What Nora Ephron Said She Would Miss

Nora Ephron, who, of course wrote the classic film, You’ve Got Mail, fought a long battle with leukemia and in her last book, a memoir, had a list of all she would miss. The book was called I Remember Nothing: and Other Relections. Nick was her husband and the Author of Goodfellas. Incidentally, it’s apple rhubarb pie that I really love, speaking of last misses.

1. “My kids
2. Nick
3. Spring
4. Fall
5. Waffles
6. The concept of waffles
7. Bacon
8. A walk in the park
9. The idea of a walk in the park
10. The park
11. Shakespeare in the Park
12. The bed
13. Reading in bed
14. Fireworks
15. Laughs
16. The view out the window
17. Twinkle lights
18. Butter
19. Dinner at home just the two of us
20. Dinner with friends
21. Dinner with friends in cities where none of us lives
22. Paris
23. Next year in Istanbul
24. Pride and Prejudice
25. The Christmas tree
26. Thanksgiving dinner
27. One for the table
28. The dogwood
29. Taking a bath
30. Coming over the bridge to Manhattan
31. Pie”

Nam, a Lot of Heat in My 20’s

Pilgrim on a Long, Long Journey

It was the mid-1960s. I was a college student at Emory University considering law instead of medicine. Completely out of my control the draft and the Vietnam War were heating up.

A lot of now famous men were caught in my dilemma about the future. The thought of being skinned alive or spending a few years in the Hanoi Hilton was a non-alternative for me. Trump ( bone spur), Sanders( age) and Bloomberg ( flat feet) all found ways to avoid those treacherous trenches of torture. Medical school and my internship ended soon thereafter with the end of the doctor draft. The late John Mc Caine took the opposite tact.

For the famous and little known men of the 60s that war put an irreversible stamp on our lives. My sole trip to the Vietnam Memorial reinforced my appreciation for the men who saw it through to their dying day…

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A Great Friend

“To be able to laugh and to be merciful are the only things that make man better than the beast.” Ruskin Bond, a highly regarded author in India.

Years ago I started at a company where we gave key presentations to a committee of about 12 physicians. The flip side of being effective with the group was falling short on their toughest questions.

I don’t remember what I was asked but I just wasn’t sure what to say. My several seconds of silence seemed like an hour to me. Then a man on the group answered the question for me. What a relief.

He died in the last few years and his obit characterized him as a man eager and willing to help others. He took a foreign trip every year to help poor folks who needed surgery. That obit, of course, was no surprise.

He and I used to share the goings on of my young son who was named after him. To this day I am so glad we did that.