1995 - The Year we make Contact

1995 - The Year we make Contact

Anyone get the reference?

Well, 1995 arrived, and it was off to Seattle in mid-January. My production assistant was Timmy Baker, our video tape duplicator who got my job after I got the bump up to first class. Strangely enough, his mom worked for Signal, a company which owned imaging centers, including the Waterbury Imaging Center. More on this later.

We flew out of Westchester County Airport, a very convenient location just off 684.
The shoot was with Patchen Dellinger, for a vertical banded gastroplasty for morbid obesity. This was the precursor to the wildly popular gastric bypass operations you hear about these days. In this operation, the stomach is stapled into a pouch to limit food intake. The patient was so morbidly obese, that it took over an hour for intubation. This was the first operation in which I learned the purpose of surgical masks, as there was a spurt of blood emanating from the patient, which zapped both the surgeon and myself, since I was leaning over his shoulder at the time with my camera suspended from a boom. You know come to think of it, on an earlier shoot in Cleveland, a doctor flicked a piece of kidney tissue off his glove, and it landed squarely on me - luckily on my hospital scrubs, so I did not need to worry about getting that stain out with ALL detergent.

After the shoot we drove around Seattle, saw the famous Space Needle from the ground, unwilling to shell out the 10 bucks each for the ride to the top, and then had dinner at a restaurant up on Broadway. It was toward the end of the meal that we observed a lack of any women in the place, and a lot of couples of the same sex dining together. I’m sure they were all business travelers!

Then it was back to the airport for the red-eye home. I should mention here that a week or so before this trip, I happened to be in a chatroom on AOL, and another person sent me a private message. She liked something I had written in my profile. I immediately checked out her profile and read with interest a verse by some poet named Trent Reznor (I really thought she was into poetry). We chatted for a bit and found out that we both lived in Connecticut. I wish I had saved the text of those chat sessions. My screen name was VideoCT - hers was U2Kelly. We agreed to meet online again at a prearranged time to chat, and also exchanged e-mails. I told her I was heading out to Seattle. She advised me to wear flannel and drink lots of coffee. I offered to send her a postcard, and she sent me her name and address. That’s right, up until this time I don’t think I knew her name, but I could be mistaken. Anyway, it was Rachael Kelly, who it turns out worked at Greater Waterbury Imaging Center. I think I sent that postcard, but I don’t recall.

Over time we continued to meet up for chat sessions and exchanged e-mails, discussing many topics especially movies we both liked, but neither of us suggested exchanging phone numbers...yet.

In early March, with the approach of Grandma and Grandpa’s 50th anniversary, Jeff and I decided to make a video - the first in a 10 year odyssey of memorable family videos. We drove up to Pittsfield on March 11 and did some filming at their house, and all over town, getting shots of all the key locations. We had dinner with Maury and Zelda then drove home. The next day after Jeff left, I decided to give Rachael a call (apparently I did have her number by this point - I think we had decided to meet for a movie at a future date). I called, and thank god she answered. I introduced myself by phone, asked if she thought I would really call, and asked if she wanted to see the movie Outbreak starring Dustin Hoffman and Rene Russo. She agreed, and gave me directions to her house. I made a joke about being in a Delorean, a Back to the Future reference, but she didn’t get it. This was the first in a 10 year odyssey of memorable yet often incomprehensible jokes by yours truly!

I picked her up at her house, we shook hands, and were off to Showcase Cinema in Southington. I don’t recall if we got food or drinks, but probably. Since we both worked in medical related fields, we did a lot of commentary with each other during the movie about the virus becoming airborne and so forth. For the record, there was no hand holding or other monkey business (at this point - more on that later (Not!) ).

After the movie we decided to go to Friendly’s for ice cream. We talked about the movie, and I told her about some of the videos I had made in college. We also discovered that we both prefer bendy straws over straight ones, however I prefer no straw at all. Friendly’s always had nice bendy straws, and to this day whenever I use one, I think of our first date (I know, I am really weird). I took her home, shook her hand again (no, really), and we said good night.

I believe I called her the next night, and that was the beginning of a 10 year odyssey of...ok, that expression is getting a bit tired. That was the start of almost nightly phone calls discussing every manner of subject over the coming weeks and months. I won’t go into every date and activity here, as that is another blog for another day.

The rest of 1995 included other interesting trips. I visited St. Louis for the first of many videos with Dr. Jim Fleshman, a leading colorectal surgeon. This particular video was on repair of rectovaginal fistulas. Here is that warning about skipping to the next paragraph. Apparently for whatever reason, a fistula, or opening, can develop between the rectum and vagina, which you may recall from high school anatomy are adjacent to one another. Well needless to say this can cause all sorts of unpleasantness, so surgeons figured out how to repair it. It is mechanical, as much of surgery is, but still takes skill and superior knowledge of the pelvic anatomy, which is some of the most complex in the body (the next is a close second).

For fun, we (Sean McGovern, the boss’ brother) visited the famous St. Louis Arch. It is quite amazing that there is an elevator which goes up one side to the observation deck, and down the other. I guess it is quite plausible that you could have a Great Glass elevator which can move in any direction.

Incidentally, the surgery did not show up very well, so I went out again to shoot another case in June. That in fact was my first solo trip. Very exciting. I stayed at the Best Western near the hospital (Barnes Jewish Hospital) and having forgotten an XLR audio cable, had to find a Radio Shack to buy one before going to the hospital for the shoot. In 2004 I found myself in a similar situation, in St. Louis needing some audio peripherals before a shoot, and somehow managed to remember exactly where said Radio Shack was. Good brain, good brain, that’s a good brain. Sit, lay down...roll over....now where was I.

Growing up, I remember my mom kept in her wallet one of those metal discs you used to be able to make with a machine, where you can stamp a short message into the metal disc, around the perimeter, and on the other side is an engraving of whatever tourist attraction you bought it from. It is similar to those machines that let you roll a penny into a magical keepsake. Anyway, they had such a machine at the St. Louis airport, and being nostalgic, I made one for Rachael - a metal disc, not the squished penny.

Another interesting shoot was to Atlanta later in the Spring, maybe around April? I stayed at the Emory University hotel, and worked at that hospital with Ira Horowitz. This was not your usual video. I arrived somewhat late to the operating room due to poor directions, filmed a couple of cases (cervical cancer excisions) and then met with Dr. Horowitz to see what else he had planned. He showed me an outline of what he wanted to accomplish. Mind you, this was pre-PowerPoint, actually pre-computers for the most part. So I took the 35MM slides he had made back home with me, but first recorded him narrating each slide. Also had to record an on-camera of him addressing the audience. I think there was a Radio Shack run on this trip also.

We finished up in his office around 11pm, and I enjoyed a delightful vending machine dinner at the hotel - Soda and Andy Capp’s snack mix. Had I known, there are numerous fast food joints just around the corner. Remember, this was pre-internet, so short of calling AAA, it was difficult to get any info before such a trip.

Later in the year, as Rachael and I became inseparable, we decided to take a vacation to Europe in August. Rachael had a bunch of brochures from Contiki, and travel tour company. They had both a one week and two week trip all around Western Europe. We decided the 2-week trip looked fantastic, but as a relatively new employee, I wasn’t sure I could get the time off. Well I asked and was given the time off. As the Summer passed, and we did mini golf, lots of movies, camping trips to Hamonassett, and various other activities, and I also got to know her parents Mike and Elizabeth, we prepared for our trip. That, however, will be the next blog, because for me it is time for beddy-bye.