Episode 14: Tell Me Sweet Little Lies
January 22, 2006
Opening:
As doctors, we’re trained to be skeptical… because our patients lie to us all the time. The rule is: every patient is a liar until proven honest.
Lying is bad. Or so we’re told. Constantly, from birth. “Honesty is the best policy.” “The truth shall set you free.” “I chopped down the cherry tree.”
Whatever. The fact is, lying is a necessity. We lie to ourselves because the truth… the truth freaking hurts.
Closing:
No matter how hard we try to ignore it or deny it, eventually the lies fall away… whether we like it, or not.
But, here’s the truth about the truth: It hurts. So… we lie.
Episode 15: Break on Through
January 29, 2006
Opening:
In surgery, there’s a red line on the floor that marks the point where the hospital goes from being accessible to being off-limits to all but a special few. Crossing the line unauthorized, is not tolerated.
In general, lines are there for a reason. For safety. For security. For clarity. If you choose to cross the line, you pretty much do so at your own risk. So why is it… that the bigger the line, the greater the temptation to cross it?
Closing:
We can’t help ourselves. We see a line, we want to cross it. Maybe it’s the thrill of trading the familiar, for the unfamiliar. A sort of personal dare. only problem is… once you’ve crossed, it’s almost impossible to go back.
But, if you do manage to make it back across that line, you find safety in numbers.
Episode 16: It’s the End of the World
February 5, 2006
Opening:
It’s a look, patients get in their eyes. There’s a scent. The smell of death. Some kind of sixth sense. When the great beyond is headed for you, you feel it coming.
What’s the one thing you’ve always dreamed of doing before you die?
(Shower dream sequence) Okay… Hello? Clearly not my dream.
(George falls out of bed) See? I told you. Not my dream.
Episode 17: As We Know It
February 12, 2006
(Part II of the two-part bomb story line. No closing monologue in part I, and part II’s opening monologue is nearly identical to part I)
Opening:
In hospitals, they say you know. You know when you’re going to die. Some doctors say it’s a look patients get in their eyes. Some say there’s a scent, the smell of death. Some think there’s just some kind of sixth sense. When the great beyond is heading for you, you feel it coming.
Whatever it is, it’s creepy. Because if you know… what do you do about it? Forget about the fact that you’re scared out of your mind.
If you knew this was your last day on Earth, how would you want to spend it?
Closing:
If you knew this was your last day on Earth… how would you want to spend it?
Episode 18: Yesterday
February 19, 2006
Opening:
After careful consideration and many sleepless nights, here’s what I’ve decided: There’s no such thing as a grown-up.
We move on, we move out, we move away from our families and form our own. But the basic insecurities, the basic fears, and all those old wounds just grow up with us. And just when we think that life and circumstance have forced us to truly, once and for all, become an adult… your mother, says something… like that. Or worse, something like that.
We get bigger, we get taller, we get older. But, for the most part, we’re still a bunch of kids, running around the playground, trying desperately to fit in.
Closing:
I’ve heard that it’s possible to grow up. I’ve just never met anyone who’s actually done it. Without parents to defy, we break the rules we make for ourselves. We throw tantrums when things don’t go our way.
We whisper secrets with our best friends in the dark. We look for comfort where we can find it. And we hope… against all logic, against all experience. Like children, we never give up hope.
Episode 19: What Have I Done to Deserve This?
February 26, 2006
Opening:
(George’s Monologue)
Okay, so, sometimes… even the best of us make rash decisions. Bad decisions. Decisions we pretty much know we’re going to regret the moment… the minute… especially the morning after. I mean, maybe not “regret” regret, because at least… you know, we put ourselves out there… But still, something inside us decides to do a crazy thing, a thing we know will probably turn around and bite us in the ass. Yet… we do it anyway.
What I’m saying is… we reap what we sow. What comes around, goes around. It’s karma. And, any way you slice it… karma sucks…
Like I was saying… payback’s a bitch.
Closing:
One way or another, our karma… will leave us to face ourselves. We can look our karma in the eye, or we can wait for it to sneak up on us from behind. One way or another, our karma will always find us.
And the truth is, as surgeons, we have more chances than most to set the balance in our favor. But no matter how hard we try, we can’t escape our karma. It follows us home.
I guess we can’t really complain about karma. It’s not unfair, it’s not unexpected. It just… evens the score. And even when we’re about to do something we know will tempt karma to bite us in the ass… Well, it goes without saying… we do it anyway.
Episode 20: Band-Aid Covers the Bullet Hole
March 12, 2006
Opening:
As doctors, patients are always telling us how they would do our jobs. “Just stitch me up, slap a Band-Aid on it, and send me home.” It’s easy to suggest a quick solution, when you don’t know much about the problem, when you don’t understand the underlying cause, or just how deep the wound really is.
The first step toward a real cure, is to know exactly what the disease is to begin with. But, that’s not what people want to hear.
We’re supposed to forget the past that landed us here, ignore the future complications that might arise, and go for the quick fix…
Closing:
As doctors, as friends, as human beings, we all try to do the best we can. But the world is full of unexpected twists and turns. And just when you’ve gotten the lay of the land, the ground underneath you shifts, and knocks you off your feet.
