Two Days in June, 68 Years Apart

Want to watch/listen instead? Click to see Abbey Algiers and Sally Jensen discuss the letter.

---------- Forwarded message ---------

From: James Algiers

Date: Wed, Jun 13, 2012 at 4:37 PM

Subject: June 6

To: Louis

Hi Louie,

June 6 , 1944 was a great day, an important day for me;  after two 

years, nine months of which were spent on Adak, I was discharged from 

the USNR.  

June 6, 2012 was a day of awakening for me.  June 6, 2012, I 

attended a funeral for the wife of a classmate from med school.  It 

was as awakening to me as much as the discharge from Adak; but for 

unrelated reasons. 

In 1944, I was freed for the life which might come, for experiences of the next sixty or so years.  

June 6, 2012 was so different.

The attendees at the funeral were all men and some women of repute; 

many retired physicians from St. Luke's Hospital in Milwaukee; a hospital 

which for fifty years had set standards of excellence.  

The attendees were participants in the search for excellence; in

attendance were  neurosurgeons, vascular surgeons, cardiologists, family

physicians, nurses from various services; all now slumping, graying, and

obviously slowing.  None were trim, all moved slowly, genuflected with 

difficulty, and read with bifocals. 

All had that quizzical look on introduction, that look which said, "I thought I

read of you in the  obits,”  but in reality said, "You are looking well, nice to

see you.”

Talking and conversation included the bereaved, but moved quickly to 

the attendees, those who had been able to attend the funeral.  I sat 

in the rear of the church and looked at all who had been so important, 

all who had set the pace of medicine during those vital ages of 

change, growth, and outcome.

I recalled the long hours, the inventive, aggressive procedures in the

cardiac labs, the eye opening advances from the department of vascular

diagnosis, and I thought of the neurovascular surgeon who had driven to

Hartford to attend a compressed fractured skull of my neighbor, a man

who now is 85 and on his journey for visitation by the neurosurgeon, if he,

the neurosurgeon, reads and recalls the name from the obits. 

The cycle goes on and on, the viewers become the viewed. 

And we attend as many wakes as possible knowing full well that soon

 our children will capture the events of life on the "picture wall" of the

mortuary.

My June 6 recalls are so different. 

One in 1944 was wildly vigorous,  brilliantly vivid with optimism and plans for work and success. 

In 2012, June 6 was quietly reminiscent of what had been, and cognizant of what will be. 

However the play plays out, it has been a great ride.

So what the hell, hang in there Louie, and let me know you are still 

with it.

Keep the faith,

Jim A.