincoln

Hard work beats talent when talent doesn’t work hard.

~Shreya

When you come to the end of your rope, tie a knot in it and hold on.

~Thomas Jefferson

There are no shortcuts to any place worth going to.

~Beverly Sills

When it is dark be the one who turns on the light.

~Unknown

Fortune favors the bold.

~Virgil

Kindness is difficult to give away because it keeps on coming back.

~Marcel Proust

By perseverance the snail reached the arc.

~Charles Spurgeon

Learn as if you were to live forever, live as if you were to die tomorrow.

~Mahatma Ghandi

I’ve learned that life is like a book. Sometimes we must close a chapter and begin the next one.

~Unknown

Injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere.

~Martin Luther King Jr.

Among life’s quests, there seems but worthy one: To do men good.

~Gamaliel Bailey

We didn’t all come over on the same ship, but were all in the same boat.

~Bernard Baruch

Let us always meet each other with a genuine smile.

~Mother Teresa

No man is an island entire of itself.

~John Danne

To be able to look back upon one’s life in satisfaction is to live twice.

~Kahlil Gibran

If the wind will not serve, take the oars.

~Latin Proverb

For kindness begets kindness evermore.

~Sophocles

Kind words do not cost much yet they accomplice much.

~Blaise Pascal

Do not go where the path may lead, go instead where there is no path and leave a trail.

~Ralph Waldo Emerson

Life is a ticket to the greatest show on earth.

~Martin H. Fischer

Thousands of candles can be lit from a single candle, and the life of that single candle will not be shortened. Happiness never decreases by being shared.

~Bukkyo Dendo Kyokai-Teachings of Buddha

Good actions are the invisible hinges on the doors of heaven.

~Victor Hugo

Your best takes your time.

~Unknown

The man who moves a mountain must start by moving small stones.

~Chinese Proverb

Paradise on earth is where I am.

~Voltaire

Be kind whenever it is possible. It is always possible.

~Dalai Lama

‘Tis always morning somewhere in the world.

~Richard Henry Hengist Horne

Be the change you want to see in the world.

~Mahatma Gandhi

He was a bold man that first ate an oyster.

~Johnathan Swift

The difference between ordinary and extraordinary is that little extra.
~Jimmy Johnson

If you fight fire with fire the world will go up in smoke.

~Lemony Snicket

Even the toughest dogs are afraid of vacuums.

~Unknown

Most of these quotes are from a book called “365 Days of Wonder” written by R.J Palacio.

In the book see page March 18^th

J.R.R stands for John Ronald Reuel (J.R.R Tolkien) 

SUGAR CALLING

In this time of  COVID, we have all been forced to change our behaviors and live in very different ways. No aspect of our lives has been untouched by this virus and the response to it that is meant to keep us safe. All of us are looking for new ways to cope.

One of my favorite activities is listening to podcasts, and I am always on the lookout for something new that is either educational or comforting. Recently, I came across a new podcast from the New York Times featuring the writer Cheryl Strayed called "Sugar Calling," in which she calls some of her favorite writers and asks them what they make of this moment and how they are dealing with our new reality.

https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/the-daily/id1200361736?i=1000470460017

The first episode featured one of my favorite writers George Saunders who wrote "Tenth of December" and "Lincoln in the Bardo." As usual, George was completely uplifting, and he reminded me that there is no one I would rather be "stuck" with than the three other people in my house.

We'll all get through this, and being kind and caring to each other will make this time in self-distancing all the more tolerable and - dare I say - joyful.

DEAR MEDICINE

Dear Medicine,

Since the COVID crisis began several weeks ago, I have given a lot of thought about what it means to be a doctor and why I chose you in the first place.

If you would have asked me pre-COVID, I would have said that I went into medicine because I loved science and the chance to help people. However, there are a lot of jobs that allow one to do science or help people. Why medicine? It is a good question, and a global pandemic has a way of clarifying things.

The road to becoming a doctor is long, and there are certainly more lucrative or easy careers. In retrospect, I spent most of my twenties in classrooms or in hospitals learning my trade and attempting to become an expert. I never thought of this as a sacrifice because I was doing exactly what I wanted to do. I have never regretted the long hours or "demands" of the job. In fact, the best years of my life have been the past twenty-seven in this profession. I could not imagine doing anything else, and I must imagine that athletes like Kobe Bryant or other professionals who dedicate themselves to a cause bigger than themselves feel the same way.

It is that desire to be a part of something bigger than one's self and to try to make the biggest difference possible that led me to change institutions this past summer. The past eight months have been the most challenging time in my life. However, the past eight months have taught me that I am stronger than I knew I was and that - with the help of others - one can overcome any obstacle. In so many ways, my life in medicine and this move have prepared me for this moment.

When the COVID crisis hit, I was afraid of what might happen to me, even though I was not on the front lines in the emergency room or in the intensive care unit. Despite being mostly laboratory research-focused these days, I came to realize that my place was in the thick of things. I have helped to lead my section's response to the COVID crisis at my institution and continue to meet with patients whose disease status mandates an in-person clinic visit despite COVID. However, even those efforts seem too small for this moment.

