Thanks are in order to those who believed in this idea at critical moments and set it on the path to becoming a book. To the infallible Allison Hunter and Clare Mao. To Sarah Murphy, who began as my editor and ended up my friend. To editor Hannah Robinson for gracefully shepherding me along. To Seb King, Lisa Tumarkin, Helen Haskell, Margot Presley, Lucille Glick, and Adrian Murphy for their essential input. To Julie Hersh for her sharp eyes, narrator Anne Marie Gideon, and the Harper Wave family at large.
Next, cheers to solid gold friends, without whom this book would have been written with half the heart. To Mamie Stevenson, who got me writing. To Maddy Villano, who appears around the corner at all the right moments. To Gabe Zinn, who took me to the Lucky Horse Shoe, and to the Malek-Axleys, who took me in the summer I started this project. To Jillian Porten’s charm, Nick Hiebert’s exuberance, and Stephanie Cantor’s advice. To muse Clemmie Wotherspoon and mentor Maya West. To Lilly and Peter Nickerson for the fishing and cormorants. To Kayla Wisnieski, Carolyn Griesser, and Jazmyn Price for welcoming me to a new city, and to Margaux Forsch, Garrett Felber, and baby Jules for visiting me there.
Thanks to my mom, who introduced me to the world of medicine, and to my dad for being my steadfast friend. To my grandparents Dorothy and Sidney, and my brother Ethan. I am lucky to call my family my friends, and to those touched this book directly—either by listening to me as I talked out an idea or sharing their own story—I am especially grateful: Julie Kaplan, Amy Sgro, Sarah Sgro, Molly Kaplan, Phyllis Mossberg, Deborah Goldberg, and Elizabeth Kelley.
To patients. To teachers (Pete Rock, Kristen Beiers-Jones, and Paul Currie). And to libraries.
To Bourbon the dog.
And, of course, to Tess.
We ate and talked and went to bed,
And slept. It was a miracle.