Today’s blog
Lynn Murphy Mark
Brain perks
By “perks” I mean the sound that an old fashioned coffee pot makes when it is bubbling water into coffee. That’s how my brain is this morning. Little bubbles of thoughts, random and unconnected, are popping for my consideration. I want to write a blog this morning. Last evening I thought of a perfect title and subject, but that disappeared overnight. I’m not able to recall what it was, either. Oh well.
This morning I am still thinking of my friend, Rick. I have gotten some responses from yesterday’s blog about his sudden death, including a message from a friend who also worked with him. Like anyone who knows him, she has a funny story, which she shared. One day they were in their tiny office working side by side. She must have had something on her nose that didn’t belong there. Before she knew it, he had a Kleenex and gently removed it. As he did so he said, “I was a baboon in my last life…” In Saint Louis, there is a group of people who have great Rick stories. I wish we could get together in his honor.
One day we were comparing notes about a particularly problematic, challenging patient. No matter what approach we took, we were rebuffed and scorned by this very angry woman. We had informally diagnosed her as having a personality disorder and were looking up the details in the Psychiatric bible, “Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders”, now in its’ fifth version. The DSM classifies mental illnesses on 4 axes. Axis 1 is clinical disorders, Axis 2 is personality disorders, and so on. It was obvious to us that Axis 2 was where the woman belonged.
Back in the day, and maybe still today, personality disorders were considered notoriously hard to treat. Rick and I had a handful of patients in common who we had placed in this category and were swapping stories about the challenges. Suddenly he started chuckling. “You know what?”, he said, “we should write a book and call it ‘Life on Axis 2’.” I think it would have been a best-seller. Another opportunity missed.
I can’t shake the finality of his passing. For me it is an empty feeling and also a sense of great sorrow and lost opportunity. There is a word in Portuguese, “Saudade”, and it is perfect for today. Saudade means a feeling of longing, nostalgia and melancholy. A Portuguese scholar, Aubrey Bell, once wrote, “Saudade is a vague and constant desire for something that does not and probably cannot exist, for something other than the present.”
Miguel Falabella, a Brazilian actor and poet, wrote this:
“Saudade for a brother who lives far off.
Saudade for a childhood waterfall.
Saudade for the flavor of a fruit never to be found again.
Saudade for the father who died, for the
Imaginary friend who never existed.
Saudade for a city.
Saudade for ourselves when we see that time
doesn’t forgive us. All these saudades hurt.
But the saudade that hurts the most is the
one for someone beloved.”
There you have it.