J.D. Salinger

J.D. Salinger/Salisbury/Saliva is dead. Everyone at my school is so upset. If he was watching us now, which I suspect he is, he would be highly amused. I think he'd call us a bunch of phonies.

"You take a really sleepy man, Esme, and he always stands a chance of again becoming a man with all his fac -- with all his f-a-c-u-l-t-i-e-s intact."

Before Basketball

I'm in the midst of the 2.5 hours after school and before basketball, when you really don't want to commit yourself to anything super-important, but instead veg on the couch, eating dinner, checking Facebook, and registering for the SAT.

Wait, what?

The SAT?

Again?

Ugh.

Dreaming

I don't dream anymore. Or, rather, I do, but my dreams blend so seamlessly into my reality that it really isn't worth the trouble to distinguish them anymore. Last night, I dreamt I was in a sunlit room, eating cereal and writing, and then I woke up and I was in the room and just picked up writing where I had left off. I am living my dreams, which is odd, because isn't that what everyone wants to do? If I had a choice of what I wanted to do, I would never pick living my dreams.

I blame all of this on an even three-way split between powerful medication, the slow and rocky maturing of my mind, and my treacherous heart going about the process of healing itself. Bah. Love sucks. Like that hasn't been said a thousand times before. And even though I am in love, again, because I am a hopeless romantic and quite a needy person (which no one will ever believe) my mind keeps racing ahead at a thousand words a minute. It must be my calendar, because how else would I know that spring is coming? It has rained and rained in the desert, so that a river has formed behind my house and ducks have somehow appeared on its brown surface. Cold wintry rain. Unforgiving.

After Christmas, I stole a string of lights and hung them on my bedroom wall.

Scrap

I don't understand.

I don't understand where a lot of my strength comes from, just like I don't know how I look on the basketball court and I know I never will. All I know is that I love to play tough and use the "power of the butt," probably because nobody ever believes that I do such things until they see me.

Tonight, we're playing Jess Schwartz, one of the most aggressive teams in the league. Last night, with our 24-4 victory over Mesa Prep, my team boarded a wave of self-confidence that I hope will tide us over until we win this game, too. I especially would like to win against Jess Schwartz, mostly because of certain unfortunate events that happened between summer 2008 and winter 2009. If you know what I mean. Which, probably, you will not.

Mesa Prep only had five players on their team, so I was very empathetic towards them. Last summer, I played on a coed basketball team with four guys. We started out with 20 players, and by the first game, there were five of us. It's hard, running for 16 minutes in a row, and getting bruised and battered into the bargain. When I first started playing basketball in 9th grade, though, I never thought I would get this addicted.

Meanwhile, I'm attempting to apply for a scholarship which could get me THOUSANDS OF DOLLARS IN EDUCATION. THOUSANDS OF DOLLARS. Thousands. Of course, only eight people win every year, and those that do have to, in my words, "organize a soup kitchen...and drive a bloodmobile...and donate shoes."

Donate shoes! Holy smuckers! I don't know if I'm up for that.

Here are the books I am/want to be/should be reading, at the moment:

Wrong Medicine, a book about dying people

Things Fall Apart, a book that makes white people feel guilty

The Memory Keeper's Daughter, a book which makes me want to adopt a child

Sons and Lovers, a nasty book

The Woman With a Worm in her Head, a book about the curious relationship between women and worms (oh dear God, did that sound nasty)

The Handmaid's Tale, a book which makes 1984 look cheerful.

So now, since my conscience is starting to get to me about all the work I should be doing, I shall leave you with a quick brain-teaser:

"A cowboy rode into town on Monday, stayed two days, and rode out on Monday. How?"

And this:

Medical Futility

A 65-year-old woman was driving to work when she was hit by another car. The accident resulted in her being left completely brain-dead, with no capacity left to think or interact with other people. “Still,” her daughter insisted, “I want everything done to keep her alive.”

Out of curiosity, one of the doctors asked, “Would you want your children to keep you alive, if something like this happened to you one day?”

“Hell, no,” said the woman. “I'd just want to die naturally.”

Welcome to the world of medical futility, where doctors are unfortunately pitted against patients' families when deciding what treatment to give the terminally ill. These days, I and many others think that doctors should no longer be forced to provide medically futile treatment.

When a situation like the one I've just described happens, solving it seems like a simple matter at first: just follow the patient's advance instructions regarding treatment. But what if it was a young person or a teenager? Very few healthy teenagers I know dwell long enough on their own death to write a will or advance instructions, and in fact, if they did, that would be a little scary. So, the worst happens, spinning towards someone's life at an ungodly speed, and suddenly they're lying in a hospital bed hooked up to a dozen machines with their family on one side and the doctor on another. At a time like that, a thousand questions come up, but one of the most pressing is: what do we do now?

