Two newspaper articles mysteriously appeared on my desk.\u00a0 Where they have been hiding until now, I couldn\u2019t begin to say. But I know why I kept them. They are both golden.<\/p>\n
The first came from USA Today for March 30, 2004.<\/strong><\/p>\n Robert Lipsyte, who is identified as a journalist and author of a young-adult novel, Warrior Angel,<\/em>\u00a0is writing about the way we only realize the value of the elderly in times of crisis.<\/p>\n Robert Lipsyte writes,\u00a0Whenever disaster strikes\u2013from illness in the family to carnage on the evening news\u2013I call my dad. In 1963, when President John F. Kennedy was murdered, I called Dad to make sure he was OK. After all, the old man was pushing 60. I called him after 9\/11 to make sure I was OK. After all, I was in my 60s. Being a frequent subway rider in New York, I even called him after the recent train bombings in Madrid, which killed 190 people. I knew he would calm me down. After all, he\u2019s pushing 100.<\/i><\/p>\n Pushing 100. Lipsyte\u2019s article says the Census Bureau tells us this country can point to more than 50,000 citizens of that age or better. \u201cThe so-called oldest old (over 85) are the fastest growing segment of the population. If we\u2019re lucky, the rest of us will become them.\u201d<\/p>\n Oh my.\u00a0 I’m now among the oldest old.\u00a0 (I turned 85 last March.)<\/p>\n The other article comes from the Northeast Mississippi Daily Journal of Tupelo, also from 2004, only two days earlier. A medical doctor, Joe Bailey, is paying tribute to the M.D. who influenced his life. It\u2019s a story for the ages.<\/strong><\/p>\n <\/span>The Bailey family were farmers, Dr. Joe says, but since his mother refused to live anywhere but in town, they lived in Coffeeville, MS, population 600. Their home was precisely across the street from the town doctor, H. O. Leonard.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n As far back as Joe Bailey remembers, he wanted to be a medical doctor. When he was 10, his father suggested that it was time for him to begin helping out on the farm. Young Joe took a deep breath and told him that if I”m going to be a doctor, it would be better if I had a job that would teach me about people.<\/p>\n The truth is, I really enjoyed the farm, but at age 10 I went to work in the local grocery store for 25 cents an hour (in 1957). I kept the job until I finished high school in 1965. By then I was making $1 an hour and the experiences of dealing with people those eight years have proven invaluable to me.<\/i><\/p>\n In the middle of that vocational experience, however, little Joe Bailey began his medical training. Here\u2019s how it happened.<\/p>\n When he was 11, he climbed the steps to Dr. Leonard\u2019s office and knocked at the door. \u201cYes, Joe, what can I do for you?\u201d said the elderly physician.<\/p>\n \u201cSir,\u201d Joe said, \u201cI want to be a doctor, and I wondered if I could help you in your office after school. I won\u2019t get in your way. I just want to learn what to do.\u201d<\/p>\n Dr. Leonard smiled, \u201cI think that would be fine, Joe. Why don\u2019t you come by after school tomorrow?\u201d<\/p>\n As he walked down those stairs, young Joe Bailey had the feeling that life had just changed for him forever.<\/p>\n Dr. Henry O. Leonard was born in Coffeeville less than 13 years after the end of the Civil War. He finished medical school at the University of Tennessee in 1903 and he immediately began his practice. At the time he allowed me access to his life, he was 80 years old and I was 11.<\/i><\/p>\n The first thing the elderly physician taught his young protege was how to run blood glucose and urinalysis tests. Those were the only two tests available, Dr. Bailey remembers. They involved boiling the specimens and adding reagents.<\/p>\n Soon he was running almost all of Dr. Leonard\u2019s tests.<\/p>\n From time to time, the doctor asked and the patient would give permission for young Joe to observe tests being performed in the office. \u201cListen to this heart murmur,\u201d he would say. \u201cLook at this red ear.\u201d \u201cThis is what appendicitis looks like.\u201d<\/p>\n At the age of 13, Joe began driving for Dr. Leonard. Yep, you read that right. Country boys learned to drive on tractors so this knowledge came earlier than otherwise. \u201cHe had a new Ford Falcon with an automatic transmission, paid for with the $2 he charged for each office visit.\u201d<\/p>\n After they closed the office, Joe and Dr. Leonard would make house calls. Anyone remember house calls?<\/p>\n And this kid is driving.<\/p>\n One night, the Bailey parents were in bed early. From the kitchen window, Joe could see that Dr. Leonard was making his way from the house to the car. By the time he arrived at the automobile, Joe was there.<\/p>\n It had been raining hard for two days, and the small house which was our destination was cut off by a creek. I waded that creek with Dr. Leonard on my back, and by the light of a kerosene lantern, in a house with no electricity, I delivered my first baby. When my mother woke me up for school the next day, she never knew I\u2019d been gone.<\/i><\/p>\n One morning at school when Joe was 15, the principal called him out of class. Dr. Leonard had been killed in a car accident that mornig.<\/p>\n The next Saturday, a stream of patients filed into the grocery store where Joe Bailey worked. Someone asked for a remedy for a bad cough. Another said his daughter had the earache and wondered if Joe would look at her.<\/p>\n One woman became angry when Joe refused to write her a prescription for blood pressure medicine. \u201cYou always wrote my prescriptions before!\u201d she said. Joe had to remind her that Dr. Leonard had signed it.<\/p>\n At the conclusion of his newspaper article, Tupelo physician Joe Bailey, M.D., gives the lessons he learned from Dr. Leonard:<\/p>\n \u2013Treat every patient as you would your own parents.<\/p>\n \u2013There is no difference in a black human being and a white human being.<\/p>\n \u2013Never do anything for money. Always do the right thing, and you will never lack or want.<\/p>\n \u2013Above all, listen carefully and be kind.<\/p>\n I told you this article was something special.\u00a0 Was I right or what?<\/p>\n The Bible has a lot to say about honoring old folks. Mostly in Proverbs. I\u2019ll let you look them up. It\u2019ll be worth the trouble.<\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Two newspaper articles mysteriously appeared on my desk.\u00a0 Where they have been hiding until now, I couldn\u2019t begin to say. But I know why I kept them. They are both golden. The first came from USA Today for March 30, … Continue reading