Therefore, when my hospital asked for volunteers to staff our emergently-constructed field hospital for COVID patients, I thought long and hard about what to do. Before sending in my email response, I considered my own family, especially my children Cate and Nicholas. I thought about how much I loved them and how I would hate to lose my own life battling this virus. Despite this, I decided to volunteer.

Why volunteer to go into a burning building when you are safe outside? It is because there are people inside that building just like your family who need you more urgently and because you believe that fire will be put out more quickly and effectively with you inside. This is what military personnel or first responders do every day. They do so not because they believe their own lives have no value. Rather, they know that some things, namely life itself, are bigger and more important than their own lives.

I now realize that living the fullest life possible - and enabling others to do the same - is what has kept me going all these years and what drew me to medicine in the first place. No matter what happens, it has been a privilege and a hell of a ride. Thank you.

Love,

Joshi

STORYCORPS

Many Fridays, I happen to catch Storycorps on the way to work on Morning Edition on NPR. This week's story was one of the most timely and moving as we navigate isolation, fear, and loneliness in the COVID era.

I cannot do justice to the story told by Private First Class Roman Coley David. I will let you hear it directly from him here. Grab a tissue before listening.

STARTLED

Cate is fearless about nearly all things, including COVID, which she has not let get her down. However, there are a few things that are like kryptonite to her - bees and thunderstorms.Yesterday was a perfect storm - so to speak - on both counts.

When we first moved in, we noticed "carpenter bees," but they appeared to have disappeared during winter. However, yesterday when we were playing soccer in the backyard, I noticed something whiz past me. I quickly ducked, and it turned out it was a bee. Cate quickly ran inside and hid and refused to come out despite the fact that Nicholas and I continued to play safely outside. Second, there was a pretty strong thunderstorm last night right before bedtime. Cate was definitely startled and pulled into our bed right before bedtime. It definitely took some prying to get her into her own bed. Sweet little thing.

Sometimes I take for granted how brave and independent Cate is. A day like yesterday is a reminder that my sweet little girl is not all grown up yet. I will enjoy every day with her.

I'LL SEE YOUR CARDINAL AND RAISE YOU 30 OTHER LOGOS!

Nicholas' favorite activity is drawing, and the stay at home order has definitely increased his output. After seening Cate's drawing of the St. Louis Cardinals logo, he thought he would go one step further and draw all the baseball cap logos for the MLB teams. Wow, just wow!

My office walls will look like wallpaper when these kids are done with this quarantine! I am so lucky to have such artists in residence!

SPRINGTIME IS FOR THE BIRDS

The onset of spring often coincides with the return of our bird friends from parts south to northern latitudes like Michigan. Despite the COVID outbreak, the birds seem no worse for the wear, and it has been fun to spot different species in our backyard.

Just last week, I saw many red-breasted robins and - even more strikingly - a beautiful cardinal. Immediately,  I thought of the the St. Louis Cardinals baseball team and their beautiful cardinal logo. 

Though Nicholas is the most avid artist in our family, Cate has some pretty mad drawing skills, too. Therefore, I challenged her to draw the Cardinals logo after we pulled a picture of it up on the computer.

Cate was hesitant at first, but she agreed to give it a shot. She would not let me look at her drawing until it was done, and she kept shooing me away when I entered the office where she was drawing and coloring it. Finally, she said I could come in, and she showed me her creation.

It was a masterpiece! Though I am not a big fan of baseball, this little birdy will be making his way to my office. Cate for the win again!

BEST 10 BUCKS I EVER SPENT

Spending quality time with the kids seems harder and harder these days give the global COVID pandemic, stress of work, and the fact that we all seem to be retiring to our screens more often. As I have become mindful of this, I am trying to be more proactive about carving out interrupted time together, which bring me to this afternoon.

I recently bought a new pair of running shoes. Ordinarily, I would have tried these out at the gym in order to avoid dirtying them in case they did now work out, but that is not an option in the COVID era with my gym shuttered. Therefore, I took my chances and ran outside.

The first few times I ran in the shoes, they felt fine. However, on the third or fourth run - I cannot remember for sure - my feet began to hurt. I decided that I no longer wanted the shoes, but unfortunately the soles had dirt and sand in many of the treads. Undeterred, I decided that I would try to clean the soles and sought out the assistance of a little hard-worker I know!

I am not into free child labor, so I offered Cate $10 to help me. This was far less than the $150 price tag of the shoes, so I considered it a steal. Cate - the professional that she is - filled up two small containers, one with clean water and the other with soapy water. She also got an old toothbrush and a paint brush while I found a straight head screwdriver.

I picked out the dirt first with the screwdriver, and then Cate began to scrub the soles. She did an amazing job, but there were still a few discolored areas in the white part of the sole. That is when Cate had the idea to use white out to paint those areas. I almost cried at her deviousness - I mean ingenuity - and because of how seriously she had taken this job. Needless to say, the shoes look as good as new and clean enough to eat off of! We will be sending them back for a refund tomorrow!

I hope Cate remembers the hour we spent on this project fondly one day - or at least does not view it as underpayment! For me, spending this time with her was pure joy!