simon_doctor | (no subject)

simon tam. as i live and breathe.

figured you've been busy. am eminently unconcerned. you should also be eminently unconcerned.

on my way to the clinic. working part time in fremont at clinic you won't know but would horrify our mutual acquaintances/colleagues. in process of switching my license over. quack i'm seeing says giving life meaning is good for me right now. i just like making sure little kids are able to make the choice to have terrible posture that makes them look like the depraved leftist hoodlums in training that they are. more later when i'm not running late.

reacclimating? do tell.

j

Reacclimating: it's the close quarters, mostly. The same walls and the same few faces, all the time, and one can't exactly step out for a walk and a change of scenery. It takes some getting used to after six months planetside, even when it's what we were used to for years.

Horrify for good reasons, or for bad ones? Or both?

-Simon

Now that I have time to use proper capitalization...

It sounds like you need a vacation.

Horrify for bad reasons. The inequities in the health care system that you see are certainly worse; until I started, the waiting list for orthopedists within our administrative division averaged seven months. I've brought it down to five, and I'm tempted to go full time. You do realize that most of us aren't in it solely for the high from helping our fellow humans. The facilities also leave a little to be desired, especially when I think about Central-General on Londinium.

But you've heard that story from me before in exhaustive detail. This time I'm preaching to the choir. Do you know what a selfishly delightful change that is? Congratulations, Tam! Your deprivation makes you worthy. Don't you feel better?

The quack says I ought to get out more, and that I'm trading one preoccupation (misery) for another (workaholism). I say at least this way I'm of use to someone. And my aunt is trying to kill me with food, so at least this way I'll do some good before she fattens me to a local meat broker's satisfaction.

Has your aunt actually managed to make you eat? I think I'm impressed.

We just recently had a few days' worth of shore leave on a little moon called Praxed. I suppose that could count as a vacation. We bought souvenirs, which I believe counts toward qualifying.

Kaylee sends regards, by the way.

I've gained ten pounds. I know this because she put me on a scale that veterinarians use for dogs on our way back from the garden. She has to roll me out the door in the morning, after she makes me eat her huevos rancheros, and she's told me more than once that if I throw them up due to being rolled out the door I get a double dose before I can go anywhere. She's very mean.

You don't sound enthused. I take it Praxed is not a popular vacation hotspot among the young and fabulous?

Give her my best, if you don't mind.

Praxed was fairly nice, in fact (even though no, it's not a popular vacation spot). It's just that it was something of a working vacation; we both had to pick up supplies -- Kaylee for the engines, me for the mobile clinic. We did eventually get some time for ourselves, though.

And now we're out in the black again. I've lost track of where we're heading next. Hopefully somewhere that won't involve a firefight.

I'd ask how likely a firefight is, but I'm too busy playing with this monkey somebody sent me, and reading a book that is not what it promises on the cover.

That's all right; I can wait.

(I'm glad you like them. Kaylee picked out the monkey.)

It's a glorious monkey. And a glorious book. I'm surprised you found a copy that wasn't burned.

So was I. The owner of the book stall had no idea how rare it was, and didn't care when I told him. He refused point-blank to let me pay him anything more than the price he was asking.

How did you like the rest of the package? (I did say we bought souvenirs.)

The Rim is full of wonders, glorious to behold. Clearly.

Well. No harm in being honest: the fact of the package bowled me over. I'm quite frankly astonished the two of you thought of me after you left, and I appreciate it, very much.

Well -- I've missed you. More this time than I did the first time I left Osiris, strangely enough. (Or maybe not so strangely; I'm a good deal less preoccupied this time.)

In any case, to go back to the question you didn't exactly ask: a firefight is depressingly likely. I'd say maybe 25% to 30% of our jobs involve shots being fired at some point.

I'm flattered. And a little surprised, but mostly flattered.

Do these shots often get aimed in your direction?

It's happened a time or two, but generally not. My part in these little adventures tends to be patching up the crew afterwards.

Come to think of it, the only instances I can think of where there were shots aimed in my direction weren't directly related to a job at all. There were Reavers, and there was the bounty hunter who was after River, and -- oh yes, and the time we had to pull our captain out of the hands of a local crimelord.

None of this is anything like as exciting as it tends to be in the vids, in case you were wondering.

I'm not surprised. If you had a pet monkey, however, I think it would lend your life a touch of verisimilitude.

The quack has suggested I ask you something. You may prefer getting shot.

He thinks I need to write about Liz. The kind of writing that somebody else will read. To keep me accountable.

I think he's the one who's crazy, but I told him I'd ask.

I'm almost certain our captain would veto obtaining a pet monkey.

If you're asking if I'm willing to read it if you write it, the answer is yes.

You were supposed to say that you were very sorry, but you just didn't think you could face it. Now I actually have to do it.

Sorry about that. I didn't get a copy of the script.

Let the usual sentiments of you tell anyone this and I'll kill you go unsaid.

The thing I've been struggling with is that I played it safe. That's what I've done with myself since leaving school. I've played it safe. I chose the soft life following around a woman and let my own connections to the founding tenets of my identity lie fallow. (The quack's words, not mine.) Now that she's gone, the connections I had with any of that life are dead. There was no physical or abstract profit. Effectively (the quack says) I'm back at the beginning. If you look at the whole situation as a ledger, I'm flat broke.

But the whole situation isn't a ledger, because she's dead, and I loved her. I loved her enough to give up what I wanted to do, and to shut up about politics, and to move to Londinium and deal with her parents day in and day out.

How surprised were you by that? I have to ask. At the time it seemed like the most obvious course of action in the 'verse.

Surprised? Somewhat. (In retrospect, possibly not as much as I should have been.)

And -- surprised that you moved to Londinium, yes. Surprised that you and Liz were together ... not really at all. It made a certain kind of sense.

Why, because we were sick and twisted and thus perfectly suited?

That's the other reason we never made anything official, because I don't think either of us could have kept a straight face during the vows.

Not the words I would have used, but essentially that, yes.

The other reason?

The other reason is of course my proclivity to enjoy the company of young ladies and then determine perhaps slightly prematurely that the relationship was going nowhere that wasn't delightfully hedonistic, so better to end it sooner than later since we were clearly in it for different reasons.

I know myself, Tam. As I put it to her, it would help me greatly to behave in the manner we both wanted if I still felt I had a way out, and I was far more likely to obey a beautiful woman without resentment than any government's law.

I have never pretended to make any sense whatsoever. She understood that, too. And some other things.

I think in a way that's what I meant when I thought of you as well suited. Even when you were just friends, you always seemed to make sense to each other.

I don't know if I'd call choosing her over what I knew was right evidence that we were well-suited.