musingsonwomenshealth.com

Reflections on 40 years as a doctor in Women's Health

Omne ignotum pro magnifico est


There are some bits of wisdom that are hard to forget -especially if they verge on the personal. Take, for example Virginia Woolf’s observation that ‘A self that goes on changing is a self that goes on living.’ I like that: it gives me permission to change my mind -or perhaps more to the point, the option to say that I’m not sure. I may enjoy someone’s perspective but if I don’t understand their point, I would prefer to assess the ramifications, rather than immediately climb onboard. It’s a negative capability that I feel I have honed over the years -although, I suspect I borrowed the idea a long time ago from the first century Roman Historian, Tacitus, who once wrote: Omne ignotum pro magnifico est -‘Everything unknown seems magnificent’.

Maybe, though, what I’m really hoping for is some way of looking at the world as if I hadn’t already made assumptions about it. That’s difficult nowadays, of course, because even the innocent act of clicking on something online seems to subject me to endless iterations of the same choice, long after my curiosity has been sated. Bloated. But  when I was a child, there was no internet, and we wrote in cursive to each other with pencils; there was little risk of confirmation bubbles then -only soap bubbles that burst in the bath…

I have to admit that I yearn for that uncommitted innocence again, but in today’s world, the system does not seem to want anybody to remain undecided. A young mind needs to start that way, however: it begins with naïve observations, and a preference to watch from the stands at first. Not all of us really want to be a part of the game; not all of us are even happy cheering with the crowd because it’s not at all certain where that might lead: once a choice is made, then it can be difficult to unmake. It’s a good idea to leave an escape route open.

Of course it’s difficult not to assume expertise in something by the time you’re old, and by then the hinges of the gate are rusty, and your mind is a prisoner. But life, if not your mind, does change: perspectives change; cultures evolve; times drift…

I’ve never kept a regular diary to check if I’ve changed; I’ve been writing stories since I was a child, however, and many of the characters in my stories have an uncanny, if fictional, resemblance to me and my bumbling exploits over the years. Perhaps it’s easier to understand who you are in a different persona when criticism can be shrugged off like a discarded tissue.

I certainly felt that way about James; it’s my middle name and I used it for my childhood friend in some of my Winnipeg stories. I preferred to call him Jamie, though. He was the adventurer, the risk-taker that I always wanted to be, I suppose. And I hated my first name.

In real life, my best friend Jakie looked a little bit like me: we were both short, with curly auburn hair, and heavy plastic-framed glasses which we both used as excuses to get out of overly competitive sports. And James was his middle name, too, so we were like brothers.

I remember one day in the hot Winnipeg summer, just before school started for the fall, Jakie suggested we try something mischievous in our new class. There was a rumour that the school had hired some new teachers who wouldn’t know us. We were both in the same grade and the same classroom each year, so with a new teacher there’d be a lot of confusion. “That suggest anything to you, G?”

I shook my head.

He rolled his eyes at me. “Why don’t you tell the new teacher your name is Jamie, and I’ll tell her that I’m James. “I mean it’s my middle name too, so neither of us would be lying, right?” he said trying to wink at me, although he obviously hadn’t mastered the skill yet.

I stared at him for a long moment. “Why would we do that, Jakie?” I was used to ‘G’ as my nickname and didn’t see the point.

He rolled his eyes again -he’d been practicing that all summer and was getting pretty good at it. “Because we can, G.” He smiled devilishly. “And anyway, the teachers always call you Gary, not G; I’m always ‘Jacob’ and I hate that…”

I blinked behind my thick lenses. He had a point, so after spitting on our hands, we shook them and swore an oath to which we were bound until one of us got expelled.

The first day of our new grade 5 class we headed to the unfamiliar room and crowded together with others shoving in the aisles. As usual we all shouted greetings at each other, and the girls huddled, giggling, at the front of the class closest to the teacher’s desk. Confusion reigned until a short older woman in a blue dress with her blonde hair in a huge bun wandered into the room carrying  a heavy looking briefcase and a sour look.

“I’m Miss Gowl, your new teacher,” she said loudly and rather sternly. It sounded like ‘Growl’ and some of the boys at the back started to snigger. “I’m new to the school,” she continued with a frown, “and there’ll be no noise in my classroom.” She clapped her hands loudly to get their attention, and then calmly glanced around the room. “I’ve done some homework and made a list of your names and your tendencies to misbehave… So I’m going to be assigning the seating plan this year.”

She sat down behind her desk and took a large paper out of the briefcase and spread it out in front of her. We all stared at each other; we were used to sitting near our friends.

“I’ll call you each by your first name and point to the seat to which you’ve been assigned.” She glared around the room with stern, no-nonsense eyes. “Clear?”

We exchanged worried glances and nodded our heads. None of us had the same first names, so it wouldn’t be too hard to figure it out.

Miss Gowl started alphabetically, first with the girls, who responded obediently, and then the boys. Jakie and I traded sly glances and I saw him cross his fingers, just in case. “Jacob?” She looked around room at those of us who weren’t yet seated. “You sit there, second row just in from the aisle, and pointed to the seat.

At first neither of us moved, and then we both wandered over to the seat.

Miss Gowl glared at us and then rolled her eyes as a smile just peeked through her lips. “Oh, don’t tell me it’s the old name-swap-to-confuse-the-new-teacher thing…?” She checked the seating plan on her desk and I could hear her whispering to herself that the same thing had happened every year in her previous school. “Let’s see, Jacob, middle-named James, and…” she fixed her eyes on me like a lizard tonguing a fly, “Gary, middle-named James…” She couldn’t suppress a chuckle.

“Okay, so what do your friends call you, Gary?” she asked, and not unkindly.

“G,” I murmured, and tried to smile.

She fixed eyes on Jakie. “I suppose you’re… Jakie then?”

He nodded, rather sheepishly, obviously unable to figure out how she knew.

“Do you want to keep that name?”

He shrugged and glanced at me.

“Okay then G, you sit in the desk beside Jakie… But no talking during the lessons, eh?”

After the class Jakie and I walked home together, as usual. “Well, G, I was right: my plan worked, don’t you think?”

I nodded with a smile. “Guess I shouldn’t call her ‘Growl’ -or ‘Bowel’ like she heard Andy say, then, eh?

He shook his head vigorously. “Not unless you want to sit with him and the girls in the front row this year…”

I had to chuckle at that. “I suppose you’re right.” But it was Tacitus, not Jakie, that got it right, I think…

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gozzter

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