Bread and Butter
Shattering the relative peace of an early Sunday morning, a chorus of assorted ringtones echoes through the emergency department where I work as an attending physician. The noise is a heads-up from an incoming ambulance, directed to the ED staff members’ portable phones.
I sigh and set down the cup of cafeteria coffee I’d been enjoying: The pace of the day is about to pick up. I unclip my phone from the waistband of my scrub pants. Sitting next to me, Ben, the senior resident, grabs his phone from the pocket of his fleece vest.