Medicine Man

“O thou of little faith, wherefore didst thou doubt?”

Matthew 14:31

“Honey, I have cancer.”

Four of the most destructive words I have heard in my entire life. It cannot compare with the time when I donned on my white coat in Tehran, neither when my first-born was born or when I was plagued with having to mortgage my house after my first lay-off.

It is perhaps of great irony that as someone thoroughly versed in all the detailed ins-and-outs of branch of endocrinology, enough to make a London taxi-cab driver with thoroughly, enlarged hippocampus go mad, that my wife would be diagnosed with ovarian cancer.

But this is not unusual. My grandpa’ died of stroke... and he was a neurosurgeon. And any practitioner worth his salt can vouch for Jill Bolte Taylor’s TED Talk.

I married Catherine in a jaundiced autumn-dust of ’88 September. We dated for 8 years before we tied the knot in a medical-themed wedding party. Invitation cards etched with engravings from Gray’s Anatomy and if not slightly crude humor with scalpel et al. for cutlery in a reception hall near John Hopkins. I never knew the visceral reverberation of the testament to the vow that I kept to protect her ‘till death do was apart’ would come to haunt me to this day. Ironically, coming from a conservative Persian family, our first kiss was on that day. That kiss. The most cherished memory of mine is now a haunting remnant that swathed with all the eerie ’n blurry glow of Ken Currie’s Three Oncologist imagery.

Markus listened to me with utmost concentration of Zen monk. He gave me undivided attention for entire three minutes without interruption. Perhaps as an African-American man growing up with German step-mother, he might have absorbed the detached aloofness from his upbringing. But when I finished he gently cupped his hand over mine on the cafeteria table and soothed me with usual words of comfort.

“I am so sorry. How is she doing now? Catherine?”

“She is okay. You know. Tired of all the radiation and chemotherapy and all...” I wearily mouthed out the politesse.

“Armin,” he said softly. “Look at me. Look at me! I am sorry. I really am. You know me for what? Like... fifteen years? As a friend, I wish I could do something... and know I will always be there for whatever you need.”

“Yeah.”

“And why didn’t you tell me this before, man?” he cried out softly. “I mean really? I understand it might have shook you to the core, but come’on man, I am your best friend.” He paused briefly. “What’s her... you know... her status?” He emphasized the tone of the last word slightly.

“She is in stage-IV buddy.” I writhed and shot back acerbically.

“Armin, I am sorry. Really. Man, wish I knew this before...” he comforted me and I could tell in his eyes it wasn’t your usual mock sentiment that necessitates out of politesse and abbreviated out of hurry from short lunch break.

“And what exactly could you have done?” I spoke with a cool volume.

“Listen, perhaps you don’t want to hear this. But I think I might know someone who can help.”

“Help?” I was bitter as ever.

“Yes,” he said silently. “They call him ‘Medicine Man’...”

“Wait, wait....what do you mean? You mean like a folk healer?” I cut him off impatiently.

“Hear me out Armin. Ple-ease.”

“My wife is dying and you want me to go to some fuckin’ quack snake oil salesman? My wife is dying. Dying goddamitt!!!” I thundered. “This is your help? This is your idea of providing solution? That is offer some New Age voodoo, cult faith healer for cure?” I seethed out in rage.

“Armin...” he cried out in protest. “Armin, wait, listen...man.”

“Fuck you.” I rose. “You are just like everyone else. You are here for the money,” I lashed and stormed out through the wooden swivel barn-doors.

As I sat in my office and kept rolling all the priceless images of Catherine over and over in my mind’s eye... about the time she brought me a Zimbabwean elephant’s tail-hair ring to propose mockingly after we had a nasty fight for three days, that perfect night coming from Belvedere Musuem in Vienna after taking a kiss-selfie in front of Klimt bathing under moonlight pouring through the moonroof of the tram where we never purchased the ticket, or for that matter when I took her to see the blooming of Corpse Flower in a greenhouse... my glasses became foggy and I kept spiraling downwards in abysmal pothole of depression. Our friends always say how I must be the one suffering from the vibes and looks I give. Dreary, worn-out, wretched, forlorn in my study for hours, miserable, downcast and fragile as if Hogarth himself must have etched-a-sketched his atelier. My overwhelming sadness slowly turned to frustration to bitterness which transmuted to anger, violent anger, towards all these pseudoscience-dipped, faux self-help gurus, who are, of course, nothing but downright quacks and charlatans preying on nubile, soft, gullible culprits, the mass and the sheeple hoi polloi. And Markus? Markus of all was the newest victim of this cult? It made me sick to me stomach. However, after I let the steam out and cooled down, I realized I shouldn’t have reacted the way I did with him. I mean sure he was incredibly insensitive to remotely suggest anything unethical and clownish as that, but I had no right to react like that. In his mind, he must have doing the best what he could from his viewpoint from his justification, but sure I shouldn’t have let my emotion explode after all the stress boiled and percolated. I thought.

