book while Eddie takes their order. Number two:
Which of the following is true regarding post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD)?
a) nightmares are often a troubling phenomenon
b) intrusive thoughts are a key feature
c) just witnessing a traumatic event may be a sufficient cause
d) hyperarousal state may be seen in these cases
e) all of the above
I circle e , then steal a glance over at the Berringer couple. They’re sitting in the corner in the glare of a sunny window, sipping coffees. Both are watching the traffic from opposite sides of the table, not speaking. Vivaldi’s Four Seasons starts playing. (Scotty threw out the Wagner after I complained about it enough, and now they play this ad nauseam. Management decision, he told me.) I look over at Tad and Trudy again.
Maybe it’s just that you run out of things to say after years together. Maybe it’s just companionable silence. Maybe, as a psychiatrist-in-training, I’m making too much of nonverbal clues. But as they sit there, staring past each other, I could swear they look unhappy.
Chapter Seven
T he week flies by, and it’s Yom Kippur already. Scotty and I walk out of the temple into a misty rain. This morning it was gray and muggy out, impossible weather to dress for. Clothes start out sweaty, then get soaked from a downpour an hour later. I can’t wait to get into my jeans and out of my “temple clothes”—my pin-striped gray suit, which is a hair tight in the waist (likely due to a dry-cleaning issue), and scratched-up flats. I feel like a women’s basketball coach in that suit, clapping up and down the sidelines and wishing she had her sweats on. As we walk down the street toward his car, rain starts falling in a lazy, light spray, deciding whether or not to come down in earnest. The type of rain that makes you consider but decide against an umbrella, a decision you’ll regret in a half hour.
“So what did you think of the service?” Scotty asks.
“Fine. A little heavy on the music.” Our rabbi is a big believer in music. My mom once cracked that his guitar was surgically attached to his hip. (She was the queen of one-liners before her brain started shrinking.) Not that I’m antimusic, but I can do without five musical versions of every prayer. If I wanted to sit in temple for three hours, I would have been conservative.
Scotty folds a rectangle of gum up like an accordion and pops it in his mouth, the same way he’s eaten gum since he was six.
“You going in to work today?”
“No, I’m being a good Jew. You?”
“Yeah, unfortunately. Eddie’s got the flu so I have to cover.”
The rain has made its decision to go full bore now, pelting us and sending rivulets down the side of the street. Water rolls off my raincoat and onto my skirt, and Scotty’s strategically gelled hair now lies flat on his head like a bowl cut. Our leisurely stroll becomes an all-out run until finally, we reach Scotty’s car, a tiny silver hybrid. Being tall like me, he has to fold his body in half to get in. I lumber in on the other side.
“So I’m dropping you home?” he asks. The rain thuds against the windshield.
“Yup.”
“Hey,” he says, looking into the rearview mirror and wiping moisture off his forehead, “did you get a chance to get any of those pictures together?”
“Oh, right,” I say, stalling. “Not yet.”
Scotty’s been asking me to gather pictures of Mom for a Web memorial he’s doing. I’m not exactly sure what a Web memorial is—something like a website of Mom’s life. It’s under construction but he showed me the home page, a photo of Mom from a party, her head back and laughing, unaware of the camera. She is beautiful in that picture, the essence of herself, a joyful, loving, self-assured woman. The complete opposite of who she was before she died. There were tabs running down the left side in categories: Vacations; Parties; Zoe; Scotty; Mom and Dad. An entire life shrunk down into a website, as if that were
Which of the following is true regarding post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD)?
a) nightmares are often a troubling phenomenon
b) intrusive thoughts are a key feature
c) just witnessing a traumatic event may be a sufficient cause
d) hyperarousal state may be seen in these cases
e) all of the above
I circle e , then steal a glance over at the Berringer couple. They’re sitting in the corner in the glare of a sunny window, sipping coffees. Both are watching the traffic from opposite sides of the table, not speaking. Vivaldi’s Four Seasons starts playing. (Scotty threw out the Wagner after I complained about it enough, and now they play this ad nauseam. Management decision, he told me.) I look over at Tad and Trudy again.
Maybe it’s just that you run out of things to say after years together. Maybe it’s just companionable silence. Maybe, as a psychiatrist-in-training, I’m making too much of nonverbal clues. But as they sit there, staring past each other, I could swear they look unhappy.
Chapter Seven
T he week flies by, and it’s Yom Kippur already. Scotty and I walk out of the temple into a misty rain. This morning it was gray and muggy out, impossible weather to dress for. Clothes start out sweaty, then get soaked from a downpour an hour later. I can’t wait to get into my jeans and out of my “temple clothes”—my pin-striped gray suit, which is a hair tight in the waist (likely due to a dry-cleaning issue), and scratched-up flats. I feel like a women’s basketball coach in that suit, clapping up and down the sidelines and wishing she had her sweats on. As we walk down the street toward his car, rain starts falling in a lazy, light spray, deciding whether or not to come down in earnest. The type of rain that makes you consider but decide against an umbrella, a decision you’ll regret in a half hour.
“So what did you think of the service?” Scotty asks.
“Fine. A little heavy on the music.” Our rabbi is a big believer in music. My mom once cracked that his guitar was surgically attached to his hip. (She was the queen of one-liners before her brain started shrinking.) Not that I’m antimusic, but I can do without five musical versions of every prayer. If I wanted to sit in temple for three hours, I would have been conservative.
Scotty folds a rectangle of gum up like an accordion and pops it in his mouth, the same way he’s eaten gum since he was six.
“You going in to work today?”
“No, I’m being a good Jew. You?”
“Yeah, unfortunately. Eddie’s got the flu so I have to cover.”
The rain has made its decision to go full bore now, pelting us and sending rivulets down the side of the street. Water rolls off my raincoat and onto my skirt, and Scotty’s strategically gelled hair now lies flat on his head like a bowl cut. Our leisurely stroll becomes an all-out run until finally, we reach Scotty’s car, a tiny silver hybrid. Being tall like me, he has to fold his body in half to get in. I lumber in on the other side.
“So I’m dropping you home?” he asks. The rain thuds against the windshield.
“Yup.”
“Hey,” he says, looking into the rearview mirror and wiping moisture off his forehead, “did you get a chance to get any of those pictures together?”
“Oh, right,” I say, stalling. “Not yet.”
Scotty’s been asking me to gather pictures of Mom for a Web memorial he’s doing. I’m not exactly sure what a Web memorial is—something like a website of Mom’s life. It’s under construction but he showed me the home page, a photo of Mom from a party, her head back and laughing, unaware of the camera. She is beautiful in that picture, the essence of herself, a joyful, loving, self-assured woman. The complete opposite of who she was before she died. There were tabs running down the left side in categories: Vacations; Parties; Zoe; Scotty; Mom and Dad. An entire life shrunk down into a website, as if that were
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