Sunday, March 27, 2011

The Pleasure of Meeting Dr. Barry

         The other day I had occasion to visit the emergency department at our local hospital. There are about twenty doctors who staff the department twenty-four hours a day seven days a week.

         So it was a real treat to have Dr. Barry drop in to see me. Why Dr. Barry a special treat? Well Barry was a former student of mine in junior high school.

         Now whenever I meet a former student I truly enjoy the contact. I knew that Barry was an emergency physician and that he worked in the local hospital. However, I had never bumped into him. I hadn't seen him since he left the junior highschool. Barry is now 40 so it's been awhile since I've seen him. I had kept bumping into his parents so I kept up with Barry's whereabouts.

         I remember Barry as a quiet, bright and  pleasant person. I had Barry for language arts which probably wasn't his favorite subject since if he was moving toward medicine I would think he would like science. I remember him being an extremely keen student. In those days we still taught spelling. I didn't mind using a few gimmicks. If you got 105%  five times in a row you could miss the next spelling assignment. Barry liked this idea and I think he got 100% all year. I would also bonus assignments that were done above and beyond what was called for at that level. So I didn't have any problem giving kids 11 out of 10 or even 12 out of 10. Barry could think ahead so he asked me if his average was over 100% would it show on his report card? So you see that he was not just bright but keen.

      So we had a little visit the other day which I enjoyed. I was also looked after very competently...probably 110%!

      Now you can see what happened to me. There was spontaneous bleeding in my eye. I had the same thing about 10 years ago and I thought that's what I had now but I didn't want to self diagnose so that's the reason for my emergency department visit. It's not a serious condition and the blood will absorb in ten days. There is no risk to my eyesight. It's a little hard to look at.

10 comments:

  1. You poor thing! Hooray for healthcare! That looks awful! Take care.

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  2. The worst part is the appearance. No discomfort. Of course the old face doesn't help either!!!
    Thanks.

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  3. Yikes......that looks scary. It's always nice to see someone from out past succeed.

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  4. Well I am glad it doesn't hurt..cause it looks like it might. I am sure your former student took good care of you..just another reason to call you Red:)

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  5. Yikes Keith.Hope that isn't as painful as it looks.Take care

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  6. Your eye looks awful. So glad to hear it is not painful. That was a special meeting for you. It must be nice knowing you helped that young man on his educational journey to become a doctor.

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  7. Thanks all of you for your concern. It looks awful, but I assure you no pain and it will go away. You must be looking at the ugly face to be so concerned!!!
    To me the most important point was to meet Barry. Barry was going to go above and beyond whether I helped him or not. He's still the same today. A great person who will always look to see how to do better. I think service is a key part of his makeup.

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  8. I have had that happen to me, also. Maybe not quite as heavy bleeding in my eye as you had, but it did clear up without any problem. And meeting your former student was a plus!

    Not to mention it made for a very interesting post! :-)

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  9. Surprisingly Barry told me that they see these quite often.
    Meeting former students is always a plus. It's always a thrill to see what they've accomplished.
    Hope you're having fun times in Texas.

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  10. Wow how rewarding for you to meet a student you taught. To be your Eye Specialist.

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