river Jordan's blog

I've been in Port au Prince, Haiti for the past 4 days, as part of a team of medical professionals with TIMA (Tzu Chi International Medical Association).

My experiences and days have been rich and I won't be able to adequately describe them in the 15 minutes I have to type this message and get ready to see patients for the day.

I once knew a friend named "Ace Forest" who lived in a squat shack in rural British Columbia, He would show up at the 49th parallel and when the agent would ask him "how long do you intend to stay in Canada?", he would answer straight-faced, "two days", or some such utterance, reasoning in his heart that after two days, he would certainly have lost all such conce

When I first graduated from school thirteen years ago, I remember joking to a friend about my ego-wall where I hung my diplomas, my state license, and my NCCAOM certification. I had no idea how to run a business and was extremely insecure around issues of money or discussing treatment plans. So I had a hobby practice out of my apartment that saw three patients a week (on good weeks).

A week or two ago I shared with some friends that my practice was going through an abrupt slowdown. I was touched by how many of them offered thoughtful replies. One of the remarks that really hit home suggested that I was probably just "coasting" and possibly losing focus a little bit.

I just left the clinic and bumped into the Emperor coming up the stairs in the Community Center where CommuniChi is located - well, sort of anyways. Governor Christine Gregoire was dressed in work pants and a United Way t-shirt and was flanked by other volunteers as part of a community service day, fixing up the center, gardening, hauling out old furniture, etc.

I was thinking more about the issue of not getting behind in the

In the few years since the CAN forum has been live, I've noticed that discussions that invoke the reality of classism are often the most heated. While it is not my intention to fan those flames here, I invite my friends and colleagues who use that lens of analysis with more rigor than I, to enlighten me on any blind spots or distortions in my subjective reflections shared here.

Reading the CAN blog is like walking on a beach and picking up treasures...pretty stones, shells, admiring the uniqueness in each individual's way of expression. I like to leave Nature the way I found it, put down the pretty stones and shells so other creatures can use them, but that doesn't stop me from taking the essential beauty in my heart.

D. is ten. His mother had called a week ago, explaining that he has retinitis pigmentosis, something I had never heard of before, but upon briefly researching, learned to be a genetic disease that may lead to blindness.

Last night, I was rummaging through my files, looking for a backup disk to restore the blog files on my website (didn't find), when I came across an old collection of papers from my Community Health class at NIAOM in 1998. I pulled out the folder, sensing possible relief in my writer's block for this blog.

I was sitting in my long underwear at home on my day off, reading my copy of Acupuncture is Like Noodles
when the door bell rang. Quickly, I jumped up, put on the first pair of
pants I could find, and went to the door. There was the Pastor from the

I checked the schedule this morning...2 patients...clearly the string of 100+ patients per week was coming to an end....but not so fast you of little faith...by the end of the day, 16 people had received treatment in my 4 hour shift, well, 17 if you count the guy who....that story in a moment.

March was a new record for CommuniChi - 418 appointments. It took two years and two months for that crop to ripen - maybe stuff just naturally grows slower here in the wacky northwest. Spring officially arrived a few weeks ago, but it was snowing as I made breakfast this morning and prepared for my morning bike ride to the clinic.

Hey Community Acupunk comrades, check out the latest piece on CA which aired on the local NBC TV affiliate here in Seattle:

CommuniChi - March 30 TV coverage

It snowed sometime a few nights ago.
Most Seattle-ites I know are tired of the winter and wish it would go

The story is entitled: "Acupuncture for the Masses". I thought the reporter Ann did an excellent job of composing this story in a new and interesting way that is especially relevant to the times - lowering the carbon footprint for medicine. Did anyone hear it live on NPR?