I didn’t have enough strength to go his room and apologize. So I just sent a single line missive via e-mail: “Look man, I am sorry. I hope you understand.”

He immediately replied back: “Yeah yeah man, no worries. Maybe I shouldn’t have suggested that. Anyways, if you need anything just do let me know bro.”

“Absolutely. Again I am sorry. Let’s just...drop that topic.”

But we didn’t. I didn’t. After my rage died down and as I ruminated the incident driving down 405 in my Bull, I forced to think my way out of the thought that kept recurring. What is the worst that can happen anyway! Are you insane? I shot back to my psyche. Are you nuts? Are you out of your fuckin’ mind!

But the fact was the doctor gave us clepsydra. Three months. And perhaps, just mighty perhaps... I really need to set aside my ego and give all ramifications to this harrowing cosmic chess game a thought to avoid an alternate endgame? I thought.

“So tell me more,” I laughed at the way I dropped my self-restraint like a teenage chick who gives away her virginity or rather, a former smack addict gets conned into relapse.

Coolly he sent me a 4 page PDF attachment. He didn’t even reply. It was almost he was ready for it. For me. And the fact of the matter was, as much as downright skeptic I was, I was really at my wits end clutching the last straw. I was desperate. I was ready to do almost anything.

“Honey, aren’t you coming?” Catherine always insists on cooking even though I vehemently was against her doing any chore whatsoever. But, then I negotiated in my mind that maybe having her busy wouldn’t make matters worse at all and might actually keep her busy.

“Yeah, I will be right there, dear.” I felt I was glued to the screen with Gorilla, and I needed all the might and strength to pull me off and go to the dining room. I hugged and kissed her. I quickly chomped the grub which were morsel of wild rice and chicken with beans. Frankly, it was neither tasty or distasteful. Or perhaps, my mind wandered through the corridors to photographically recreate the first few paragraphs I read before I forcibly brought myself here.

“What’s wrong, honey? You seem distracted.”

“Nothing,” our daughter lives in dorm. And as much as it pined us, we had to let her folks take care of James. James is four and I couldn’t bear to see him suffer as drop by drop her life got sucked away with IV.

“Listen. You go right ahead. Just watch TV or something. Ramsey’s on tonight, huh?”

“Why? Where will you be?” she cooed.

“I really need to work on file of a new patient,” I parried.

“Strangely that’s sweet,” she feigned a laugh. Then she looked dead in my eyes and said: “Honey, this is exactly what you should be doing. In triage, we don’t spend time on lost heart-beat. You need to be strong. For you. For our children. Our children.”

I didn’t reply. I simply didn’t have time for this. I was having a horrible day already.

His name is Carson Folger. He is 55, bald and built like a thoroughbred horse. Blonde, he has no liaison with any universities or any institutions. He hasn’t published a single paper in journal; however he is well-known in his virtual tribe. Apparently, he is an anthropologist of a sort. He travels around the world to remote and forgotten parts of the world. Papua New Guinea, Amazon Basin, Namib desert... you name it. The man has traveled to almost 80 countries. He has 500k subscribers on YouTube and he is pretty well-known among the New Age community.

The way it works after signing legal documents, he arranges for a trip via plane, usually first class, since all expenses are paid and it is he who takes over from thereon. In our case, it would be to a tiny village in Mindanao. There we will stay for three days and perform all the necessary preparations for the ceremony and cleanse our ‘spirits’. After the baylan or espiritists, as the latter in our case, hears the story and the nature of illness, he will then proceed in his own way to find the best possible solution for the diagnosis. There have been numerous cases of cures by the shaman from tumor to asthma to removal of gall bladder stones and in many cases paralysis. My only concern was if Catherine will be willing to give it a shot.

“Honey, I was thinking if... you know... we could take a break from it all?” I tried to break the news as I cozied by her in bed.

“What do you mean?” She turned around and squinted. She never looked so beautiful in her life even though half of her hair was gone and she looked like a skeleton defused of life.

“I was thinking... you know a weekend trip to...I don’t know... Manila?”

“What?!” She rose up straight like a resurrected body. “What the hell do you mean? Are you okay?”

“It’s just... a... nevermind... I felt a break from this...all this would actually be good for both us, you know?”

“And what about our kids?”

“Well, they are with Searle and Sauna anyway.” Then I mustered enough courage to break the news to her. I gargled out all the things that happened today and everything I read and researched online about Carson Folger, the so-called ‘Medicine Man’ and after she listened to me for five minutes non-stop she calmly spoke.

“You are kidding, right?”

I sighed. “It was just a thought. That’s all. Good night honey.”

Next day, I found her sitting in the breakfast table calmly sipping her coffee. She was looking at James’ photos on her iPad. I gave her a kiss on her forehead. She looked at me. And then said:

“We are going. One condition... no bloody healing.”