Volume: 3

Dear Dr. Lash

Thank you notes to all who helped with my heart surgery.

Dear Jesus;

It seems a shame they hung your expired likeness attached to a cross on the wall in every room. To be inspiring, I'd prefer to see you huddled over an operating table with forceps and scalpels and stuff, maybe working on a lamb or something. You should have a word with upper management.

Don't worry about me. The folks in this life took excellent care of me without revealing any religious bias. And the opportunity arose often. Many of the health care professionals asked me about my family medical history and I just had to shrug and say that there wasn't one since they were all Christian Scientists. Eighty percent knew and the rest asked: are those the ones that eschew the miracles of modern medicine?

For some heaven-sent reason, I was able to escape, at a young age, the propaganda of all religions. A good thing too, since the appendectomy when I was twenty-three would have killed me had I stuck it out with Mary Baker Eddy. Over the years, people have come to assume that I am an atheist. Though I tire of correcting them, I still try to set them straight: I believe in god; it's just that I think she's evil.

Anyway, better luck next time on the wall hangings.

***

Dear Grim Reaper;

I see your sorrow. You sit outside my office window, looking in like a soaked and hungry puppy. Whoever assigned you to me missed that one. I wonder how long you have to wait. Isn't there someone else you can hound for the next fifty-seven years? Need a plane ticket to Syria or Mexico? Your scythe is going to rust, sitting under that sprinkler.