The issue of medical futility has really only come up in the past 20 or so years, because new technology and treatments have been developed that have the capacity to extend someone's life past the time when they naturally would have died. Doctors, wielding all of this new weaponry, are now expected to work against nature instead of with it. When someone dies these days, it's not an “act of God” anymore; it's a failure. Someone has to be responsible for it, and that someone is usually sued until they're up to their well-schooled eyebrows in litigation, because they failed to do the impossible. Doctors don't just tack on the label of “medically futile” to any treatment they feel like. They don't like patients to die either. If something is considered medically futile, there's a darn good reason for it. Most likely – not always, but almost always – the treatment will either make the patient's quality of life unacceptably low, or it will provide almost no benefit in regards to lifespan, or both. Families have to consider this carefully when they are deciding for or against futile treatment. Is it really worth it?

Sometimes the line between right and wrong is very thin. One man had written in his advance instructions that he did not want antibiotics or resuscitation in the case of a fatal illness. Now, years later, he suffered from Alzheimer's disease. When he contracted pneumonia, a nurse asked if he wanted antibiotics, and he appeared to nod. Even so, the doctors decided not to give him antibiotics because his quality of life was so low in general that it was doubtful he enjoyed anything at all anymore. The man's family then accused the doctors of “playing God” even though they would be “playing God” much more if they did give him the antibiotics. The man was already ill from a natural and untreatable illness. In this case, the doctors decided to work with nature instead of against it and followed the man's advance instructions. Did they do the right thing? No one knows for sure, but I think they did because they acted in the best interest of the patient.

In the field of medical ethics, a question often comes up that is otherwise only heard in drug-induced mumblings: what is a person? All of us in this room are people, of course – unless I am wrong, in which case, hello...aliens! But if we were brain-dead, would we still be the same people we are today? Our bodies would still be alive, but would we? The goal of medicine – or what is supposed to be the goal of medicine – is to treat people. When someone is brain-dead or otherwise forever robbed of the true capacity of consciousness, they are still human, and as such, they should be treated with respect. But are doctors required to treat such patients? According to the definition of medicine, no. According to most doctors' consciences, no. There is no value – to anyone – in treating the shell of what was once a person. As one doctor said, “The wheel may be spinning, but the hamster is gone.”

The esteemed philosopher, epic musician, and alleged physician Gregory House claims that “there is never any dignity in death.” That may be true, but neither is there any dignity in medically futile treatment. Life is short – maybe too short, in some cases – but all life has to end, and once that truth is faced, the patient's wishes and comfort can be addressed. Medicine isn't always about saving someone's life, fighting nature, or performing miracles. However, it is always, always about the patient. Because in the transition from life to death, the only person who matters is the person who's making the journey. There are some situations when doctors and families must look up from the bed where their patient and their loved one is lying and work together to find the best answer to the all-important question: What do we do now?

Euthanasia

The patient's family gathers around his bedside. He is a healthy-looking man in his forties, but he is quiet and pale. His doctor has just told him that he has metastatic lung cancer. “I want to die,” he says, and his family murmurs in dismay. “There's nothing they can do for me except keep me alive to suffer.”

“That's not true,” says his wife, putting a reassuring hand on his. “Miracles happen all the time.” The doctor, standing in the doorway, shakes his head. He's seen this before, and he knows what will happen. The patient will waste away, racked by palliative chemotherapy and radiation, destroyed by pain, slowly suffocating until at last he is mercifully taken by a coma, and then death. Every step of the way, he will beg the doctor and his family to help end his suffering. This is what will and does happen, and the doctor and I watch in despair and anger. This patient, you see, was my uncle.

What my uncle wanted can be described in many different ways – a mercy killing or assisted suicide, among other terms. However, the scientific community usually refers to it as euthanasia. Euthanasia is illegal in all areas of the world except Belgium, the Netherlands, and Oregon. Denying a mentally competent, terminally ill patient the right to choose how and when he or she will die is a violation of the ethical principles of innate human dignity and personal choice. Allowing someone to suffer is not, contrary to the belief of some, dignified or holy. It is needless agony that affects not only the patient, but also his or her loved ones and caregivers. We allow people to make the choice to smoke, to abort their pregnancies, to marry whomever they choose and live in whatever way they want. Doctors can save people from death. Is it so wrong to deny them this most personal of all choices and to save them from life when life is no longer worth living?

As someone who is interested in a medical career, and as someone who has worked and lived with the severely ill and the dying, I can well appreciate their courage. As much as I admire their faith and perseverance in the face of certain defeat, I can't help but think that some of them must want a way out. Plenty of people consider suicide; what makes this group of people special is that their problem is not only depression. Their problem is that they must make a very clear decision: to die naturally, or to die by euthanasia. Unfortunately, this is usually a decision with only one answer. A mentally competent, adult patient should not have to suffer needlessly with no escape. To me, it signifies more respect for human life to assist that life's end if the patient makes that choice, than to refuse his or her plea for assistance.

