I like liking people. Except of course when I don't. What I mean is, some folks grease the wheels for congeniality, by being friendly first. 

 

The other day I took a meal to a friend who is recovering from surgery. It was an automatic reflex to sign up on a schedule to bring soup. She has fed my daughters, chauffeured my son, and chatted with me at fancy occasions when I felt self conscious. Of course I would offer pumpkin muffins and chili. 

 

But other times circumstances require me to extend myself for people who are crusty. Hard to understand, or have sharp edges. That's when resistance shows up. A flood of reasons surface about why I can't be expected to inconvenience myself. 

 

The show I rewatched recently while resting after a brief but insistent attachment to the bathroom was about the dilemma doctors face in this arena. A surgeon who was one of three capable of performing a double transplant of heart and lungs was confronted with performing a life saving procedure on someone he hates. His feelings were not based on annoyance over a parking space, or high school drama. The patient was the son of the dictator who murdered his own father.

 

There were two other physicians who have successfully accomplished this, but one was himself recovering from surgery, and the other was on the North Face in Nepal. 

 

"Going up or down?" he asked. 

 

The President ordered him to scrub up, to look into the face of the young boy who was near death. 

 

"He is not your enemy. Plus this is how it starts. One reach across the divide, in the name of compassion."

 

I did not make an appointment with my own doctor over symptoms that will go away on their own. But perhaps I need a remedy for the resentment that stays my hand when someone outside my circle of preference is in need. 

 

Thankfully the Great Physician does house calls.