The doctor said to keep going

The Column: 07.14.25

I spent three days at the Mayo Clinic last week and found out that, for a person who doesn’t take care of himself, I’m in rather good shape. No aches or pains, no anxiety, not diabetic nor likely to be, no risk of colon cancer, skin looks good thanks to my dread of sunlight, heart sounds good, plenty of hemoglobin, and I have a lower percentage of body fat than two-thirds of men my age, and I probably shouldn’t brag about my prostate but I’m told it is soft and youthful. What more could one ask.

I was a devoted two-pack-a-day smoker for two decades, a dedicated drinker, thinking it obligatory for a serious writer, and I avoided physical exercise whenever possible. In a rare act of sheer will, I cut out tobacco and alcohol, and now, through no fault of my own, I feel limber and light and, for an old evangelical brought up on the flavor of brimstone, remarkably lighthearted.

I go to Mayo because it’s one of the cheerfullest places on the planet. People come here quite aware of mortality, and cheerfulness is the only way to regard mortality: life is a gift, so be grateful especially as you get up into dangerous octo territory. I feel congenial here, make small talk with strangers, hold the door open. People in blue scrubs smile at you, offer directions.

All forms of decrepitude and disability are here to be seen, and it’s touching to see the couples, one of them sitting and being wheeled by the other, old couples, some young ones, who were busy living their lives and then one started to falter and the lover became the caretaker. Each couple walks by and you see clearly the love between them, holding hands, an arm around a back — maybe the passion has waned, surely they had their ups and downs, but that’s all over now, now they are united. And then you see children, anxious, children in distress weeping, wounded, children with no hair, and it breaks your heart, you can see the pain in the parents’ faces, but even so, your pity is not what’s needed. Playfulness is good, a little comedy if possible.

There is a moral network here, a communal bond that I think no longer prevails in our country. Highly educated men and women dedicate themselves to improving the lives of people in need, some urgently. Honesty, competence, and kindness are prime virtues here, and the army of aides, receptionists, cooks, janitors feel a sense of higher purpose as well. Our country today is fascinated by a Nietzschean executive who lies, steals, cheats, and commits acts of pure cruelty on a daily basis, whose prime motive is personal vanity. Mayo serves a big slice of rural Minnesota so plenty of Mayo patients likely support him. There’s an interesting contradiction here. If this were the Trump Clinic, best service would go to the top bidders, others would go on a long waiting list, the poor would be given analgesics, and there would be enormous portraits of him in all the hallways.

To its expansive campus Mayo is adding a building devoted to Wellness, where you can go to be told what you already know: eat less, eat better, get regular exercise. But Dr. Will and Dr. Charley weren’t wellness people; they were surgeons and their Clinic pioneered great advances in surgery, which is what brought me here years ago.

I was out of breath, even standing still, and a doctor heard it, listening to me on the radio, and sent me here, and a couple days later I was wheeled into an OR where five intensely serious people in scrubs stood around the table, focused on the job at hand, and Dr. Orszulak sewed up my mitral valve, and ten years later Dr. Dearani replaced it with one from a pig, and so I was given some bonus years beyond what my relatives got who were born with the same heart defect I have. I think of this every single day. When your life is saved you feel an obligation to do something worthwhile with the gift. And so I try.

I want to create some beautiful hours with audiences across the country, including comedy, poetry, stories, and the whole crowd singing old songs in simple harmony. The best singing crowds, crowds whose harmonies bring tears to my eyes, are in red states that voted for cruelty. There’s a contradiction there. I’ll never understand it, neither will you.

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