The session went well, he thought. Nothing particularly exciting, nothing dramatic. But some steady progress. The young woman on the couch was a third-year psychiatric social worker, seeking to gain her psychoanalytic certificate while bypassing medical school. It was neither the most efficient, nor the easiest route to becoming an analyst, and was a course frowned on by some of his stodgier colleagues because it didn’t include the traditional medical degree, but was a method he’d always admired. It took real passion for the profession, a single-minded devotion to the couch and what it could accomplish. He often conceded to himself that it had been years since he’d been called upon to utilize theM.D. that followed his name. The young woman’s therapy centered around a set of overly aggressive parents who’d created an atmosphere in her childhood charged with accomplishment, but lacking in affection. Consequently, in her sessions with Ricky, she was frequently impatient, eager for insights that dovetailed with her textual readings and course work at the midtown Institute for Psychoanalysis. Ricky was forever reining her in, trying to get her to see that knowing facts is not necessarily the same as understanding.

When he coughed slightly, shifted in his seat, and said, “Well, I’m afraid that’s all the time we have for today,” the young woman, who had been describing a new boyfriend of questionable potential, sighed. “Well, we’ll see if he’s still around a month from now…”-which made Ricky smile.

The patient swung her feet off the couch and said, “Have a nice vacation, doctor. I’ll see you after Labor Day.” Then she gathered her pocketbook and briskly exited the treatment room.

The entire day seemed to fall together in routine normalcy.