8-6-06 Shrapnel
Perched on my knee are two shrapnel, a gift from Yovel, the six year old I interviewed Friday in Kiryat Shemona during rocket fire. Two of three he found in his back yard, after the Katyusha hit the bright pastel rose painted kindergarten, catty corner from his house. One is a sphere fragment, fits my index finger tip. It has an organic-looking or geological studded convex surface, ragged edges; its concave side has a single ridge. It feels unfriendly even as I try capping my finger with it. The other, perhaps four by one cm, looks like a modern steel sculpture, a miniature fragment from something by David Smith, from inside his polished globes, with nefarious, studded innards. It has two sharp edges, striated with glistening, brass striations and a central ridge on each side, like some postmodern arrow head. Or some abstract sculpture of a sturgeon, thickened body, lateral lines, its dorsal and ventral "fins" are knife sharp, ridged; one end snub-nosed, the other its fishtail waving laterally.
The car I saw on Eilat Street looked like a sieve, hit by shrapnel.
Another took a direct hit, was burnt black. Still another took a hit
through its rear window.
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D. is one of the soldiers who come to the triage center. All the
soldiers are nonchalant about their injuries. D. has a laceration on
his finger. Shrapnel. Just wants it cleaned, wrapped, so he can go
back to artillery. He washes it himself, but lets Nurse Sarah bandage
it carefully. On the back of his flak jacket, he has written his name
in large black letters. Below this he has written this, which I read
thrice:
"If your going to shoot a man, better hit him. If you hit him, better
kill him. Because, if you don't, he'll try to kill you."
A. another kid, is brought by the army doc. Dropped a five kilo
hammer on his finger three days ago; wouldn't tell anyone; doesn't
want to get sent back from the front. He's sent for an X-Ray. No
break. He can go back to his unit. I mention, as I look at the old
blood engorged under his fingernail, that we learned a trick to drain
this if it is painful: heat a paper clip and poke a hole through the
nail. Doesn't hurt and relieves the painful swelling. But, the soldier
says, it doesn't hurt. Then he's off.
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I get irritated at the Russian doc who takes care of the Russian
fellow who arrives limping, arms around his buddies shoulders. The
soldier, a father of two, straining at his belt, says he twisted his
ankle yesterday. Off to XRay. Returns with an XRay of one ankle. The
Russian doc takes over in Russian, then looks at me and says in Hebrew
to the soldier, Well, I guess we'll have to talk the other language."
I reassure him, better to talk in Russian if the soldier is more
comfortable. Certainly the doc seems more comfortable in Russian.
Glances at the XRay and says, no fracture and is about to send him off
with diagnosis of a strain. I become Dr. Butt-inski and look at the
film again. Not clear that there is a fracture or not. I mention to
Dr. "Russki" that when I trained we would always XRay both limbs to
compare them. He responds, maybe in pediatrics, and I confess to my
pedicatricality. Dr. "Russki" sends the soldier home with his old,
now filthy ace bandage and boot laced up. I ask where home is --
Beersheva. How to get there -- bus. This is perhaps a 4 hour trip if
the buses are running. He should be icing and elevating the leg.
This seems quite wrong with me. I get an ice pack from the nurse,
insist that his buddies ride him out with the wheel chair. But the
soldier won't put the ice pack inside his boot, and certainly won't
unlace his boot. He has two children to get home to, he says.
When I return, Dr. "Russki" is checking the XRay again. Turns to me,
as if to explain, "I'm a urologist, not an orthopedist." I don't tell
him that I'm a shrink. Just leave it at that. But I do think that
speaking Russian doesn't make up for uncaring medical treatment.
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The shrink cases are varied. Some people simply have been in need for
some time; the Katyushas and the open triage is a chance to get
someone to care for them. My colleague, Chana is sitting on the
mattress on the floor in the front triage room, holding the hand of
such a sad soul, her head leaning, nod wise to the right, openmouthed.
Hardly a word passes between them while I am there.
Another sharp-featured, rail-thin lady is brought by a fellow worker.
Both are from Tuba, the Arab or Druze village closer to Safed. She
fell at work, hit her head, she says. Now has pains down the right
side of her head, on her hip, leg and can't stand or walk. Off to
XRay she is sent by the urologist-who-isn't-a-orthodpedist. XRay
normal, she is ready to be sent off. Moans that she can't stand, must
see a neurologist. No neurologist hereabouts, so the shrink (me) is
sent to talk with her. I ask her about herself, home, family, age and
such. Five brothers all married; she is thirty, living with her
parents. And she doesn't need a man, she insists. Catches herself
here and eye-shoots me: "I know what you're doing! You think this is
psychological. I need a neurologist." A middle-aged fellow arrives,
balding, a touch portly, carries himself with importance. Says he is
taking responsibility for her, when I ask if he is related. I suggest
she see her doctor in Tuba. They ask for the XRay. Given, she moans
as she is loaded onto her fellow worker. I port over the wheel chair
so she can ride out. Learn later, she is a chronic psychiatric patient
at Safed Hospital.
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The former Southern Lebanese Army soldier arrives with piercing
headaches, eye-stabbing feelings and whooshing in his ears. He is fit,
closely-cropped hair, well-groomed. I remark on the two scars in his
throat; unusual, in that it looks like he had two tracheotomies. He
did, in 1996 and his tale unfolds.
He has returned from evacuating his wife and 4 yo to Hadera to live
with the extended family. He can't take the crowding there, he
claims. But his 4 y.o. holds holds his index finger with her fist like
this (he shows me), for security. When the sirens wailed, he would
shut the door to the secure room and she became hysterical. But what
can he do.
He has returned from death. Here he was shot in southern Lebanon: he
shows me the entrance wound in the corner of his left lip. Took out
his teeth, part of his tongue (he extends it briefly for a look),
lodged in his right neck. 42 units of blood they used in Rambam.
Several times he heard them say he was a lost cause. He was not
supposed to survive. The Israeli doctor who had a bit of Arabic,
explained things to him. For four months on the respirator, he could
not talk.
He was engaged to be married one month before he goes to southern
Lebanon. His fiancé is in Beirut. That was it.
Here, he meets another woman, builds a life.
But his extended family lives in a kfar five kilometers from the
border into Lebanon. He reached them once by cell phone, but they are
afraid to talk, afraid of monitoring. Then, after he hears the
evacuation orders by Israel to citizens of Southern Lebanon, he can no
longer reach them. He worries.
He saw things he doesn't want to remember. Men dying next to him.
What can he do. He has enough of fighting. then he was young. Now, he
has a daughter, a wife. He returned to Kiryat Shemona and he has
pains in his head, eyes, whooshing in his ears.
The Arab M.D. is asked to assess him. He takes a brief moment, hands
him a prescription for ear drops. The pharmacies are all closed. The
doctor says dismissively that he won't use any of the E.R.'s supplies
for this fellow.
The ex-soldier knows he has been treated disdainfully.
Chana Mann, my colleague explains that little love is lost between
the Israeli Arabs and the former Southern Lebanese soldiers. They
share a language, and barely that.
The ex-soldier winces at each boom of Katyushas, even in this secure
bunker of an E.R. It is a reflex. I wonder if he returns to face
memories and feelings that have burrowed within him, lurking.
He is in a no-man's land, near to his home and faraway, in a land
that has adopted him, even as his heart seems to remain in a small
kfar on the other side of the border.
