CHAPTER FIFTY
I was scheduled to graduate from my nursing program in August 2007. Med/Surg I and Med/Surg II were probably the most challenging classes in the program. I passed my final exam in Med/Surg I but failed my other final, in Med/Surg II, by answering one question wrong. The correct answer was “droplet precautions,” but I had picked “airborne precautions.” When one question is all that keeps you from graduating from a nursing program, and what holds your ticket to go back home to California, you never forget that question, trust me.
While most of my classmates graduated in August, a few of us — including me — had to stay one more semester and retake the Med/Surg II class. I was disappointed and frustrated but also grateful that I was being given another opportunity by the faculty to graduate. If I failed again, I knew I would be dismissed from the program, and everything that I worked so hard for, all the time, energy, and money I had poured into this stage of my journey, would have been wasted. The pressure was huge, as it had been ever since I decided to take on this journey, but I passed the second time and graduated in December 2007.
During the program I became good friends with a classmate named Frank, who was in his early fifties when we met. He had retired as the assistant chief of the Columbia Fire Department, but for reasons of his own wanted to go back to school and get his nursing degree. He had worked as both an EMT and a firefighter for many years and he helped me study during the program when a subject became too difficult to grasp. He showed me effective methods of studying and ways to understand a lot of complicated medical material more easily. Frank could explain E=mc² to a person so they could comprehend it as simply as 2+2=4.
I spent some holidays with Frank and his family at his warm, cozy house. I will always remember enjoying drinks and the delicious food his wife made in their kitchen. We’d talk about anything from Mark Twain, to the restaurant scene from the 1970 movie Five Easy Pieces, to what made a cigar or whiskey good, to the Rolling Stones’ “Wild Horses.” From the wooden cabinets, warm lighting, candles, and artwork on the walls to the fresh bread right out of the oven and fruit spread on the counter, I could spend hours in their kitchen sitting on those farmhouse stools with such great company. Frank and his wife were very hospitable people and you always felt welcome at their house. They were two of the most good-hearted people I had ever met.
Frank was the type of guy who knew the answers to a variety of things. He could tell you how many toes a koala had, where Paul Newman was from, the life span of a female veiled chameleon, or what year Tom Berenger had graduated from Mizzou, but he would often downplay his level of knowledge, which I thought was very humble and clever of him. At times I wondered why he never competed on Jeopardy!
He was a nice guy with a love for fine whiskey, a cigar, horses, and good music. I would find out a few years after we met that he was good friends with Steve Young, along with Steve’s brother and father — a great songwriter and a musician. I had never known that Steve was the songwriter behind one of my favorite songs, the Eagles’ “Seven Bridges Road.” I enjoyed being around Frank because he always carried himself with class, humility, and somewhat of a hidden intelligence that seemed to always pop up at the right time. He was a great listener while being able to hide his own personal problems and pains extremely well. Most importantly, he never judged me — or anybody else, for that matter. I feel fortunate and proud to call him my friend to this day. He was kind enough to attend my graduation, along with my mother — who had come to visit from Turkey — Melissa, and my cousin Sercan.
At every graduation, Sinclair School of Nursing gave an award to one student in each program, called the Janet Joy Thompson Award, for “demonstrating compassion and the personal attributes of tenderness and the natural ability to bring comfort to those in their care who are ill or distressed.” When the faculty called my name to the stage to receive this award for the bachelors program, I was shocked, because I had met many students who I felt demonstrated those qualities just as much as me, but it was a wonderful surprise. I was asked to say a few words, but as I stood on that stage looking at the audience, I was speechless. Hundreds of people sat quietly staring at me, waiting, so I simply said, “Thank you.” It is an award I will always be proud of, because it precisely describes my eagerness to connect with people from all walks of life and bring them comfort.
The faculty had recognized my good, genuine, friendly nature, which meant the world to me. The Janet Joy Thompson Award will always have more meaning for me than any career position I might ever hold or any amount of money I could ever make, because it captured my true feelings about humanity and my overall approach to life and the universe. I will always be grateful for my knowledgeable, supportive instructors and the friendly, helpful staff at Sinclair School of Nursing like Laura, Pam, Erin, and Tom. They were very understanding, caring, supportive, and encouraging and they helped turn me into the nurse I have strived to be ever since.
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