When you are a long way from home, there is nothing that cheers you up like getting a package. 

CDR Mark Plaster, MC, USNR writes from Iraq

“Sir, there was a little situation last night that you might want to be aware of.”

I’ve been staring at my sea bag and field pack in the corner of my office since May when I got notice of my return to active duty. But now it’s time to finally go...

Aphe*phobia

noun: a fear of being touched;

also called haphephobia, haptephobia, thixophobia,
origin: from the Greek haphe ‘touch’

It was to be my last shift in the ER for about a year, so I was feeling a little reflective...

I should know better by now than to answer a call at 9:30 at night. It can’t be good news. But I’m always afraid that I’ve made some bonehead scheduling mistake and have failed to show up for my shift. So I left the family watching March Madness basketball and took the call in another room.

As I sat down and closed my eyes to block out the office, I drifted off into a daydream of scantily clad physicians and nurses cavorting through the ER.  Each had a perfect body and sported a distant dreamy look as they passed one another in the hallway.

As our plane descended into the mist of clouds swirling over small towns and rice paddies I was flooded with a mixture of feelings that went all the way back to my teen years. As the nation convulsed over our involvement in Vietnam, my only concern was where my birth date was going to fall in the draft lottery. 357. My eyes had to scan the newspaper three times before I found it. I couldn’t believe that out of sheer luck, call it Providence, I would be sitting this one out. But many of my friends weren’t so lucky.

“I think he’s sick,” my wife said raising her voice while stepping between me and the TV. She shoved our little chubby boy towards my face. He had just the slightest gray cast and the soft stridor that was left after was beginning to show respiratory fatigue. It caught my breath.