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Dorota (Almost) Smiles -- Writer's Poke #354




The Doctor knows something about the temporary nature of the human condition. During World War II, he was a young man with a wife and two children. One day, he had to work a long shift at the hospital. When he called home, everything was fine. But when his shift was over and he returned home, he discovered that his home no longer existed. Bombs had left a crater in its place. His family was dead.

This is what the Doctor knows and has personally experienced; so, when Dorota explains to him that she will have an abortion if her husband, his patient, lives, he must make a choice. Dorota forces the Doctor to take responsibility for her actions; put in that position, he elects to lie, telling her that her husband will die.

In the end, Dorota’s husband does not die; however, thanks to the Doctor, she has not had the abortion. She has returned to living her life, and she has told her husband that they are having a baby. She does not tell him that the father of the child is another man’s, but allows him to believe that he in the father. The actual father of the child knew that Dorota was planning to have an abortion, and for him, that would have been a deal breaker. Although we cannot know for certain, it seems as though Dorota, with the Doctor’s help, has made her choice. She stays in the marriage and raises the child. She can’t have it all, but instead of sacrificing the child, she will sacrifice her lover.

What do you think about the lies both Dorota and the Doctor tell?

“We are not animals. We are not a product of what has happened to us in our past. We have the power of choice.” – Stephen Covey

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