As I was leaving work after half a day's work, I saw a clump of white clover growing next to the driveway to the office.
Suddenly, I remembered seeing on television that there was a person who was a master at finding four-leaf clovers.
Come to think of it, I am a pathologist, so I thought it would be easier than I thought to recognize a four-leaf clover, and when I put my face a little closer to it, it was easy to find.
I don't know the trick, but I guess I have a pathologist's eye, or something like that, and somewhere I'm unconsciously doing something in common with finding tumor cells in my usual microscope work.
Yesterday there was a reunion of the pathology department in Tokyo.
I (Ken Koro) am a graduate of a certain medical university and went from there to the pathology department of another university.
There was a wonderful professor who trained me in pathology when I was a student, and I wanted to become his disciple, but he was then an assistant professor (now known as an associate professor, and later became a professor in another university) and could not take care of me until I graduated, so he said he would introduce me to the pathology department of his former school, and I went there. So I went to his school's pathology department.
The pathology department I was introduced to is a prestigious and traditional department, and although I thought it was an inappropriate place to be from the time I entered until now, I have known it for more than 30 years.
This year, for the first time in a long time, they held a face-to-face reunion, so I attended.
I had not seen them for a while because of the Corona disaster, but some of the teachers have passed away, and those who retired have aged considerably.
On the other hand, a junior professor who is one year younger than me has become a professor in some university, and I feel like I am the only one who has not aged well.
Anyway, while I was standing around chatting with people I had never met before, including teachers I was indebted to and young people I had never seen before, or just exchanged nods with, I was thinking about something superfluous: the feeling of distance is something that will never change with time.
After the meeting, we had a drink and talked about this and that with the people we often drink with.
I asked them to listen to some of my complaints, which was quite helpful as we talked about how to avoid the same kind of relationship problems that everyone else has.
Although we are all alone, it is a blessing to have friends who listen to our complaints.
Pathologists are not alone.
