I was at the port buying a ferry ticket to the mainland when I first heard the news. "The doctor died last night in his bed!" someone said to me. "Komatta, ne!" Yes, it was problematic, but not necessarily for the immediate reasons you'd think.

There is only one medical clinic for the population of 550 people on Shiraishi, our island in the Seto inland Sea. Our very kind doctor, who was known to dispense medicine without requiring a medical exam, was 78. A darling diminutive man with a robust head of hair and a frail voice, he donned a suit every day and led a relentless life of doctoring, which may very well have done him in. Two days a week he visited outlying islands with declining populations where there were no longer medical practitioners. While he served our local populace four days a week, two of those days were open to patients from the island next door (of 200 people), patients who came over on the ferry as necessary.

More than a medical doctor, he was a prescriber of medicines and distributor of mental salves. When I went to him for a sprained ankle, he could offer only pain medication, and I had to wait a full week before I was mobile enough to get to a mainland clinic with an orthopedic surgeon, X-ray machines and crutches. When I went to our dear doctor for body aches, he prescribed rest. When I went to him with a bout of lateral epicondylitis (tennis elbow), he suggested nothing more than elbow R&R.