Just so you’ll know, I’m getting more reading done these days since I discovered that my body likes occasional rests on my back since I got another — this time minor — compression fracture (I have no idea how). L2 this time. I’ve come to picture my back as a long tube filled with wet sand, still keeping me upright, though, and appreciating at least a half-hour a day of walking.
But now down to business
This amazing book certainly doesn’t need more reviewers, but I’m pressed to describe how impressed I am by it. It’s a mystery story page-turner, except it’s not fiction. From environmental injustice monitored by zip code to systemic inequality and shocking (but I am no longer shocked) governmental insensitivity. In my ninth decade I’ve finally come to accept that those who are elected to serve us often do not, unless it is in the interest of their careers and the well-being of those like them. Truly a horrifying reality.
But there’s more. The courage of Dr. Mona, the caring pediatrician, the persistence in spite of efforts to shame and destroy her, the beautiful description of the careful use of scientific method, the attempt to refute science in favor of the dollar, the almost victory in the end, the failure to follow through completely. (Apparently there are children still bathing in lead-damaging water.)
But there’s even more: the source of her courage in her intellectual and active roots as part of an immigrant family, comments on irrational war and the loss of homeland, making a married life and family with a fellow Pediatrician. (As someone who made a career in addition to home and family despite the cultural pressures against it, I was especially appreciative of that aspect of her story.) One couldn’t help noting the drain on her personal health. And just plain heroism displayed by her active partners. I’ve recommended this book to our Waters of Excelsior book group.
1/26/2025
monagustafsonaffinito 