7:30PM. Two nights ago.
I hold in my hands an electric hedge trimmer. Before me, guarding the gate to a relaxing evening with my wife, are our two hedges. Two SEC defensive tackle hedges; they’re overgrown, thick, and neglected. Staunch with a vengeance. With a bow, I pull the electric trigger and wage war.
8:00PM.
Humbled, I’m an evergreen air freshener, smelling like I did when I sold Christmas trees in high school. I’ve been warned by my wife I better dust off before entering the home. And I’m not halfway done. My spirit in the fight is waning. Resentment is building: Why did I agree to do this job again? Shit, now I can’t back out because I wrote that newsletter about it last week. The evening was taking begrudging tone; the same resentful tone my inner life took anytime I use to suffer outside medicine. Marginless existence. Still, I forge on, end of the first hedge in sight.
8:10PM
It’s not apparent when this will end. I forgot the top needs trimming too. Oh, I also need to bag the trimmings up and place them by the porch. A neighbor just made me aware of the city’s policy. My gratitude was infinite.
8:30PM
I wonder why this is so painful. Does it have to be? I ponder. A calm but quiet voice answers. No, it does not. I wait for more from this reasonable sounding part of myself. Remember Ryan, you can do things like this now. Tomorrow you’re going to wake up and do things you enjoy. Trim the hedges all night for god’s sake. You’ll be fine. Hmm, this feels like the right assessment of things. I look around, seeing late evening calm. There’s the moon over there too. And with these trimmers in my hand, pivoting 180 degrees, I feel Edward Scissorhands. Let’s have some fun.
9:00PM
I’m on the couch, eating dinner with my wife, telling her about the great hedge war. As I finish, she says, “You didn’t dust off.” I look down at my evergreen needle dusted shirt. No, I did not. So, as I return to the battlefront, viewing my conquered enemy in the twilight, with a mighty fine haircut, I feel pride. Not at being done, not at how it looks, not at having survived, but at having fun while I did it.
And that’s a privilege, I had to earn back.
To living a life we love,
Ryan Fightmaster, MD
(P.S. A stressful life (or trauma) casts a long shadow. Undoing past experience is like unlearning muscle memory. It takes time. One year out, my life is showing signs of sunlight, which I detail this week in You Can Take the Man Out of Medicine.)
