Healing After Dark: Pioneering Compassionate Medicine at the Boston Evening Clinic by Morris A. Cohen

While there are a number of ways to read into Cohen's memoir, my thoughts took a more holistic view identifying with the philanthropy work involved in providing affordable healthcare, with dignity, to working class people who often couldn't afford healthcare `at any cost', and most certainly not at the rate of exceptional medical care that Cohen (and an initial handful of others risking their personal, professional, and financial welfare) provided `After Dark.'

It was really fascinating to reflect on what makes a person as giving. Sacrificing a steady salary, (or salary altogether), for years on end, particularly faced with such unreceptive opposition, takes internal hard-wiring worth understanding.

Ironically, this hard-wiring is at the heart of this account---those resolutely providing healthcare services to the indigent (supported by the argument, and a plethora of examples, that this service benefited employers, families, and society at large), vs. individuals, companies, and bodies of government(s) whose arguments were admittedly lost on me.

It was difficult reasoning why this type clinic couldn't co-exist with the other healthcare programs or initiatives, and interestingly enough (to put it gingerly) similarly hard reading into the many surly campaigns waged against the clinic.

Healing After Dark is a great testimonial, largely shaped by Richard Cohen, Dr. Cohen's son, whose humbling observations narrating the effects his father's work had on him and his family, that proffered the most convincing bottom-line view to understanding philanthropy work. Simply beautiful.