 Canadian Journal of Ophthalmology The official journal of the Canadian Ophthalmological Society |
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Volume 36, no.6, October 2001 |
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| Editorial September 11, 2001 The mood in the barbershop the second week of September was very sombre. The conversation of clients with my barber was varied and reflected the common man’s thoughts about how his world had changed. Ash, the barber, is Lebanese, and many times we have discussed the events of the Middle East, my visit to Jerusalem and Gaza. We both understand the incubator that the Middle East has become for trouble, hostility and hatred. It was the start of the academic year. Already we were feeling the consequences of the attack on the World Trade Center. Attendance was full, as the Sally Letson Symposium and the Canadian Society of Cataract and Refractive Surgery meeting had been cancelled. No one was particularly interested in travelling. On this occasion, Dr. Ernie Hodges gave me a large framed poster of the Human Genome as detailed by Celera Genomics. He had purchased the poster at a shop in the World Trade Center on a recent visit to New York. The completion of the Human Genome project was a remarkable accomplishment of industry and the peaceful use of science and technology. As colleagues know, at rounds, I have made a tradition of starting the academic year with a talk about the books I read over the summer and the inspiration I derive from them for the year ahead. This summer’s reading was quite varied. I wanted to reread Antoine de Saint-Exupéry’s Le petit prince.1 The author dedicated the book to a grown-up who was once a child. “He lives in France, where he is hungry and cold. He needs to be comforted.” There is a quote from the book that had been shared with me: “On ne voit bien qu’avec le cœur. L’essentiel est invisible pour les yeux.” If my francophone colleagues will permit my interpretation: “It is not what one sees with the eyes that is most important, but what one sees with the heart.” Let’s make certain that our hearts are strong and filled with the beauty of the world we live in and not the hatred of others. Our hearts go out to our American colleagues. Ian M. MacDonald, MD, CM Editor-in-Chief Reference 1. de Saint-Exupéry A. Le petit prince. New York: Harcourt; 1943. |
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