I’ve just arrived home from an ear surgery wherein a hole in my eardrum was patched. While the eventual outcome and success of the surgery remains to be seen, the experience is already overwhelmingly gratitude inducing. Some things for which I am grateful, in no particular order:

1. To live in a time where eardrum holes can be cheaply diagnosed, and relatively minor outpatient surgeries to patch eardrum holes exist.
2. That the surgery can be relatively minor due to incredible medical technology which allows the whole thing to be done laproscopically through the ear canal.
3. That the surgery itself can be pain free because by quirks of human physiology, general anaesthesia…exists. And smart/brave/insane people already did the work of discovering it!
4. To live in Boston, home of Mass Eye and Ear, which empirically seems to be brimming with doctors and nurses who are both competent and kind.
5. To be blessed with a generous wife who, without reservation, takes care of me pre- and post-op, and who knocks days out of her schedule to do so. I can’t adequately convey how kind Leyla has been throughout this process.
6. To have a great job with great benefits where I can easily take time off to look after my health, and I do not fear professional or financial consequences for doing so.
7. That my coworkers are keeping the company running smoothly without me in my absence.
8. To have the material security to not worry about health-finance interactions: health insurance, a safe-clean-comfortable house to recover in, etc.
9. That my family and friends are thinking of me and checking in on how I’m doing.
10. That nature has seen fit to endow me with two working ears so that I can hear even during the early stages of recovery!