Trafika Europe 12 - French Bon-Bons

A Souvenir from New York

SHIMON You know, Mr. Baskin, there are times in one’s life when a person is able to do the impossible. And that surgery was one of those moments. I started it at midnight and finished at six in the morning. Six hours between life and death. There were moments when everyone and everything panicked: both people and equipment. But I went on working with the heart that had already stopped, I discovered methods that went counter to the theory, and the heart was revived. And when I heard an assistant’s voice behind me say: “That’s it!”, I turned around like a crazy man: “That’s it--what?” “Everything’s all right, doctor,” she said hurriedly. “The monitor shows stability, the heart is working well.” I didn’t need the monitor to know that. “Can we start sewing it up?” I asked the assistant. “This time I’ll sew it up myself,” I said. I could not trust the girl’s saved heart to anyone. Later my colleague Reb Rosenbaum would say, “Simon, you were in shock! They would have sewn it better without you.” I agree with him, but at that moment I couldn’t leave the girl to them. I wanted to listen to the quiet, beautiful, confident beating of her heart.

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