A Walk on the Beach

In August of each year, I take a 2-week vacation with my family, wanting to get as far away as possible from the hospital where I'm the rheumatology division chief. We rent a cottage on the beach, and I do my best to avoid any thoughts of medicine, patients, sickness, or death.

Although I claim I do nothing on vacation, my day is actually full. I swim in the surf, I walk on the beach, and I fish for spot and pompano. The high point is in the evening when I sit on the porch, drink Jack Daniel's, and savor the warm moist air that sweeps in from the sea.

At the end of my vacation, I return to the hospital looking tan and fit. My mind is clear and my spirits are boosted, at least for a while. This year, however, my plans for rest went awry when, on the Monday of my second week on vacation, I decided to take a walk on the beach.

It was late afternoon. The sky was silver-blue and the heat was thick. Above me gulls soared and the sun shined molten white. As I walked, thinking about which seafood restaurant to go to that night, I heard the piercing sound of a siren and the blare of a horn. A fire truck and an ambulance rushed by in the direction of a fishing pier that the hurricanes had reduced to a skeleton of blackened pylons and planks. After the fire truck and the ambulance came two police cars. About a half mile from the pier, I saw groups of people looking at the water where a pontoon boat was navigating figure eights. I picked up my pace and began jogging.

I came up to a woman whose eyes were riveted on the …