Blast from the Past
Revisiting some of my favorite essays
While All Science Great & Small was technically launched in July 2022, it lay mostly dormant until six months ago today when I re-started regularly writing. Since then, my audience has grown from 19 subscribers (all friends and family) to thousands of readers a month, and the vast majority have probably never seen my earliest articles. So I wanted to take this opportunity to re-post three of my favorite essays from the very beginning.
Each of these is deeply personal. In “Back From the Dead,” I write about my first year of pathology residency and a dog that had a miraculous recovery after diagnosis. “Quitting Time” tells the story of why I decided to leave traditional small animal veterinary practice. “When Pathology Becomes Personal” is a meditation on the passing of both my cats last year.
I hope you enjoy reading these as much as I loved writing them.
— Eric
Love that you quote Richard Selzer in one of your epigraphs. Such a powerful essayist. I've never taught his work, because I don't think it plays well with undergraduates. But if I ever have a chance to teach a medical humanities course to med students or a more diverse group of adults, I'll have to include Mortal Lessons or The Exact Location of the Soul.