Saturday, 30 January 2021

Handwritten In The Style

I was born to be a doctor: good manners, compassionate nature, analytical mind, almost illegible handwriting. 

But then at age eight I found myself in old Miss Davy's junior school class. (I say old; she must have been fifty if she was a day.) She took it upon herself to coach my ink-stained fingers into producing perfect joined-up copperplate script - and I was lost to the medical profession for ever ;-)

A doctor writes...
We all know GPs and medics as a whole are renowned for their difficult-to-decipher script. How pharmacists must have cursed before typewritten prescriptions became standard issue. If I try hard I can just about make out most of what is being explained in the doctor's note above but the challenge of trying to read poorly-fashioned hand-writing gave me an idea for today's poem, which also draws on my current reading matter, A.J. Ayer's seminal treatise 'Language, Truth and Logic '.

A Doctor Writes
















(Deciphered):
I recommend a daily dose of logical empiricism
-  take one grain of salted truth
   dissolve in aqueous humour
   and let it sink in.
Resolve to be better tomorrow
    but
    if wayward fantasies persist repeat
    as instructed above until
Conscience and judgement are clear.
                          
                           Signed...

Thanks for reading. Stay healthy, S ;-)

mens sana in corpore sano

19 comments:

  1. Ha ha good one la' :D

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  2. Malcolm Drysdale30 January 2021 at 21:05

    This thing about doctors having near illegible writing: was it so their patients couldn't read the shocking truth? or so their writing was hard to copy and forge? It's a curious phenomenon but you've used it well.

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  3. Amusing and true.....

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  4. Very good Steve and cleverly done. The poem reminds me of your Koans poem from a couple of summers ago (the one based on the sayings of Hippocrates).

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  5. Droll, but true. My Dad was a GP - had the worst handwriting.

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  6. This made me smile Steve. Salted truth is at a premium these days. Stay wise.

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  7. The Existentialist1 February 2021 at 13:06

    Spot on. Let's all be more philosophical about life and less materialistic.

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  8. Just as well you provided a decipherment!!! :)

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  9. Succinct - like a prescription. Oh, wait, it is one. (LOL)

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  10. A clever idea Steve. I like the way you try out original things on your blogs.

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  11. A clever concept and sound advice from the good doctor. :)

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  12. Jeanie Buckingham3 February 2021 at 12:38

    ❤️

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  13. Did you write A Doctor Writes with the hand you don't normally write with? Or is it just heavily disguised? Anyway, a neat idea and a sensible prescription.

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  14. I liked the dissolve/resolve rhyme and the line "Resolve to be better tomorrow" :)

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  15. Ink-stained fingers: I remember desks at primary school having ink wells and we wrote with dip-in nibbed wooden pens. Blotches were a hazard!

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  16. I loved the lines "take one grain of salted truth/ dissolve in aqueous humour" because they are so suggestive of an apothecary. 👍

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  17. That must be one of your shortest blogs ever, Mr. R?

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  18. ☀️💖✨✨✨🤗

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