If you’re lucky, you end up with nothing more than a flesh wound, something a Band-Aid will cover. But, some wounds are deeper than they first appear, and require more than just a quick fix.
With some wounds, you have to rip off the Band-Aid, let them breathe, and give them time… to heal.
Episode 21: Superstition
March 19, 2006
Opening:
My college campus has a magic statue. It’s a long-standing tradition for students to rub its nose for good luck. My freshman roommate really believed in the statue’s power, and insisted on visiting it to rub its nose before every exam. Studying might have been a better idea. She flunked out her sophomore year.
But the fact is, we all have little superstitious things that we do. If it’s not believing in magic statues, it’s avoiding sidewalk cracks, or always putting our left shoe on first.
Knock on wood. Step on a crack, break your mother’s back…
The last thing we want to do, is offend the gods.
Closing:
Superstition lies in the space between what we can control… and what we can’t. Find a penny, pick it up, and all day long you’ll have good luck. No one wants to pass up a chance for good luck. but does saying it 33 times really help? Is anyone really listening? And, if no one’s listening, why do we bother doing those strange things at all?
We rely on superstitions because we’re smart enough to know we don’t have all the answers. And, that life works in mysterious ways. Don’t dis the juju… from wherever it comes.
Episode 22: The Name of the Game
April 2, 2006
Opening:
A good basketball game can have us all on the edge of our seats. Games are about the glory, the pain, and the play-by-play. And then, there are the more solitary games. The games we each play all by ourselves.
The social games, the mind games, we use them to pass the time. To make life more interesting. To distract us, from what’s really going on. There are those of us who love to play games. Any game.
And, there are those of us who love to play… a little too much.
Closing:
Life is not a spectator sport. Win, lose or draw, the game is in progress, whether we want it to be, or not. So, go ahead, argue with the refs, change the rules… cheat a little, take a break… and tend to your wounds. But play. Play. Play hard. Play fast. Play loose and free. Play as if there’s no tomorrow.
Okay, so it’s not whether you win or lose… it’s how you play the game. Right?
Episode 23: Blues for Sister Someone
April 30, 2006
Opening:
The key to being a successful intern is what we give up. Sleep, friends, a normal life. We sacrifice it all for that one amazing moment. That moment when you can legally call yourself a surgeon.
There are days that make the sacrifices seem worthwhile. And then t here are the days, where everything feels like a sacrifice. And then, there are the sacrifices that you can’t even figure out why you’re making.
Closing:
A wise man once said, “You can have anything in life, if you will sacrifice everything else for it.” What he meant is, nothing comes without a price. So, before you go into battle, you better decide how much you’re willing to lose.
Too often, going after what feels good, means letting go of what you know is right. And letting someone in, means abandoning the walls you’ve spent a lifetime building.
Of course, the toughest sacrifices are the ones we don’t see coming. When we don’t have time to come up with a strategy, to pick a side, or to measure the potential loss. When that happens, when the battle chooses us, and not the other way around, that’s when the sacrifice can turn out to be more than we can bear.
Episode 24: Damage Case
May 7, 2006
Opening:
We all go through life like bulls in a china shop. A chip here, a crack there. Doing damage to ourselves. To other people. The problem is trying to figure out how to control the damage we have done. Or that’s been done to us. Sometimes the damage catches us by surprise. Sometimes we think we can fix the damage.
And sometimes, the damage is something we can’t even see…
Closing:
We’re all damaged, it seems. Some of us, more than others. We carry the damage with us from childhood. Then, as grown-ups, we give as good as we get. Ultimately, we all do damage.
And then… we set about the business of fixing… whatever we can.
Episode 25: 17 Seconds
May 14, 2006
Opening:
In life we are taught that there are seven deadly sins. We all know the big ones: Gluttony, pride, lust. But the sin you don’t hear much about is anger. Maybe it’s because we think anger’s not that dangerous. That we can control it.
My point is, maybe we don’t give anger enough credit. Maybe it can be a lot more dangerous than we think. After all, when it comes to destructive behavior… it did make the top seven.
Closing:
So, what makes anger different from the six other deadly sins? It’s pretty simple, really. You give in to a sin like envy or pride, then you only hurt yourself. Try lust, or coveting, and you’ll only hurt yourself, and probably one or two others.
But anger… Anger is the worst. The mother of all sins. Not only can anger drag you over the edge, but when it does, you can take an awful lot of other people with you.
Episode 26/27: Deterioration of the Fight or Flight Response/Losing My Religion
May 15, 2006
Opening:
(Voice overs by members of cast)
(Meredith) Human beings need a lot of things to feel alive.
(George) Family.
(Cristina) Love.
(Izzie) Sex.
(Derek) But we only need one thing…
(Burke) To actually be alive.
(Cristina) We need a beating heart.
(Addison) When our heart is threatened…
(Alex) We respond in one of two ways.
(George) We either run…
(Burke) Or…
(Izzie) We attack.
(Richard) There’s a scientific term for this.
(Alex) Fight…
(Addison) Or flight.
(Bailey) It’s instinct.
(Meredith) We can’t control it.
(Izzie) Or can we?