MISTER IN BETWEEN

The journey from physician to artist was painfully slow and costly in so many ways, but in the end, it was worth all of the turmoil and distress. One aspect of the transition that I did not anticipate was feeling lost between two worlds, medicine and art.

In my mind the practice of medicine was all about the primary care physician, the general internist or the family doctor. This is how I identified myself; this is was what being a physician meant to me and this is the world I left when I left my practice in 1981 for part time work in the emergency room of our city hospital. Although I was still in contact with most of my medical colleagues, I felt estranged from medicine. I was no longer involved as I had been when I was active in our local and state medical societies and in the programs in our teaching hospital. I realized that my priorities had taken me out of that world. Others may not have noticed, but I felt I no longer belonged.

The problem was, I did not feel I belonged to any community of artists. I was a novice, at the very bottom of a steep self learning curve. There were no artist friends and colleagues to replace those I left, and to even call myself an artist was almost unthinkable and impossible to do. I had no studio and my art was simple and limited.


Wash St. pen-ink-markers 1978

For the first few years into this new life I was lost between two worlds, and it was my unshakable belief and trust in what I was doing that allowed me to continue. In the years since, there have been moments of crisis and self doubt, but I’ve never lost that basic trust in my dream.