JOHN
.....MINER

JOHN MINER

dear darrell, i didn't find out about nancy's death till after i tried calling her around 9:00 a.m. i left a cheery message for her about calling me back. then i opened sue liggett's email, referring to nancy in the past tense, so i knew something was up. then a reference to her passing. i opened up one email after another and finally got to your announcement. afterward i called friends to reach out and connect the way nancy always did--she was the connectingest person i've ever met. so now it's time for me to go visit my mother, but i'll stay in touch. if you're having the funeral this week, i won't be able to make it, but i'd definitely like to come down next summer to spend a week getting to meet all the folks who meant so much to her.

john

man oh man, am i glad i stayed up late last night to write it. i was probably composing my thoughts at the time of nancy's death. what more fitting leave-taking and memorial could there be? fond memories of our first meeting recollected at the moment of saying goodbye. man oh man.

john

 

JOHN MINER

When John Met Nancy

Nancy was just coming off a “love affair” with a guy named Herman, whom I was jealous of because I knew I just couldn’t match. Besides, Nancy was my supervisor at Charles River Hospital (CRH), and jealousy of that sort was out of the question. Besides #2, I was gay and had no right to claim Nancy. (But neither had Herman—same reason.) Even more besides (#3), Herman was dead. Even, even more besides (#4), she wasn’t in love with Herman at all—it was Chad, as Jeannie Baker later confided to me. Sound confusing? Well, yeah! Let me present the context of our meeting, which hardly serves to clarify things, only turning the tale into an even more confusing courtly intrigue.

I was accepted (the term used advisedly, as I certainly wasn’t anybody’s first choice) into the training slot at CRH after another intern bowed out at the last minute, leaving no other alternative than me, who had not been accepted into any other post. I entered to face the formidable Hedy Wermer, a pinnacle of Ice Queen aplomb, who deigned to be my primary supervisor, supported by Leslie Smith my secondary, Nicki Fedele and Alan Goldberg my group supervisors, Lynn What’s-her-name my substance use supervisor (who refused to supervise me for some unknown reason), Jeff Bryer supervisor of testing, Gerry Stechler my didactic instructor, Somebody Green my family systems supervisor, and Marsha Merkin and Nancy the overall heads of internship training (Marsha for adolescents, Nancy for adults).

Very early in the year I overheard a psychiatrist (John Mogan) say how wonderful the past interns had been, not to mention a very experienced and gifted fellow intern that same year (Liz Sparks). Here I was a grass-green, at-best second choice, plowing my way through a maze of patients’ needs, supervisors’ expectations, and idealized models from past and present, not to mention a heavy graduate course load. After four months trying to satisfy the Ice Queen, things came to a head when my other supervisors became aware of how unhappy I was (read tears from a man who rarely cries).

At this point Nancy stepped in, announcing, “I’ll supervise John.” From then on the wintry sky brightened, promising a fairer future. Hedy faded from the picture, Leslie quit, Lynn gave up her inexplicable hostility (now merely avoiding me), Gerry saw no problems in my understanding of concepts he taught, and Alan okayed me in my group work. I co-led groups of very psychotic patients with Beth Harrington, who encouraged me to empathize with their feelings, rather than get caught up in their fantasies (a very useful approach that I’ve been applying ever since in my work with children.)

They say it’s good to deal with your most difficult situations and cases under supervision while you’re an intern. But to have your behind exposed all the time to so many people was a bit much. Nancy in her gentle and self-effacing way gave balm to my sore behind. She perceived untrained but potential talents I did not yet see myself. We both loved literature and would swap quotes from poems in supervision, which gave me footing in things familiar that I needed at that insecure time. She understood me without my having to put much into words, and we both responded to patients in similar ways. We both loved patients that had few material or educational privileges but who had faced the world bravely and had acquired a hard-knock wisdom and gumption.

I felt Nancy trusted me, and I trusted her. Our mutual respect grew into love over the course of years. I now consider her my next-of-kin outside my family, and I hope she feels the same toward me.

John

Did you happen to notice when I sent my final version of what I wrote last night? It was at 11:30, the exact time when they found Nancy unresponsive.

John

John and Nancy in the spring of 2005