final_thp_2ndedition

a non-fictional prose
Lost in TRANSLATION
Mariah Shaw
The antibiotic cocktail rushes into my
vein. Six machines in the room beep like
metronomes, all setting different beats.
I look into the hall and see the doctor
frantically searching words on Google.
That is when I know I am going to die.
The nausea medication makes me sleepy.
I accept my fate and doze off.
I awake to twenty fidgety students
in white coats waiting to look up my
hospital gown. I wish I could say that
this was a dream or an episode of Grey’s
Anatomy. It is not. An older woman with
silver hair enters the room, acknowledges
me in my pathetic pant-less state, and
then begins to address the room. The
nervous white coats answer excitedly.
My mom, also a physician, chimes in
and pretty soon the whole room is
talking about me in words I cannot even
spell, much less understand. I am not
well versed in medical terminology and
anxiety sets in as I attempt to decipher
their dialogue. Just about the only term
I do catch repeatedly is “Toxic Shock
Syndrome”, which I vaguely remember
reading about on the side of a tampon
box in seventh grade.
They exit just as quickly as they entered.
At this point, I know I am going to die
of embarrassment if not of something
worse. The only reason my body hangs
onto life is because my mind will not
be quiet. I am curious and have so
many questions. I spend the rest of
my recovery pestering people and
researching WebMD for answers. Not
only do I want to learn the white coat
language, but also to translate it back into
English for the next confused, sick, halfnaked
patient in the hospital bed.
The staff at the hospital saved my life,
and to those doctors and nurses that took
the time to slow down to explain things
to me, I am grateful. This experience
as a patient has greatly influenced my
decision to become a doctor, because I
believe in the difference that a medical
team with good bedside manner and
expertise can make, and I am genuinely
fascinated by how they brought me back
from the edge of imminent death. Or so I
thought.
BY| CHRISTIAN AGUILAR-CASTELLANOS
If we are both noble gases,
how are we supposed to interact?
What could one or the other hope to add?
How could we share electrons and bond?
Neither covalently by our similarities,
nor Ionically by our charge differences.
Inert, happy as they are, with no empty shells to fill,
no electrons to donate, covet, spill.
May either great pressure or temperature upon
the heat of the dipole moment bring us closer at least.
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