In the end, it all boils down to the patient's view on euthanasia. Various religious and other groups have argued that there are ways to alleviate someone's pain and improve their quality of life. A patient's loved ones may cling to these resources, such as narcotics and comforting hospice care. This argument fails to recognize that there are drawbacks to such alternatives. By the time my uncle died, he was on such a large amount of narcotics that he existed in a stupor twenty-four hours a day. He did not experience an improvement in his quality of life, as all of his personal needs had to be handled by others. He could not eat anymore, and was nourished by an IV. He could still interact with us, one benefit, but it was hard for us to see him reduced to such a state.

As I have said before, if we claim to value human life so highly, why do we not value humans' opinions as highly? Perhaps there is fear that euthanasia will be abused. Critics point to instances in Oregon where physicians have offered dying patients death-dealing pills, but not proper treatment for their condition, because the pills were cheaper. All laws can be abused; this is one of the drawbacks of living in a democratic society. If proper restraints were put on euthanasia, such as requiring the doctor to have a permit and having the patient go through a strict physical and psychological examination to determine if there are any factors that might cloud his or her judgment, euthanasia would be much less likely to be abused.

Since I do not have any power in the medical field, I plan to go to my acquaintances at the hospital where I work and ask them for their opinion on euthanasia. To those who support it, I would ask for reasons why. Then, we could spread awareness in the community by talking to community doctors and lawyers, sending letters to local newspapers, and publishing articles in medical newsletters arguing the case for euthanasia. The Internet, a great tool for spreading information, could also be used. In the debate over euthanasia, many people have forgotten about those whom it affects directly – the patients. They do not understand that not all people would be forced to be euthanized, as that also interferes with free choice. This is one aspect of the issue that I would like to focus on, so that maybe in 100 years when people look back and think, “How could they not have allowed euthanasia?” they can also think, “At least we have it now.”

Avatar

Blue people. They're everywhere. I had a heated conversation with one of my friends about which blue person was cooler, a Na'vi or Dr. Manhattan. We agreed they are tied, because they are both hippies, even though the Na'vi are at least reasonable enough to wear clothes most of the time. And don't tell me that Dr. Manhattan's little black diaper-thingy counts as clothes. Please.

Home

When I turned down that road

it was by accident, but somehow

I knew it was right.

It was like an answer

blurted out in the drop of a moment,

unexpectedly containing truth.

"Stop," he said, "we should have

gone the other way,"

but I couldn't stop,

not with destiny breathing down my neck

on the hairpin turns,

not with every jolt of the dirt road

scattering sparks along my spine.

He clung to the other side of the car,

almost wretched,

afraid of my search's intensity.

Still, I pushed on

past tall cliffs and the barren desert,

seeing only glimpses of hidden life

behind a rising smear of dust.

The sun was no lower when I stopped,

transfixed by its golden dance

in a dry riverbed.

"I'll drive us back," he said,

pushing my hands off the steering wheel.

"Don't you worry," he said.

"I'll drive us home."

I met his gaze, both of us

locked in the harsh half-light,

and I saw a thin flutter of confusion

spread across his face.

So, I touched his shoulder

as the distance grew between us,

and without words climbed out.

In the very act of trudging

through the forgotten dust

I raised my head and knowledge struck

through me,

knowledge as clean as the distant sky:

One day I'd come back to this place

where dead trees met in a perfect arch

over a one-lane road.

One day I'd come back, alone.

One day

I'd come back home.

Paint (Unfinished)

The one paintbrush I have

is old, with ragged fibers

and teethmarks from mouths long grown up

and gone away

sunk deep into its yellow handle.

When I see it,

I am reminded of that day

you picked it up and, laughing,

held it between your face and the light.

You let the watery yellow-orange

drip from its squared-off end

onto the clearness of your skin,

running down your cheek like a tear

from the source of all happiness,

and I thought you could have let it

stay there forever,

there where it gathered

with other tiny droplets

under the roundness of your chin.

But I guess it wasn't yours to keep,

because it fell from you,

burying itself and all its brightness.

Meeting

Never before have I met anyone

as cold and silent as this,

so still that the tips of her fingers

are tinged with frost.

I want to ask her

what she's waiting for,

but I don't think she will

hear me.

She will not choose to listen.

Instead she stands,

bending before me and the world

in a long mocking bow,

waiting for the first sounds of warmth,

waiting for the clear echoes

inside her chrysalis.

Somehow I know,

in the swift darkness of my blinking eyelids,

only then will she fly.