Sanctuary
by Hannah Halter
I sat between my mother and father on one of the wooden, cushioned chairs that Good Shepherd used instead of pews. Words came floating into the air from a lectern I was too short to see, and soon, I stood in a sea of singing people. Instead of joining in song, I would flip through the thick, green songbook or stare at the ribbon of stained glass windows that wrapped around the point of the wall meeting the ceiling… Read More
Observations and Reflections from York County’s Drug Treatment Court
by Patrick Gann
On September 29, 2016, I attended the weekly-scheduled Thursday Drug Treatment Court in York County. The treatment court was held in its usual place, on the sixth floor of the York County Judicial Center, just north of York’s center square on George Street. The judge presiding over Drug Treatment Court on the day I visited was the Judge John Kennedy… Read More
A Small, Malignant Mass
by Leisa Bowman
“A small, malignant mass. Eleven o’clock. Six centimeters out. Right breast.” The radiologist’s precise words stated so matter-of-factly entered my ears. They materialized as a stark black and white imprint in my mind’s eye. This was the reality they discovered, but it only sank into my resistant consciousness as if in slow motion. I had no choice; I couldn’t say “no” like I wanted to. It was there. It was a part of me. It was inside me… Read More
A Collision Between Art and Healthcare: An Intellectual Expedition
by Erica M. Lehman
My character and intellect is greatly influenced by medicine and science. Due to my experiences in nursing, I have gained a permanent perspective which evaluates images and situations far differently than my peers of other disciplines and professions. At times, I feel as though healthcare is all I know and see… Read More
Part of a Whole: A Personal Essay
by Tyler Gehman
“No man is an island, entire of itself;
Every man is a piece of the continent, a part of the main.”
John Donne
In one of the first social work courses I took as an undergraduate at Millersville University, a professor referenced the John Donne quote above, and the saying has stuck with me. Although the language of the original quote is archaic and not inclusive, it still conveys a simple truth: a human being cannot survive in isolation… Read More
Flotsam and Jetsam
by Phil Jago
“Son, are you coming for breakfast?”
I rolled over and glanced toward the door of the bamboo hut that constituted my hotel room for this leg of the holiday. Light had slipped into the room through cracks in the walls, the ceiling, and the door from behind which my father had just spoken.After a few precious seconds, during which I simply lay back and considered how lucky I was to be waking up in paradise, I answered in the affirmative, sat up, threw on shorts and a t-shirt (no shoes required), and made my way out into the surprisingly powerful 9 a.m. sun… Read More