Responses from Readers
Bryson City Tales
Reminiscent of authors like Philip Gulley, Larimore keeps readers laughing through one chapter and teary-eyed through the next.
Christian Retailing
If you are like me, then you love to read books that involve small-town environments. I immediately fell in love with Walt and his small family and then proceeded to laugh my way through the rest of the book as Walt talks about several of the medical events that he has been a part of. Walt will quickly learn that the residents of Bryson City will teach him far more about medicine than he ever learned at Duke. I can guarantee that you’ll love this book.
Shelby Bagby, thebestreviews.com
Dr. Larimore’s insights into the life of a small town doctor are both hysterical and touching. His ability to fit in (eventually) is a testament to both his training and his iron will. If you haven’t had the opportunity to live in a small town and experience its comfort and beauty, take a stroll with Dr. Larimore through the hearts of Bryson City. He’s inspired this “man of the West” to pack up the camping gear and visit a world seldom seen, nor appreciated, by too many Americans.
David B. Salkeld
Dr. Larimore’s tales of his first year of medical practice was an enlightening, heartwarming, funny, most enjoyable read. Once I started to read it, I felt somehow drawn in by it and compelled to finish it overnight!! I encourage any and all to experience this wonderful book. Dr. Larimore has truly been blessed with a gift for not only storytelling but in the sharing of his gift of healing, in not only a physical but spiritual realm as well.
Ellen Malloy
Bryson City Seasons
Those readers who enjoy Philip Gulley’s Front Porch series or James Herriot’s veterinary tales will embrace this Christian doctor’s latest homespun reflections on his life and medical practice in a small town.
Cindy Crosby, FaithfulReader.com
“I’m hoping one day to be a ‘certified storyteller,’ ” writes Walt Larimore in the Author’s Notes at the end of Bryson City Seasons. Once you’ve read this book, you’ll be happy to grant him that certification, for Larimore is already a consummate storyteller. Part fiction, part real, the stories Larimore tells about the life of a small-town doctor will make you feel as though you’ve stepped much further back in time than the early 1980s when these events took place.
christianbookpreviews.com
Dr. Larimore’s conversational and folksy storytelling style captivates the reader. Dr. Larimore is skilled at weaving various colored threads (humanistic, spiritual, scientific) throughout the fabric of each of his stories. These “threads” teach us about the important things in life — coping with adversity, the value of religious faith, and even the art and science of medicine. The book conveys an appeal to the healthcare professional and layperson alike. The author has taken the approach to clearly articulate medical jargon in terms easily understood by the medically naive reader. The book is a must-read for medical students contemplating family medicine as a specialty, and, likewise, family medicine residents should find this intimate glimpse of rural family practice both educational and inspirational.
Charles D. Ponte, The Annals of Pharmacotherapy,
Harvey Whitney Books
Resources by Walt Larimore, M.D.
Alternative Medicine: The Christian Handbook
(coauthored with Dónal O’Mathúna)
Bryson City Seasons
Bryson City Secrets
Bryson City Tales
God’s Design for the Highly Healthy Child
(with Stephen and Amanda Sorenson)
God’s Design for the Highly Healthy Person
(with Traci Mullins)
God’s Design for the Highly Healthy Teen
(with Mike Yorkey)
Going Public with Your Faith: Becoming a Spiritual Influence at Work
(coauthored with William Carr Peel)
Going Public with Your Faith: Becoming a Spiritual Influence at Work audio
(coauthored with William Carr Peel)
Going Public with Your Faith: Becoming a Spiritual Influence at Work ZondervanGroupwareTM curriculum
(coauthored with William Carr Peel, with Stephen and
Amanda Sorenson)
Lintball Leo’s Not-So-Stupid Questions About Your Body
(with John Riddle, illustrated by Mike Phillips)
SuperSized Kids: How to Rescue Your Child from the Obesity Threat
(coauthored with Sherri Flynt, with Steve Halliday)
Why A.D.H.D. Doesn’t Mean Disaster
(coauthored with Dennis Swanberg and Diane Passno)
ZONDERVAN
BRYSON CITY Secrets
Copyright © 2006 by Walt Larimore
All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. By payment of the required fees, you have been granted the non-exclusive, non-transferable right to access and read the text of this e-book on-screen. No part of this text may be reproduced, transmitted, down-loaded, decompiled, reverse engineered, or stored in or introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereinafter invented, without the express written permission of Zondervan.
ePub Edition June 2009 ISBN: 0-310-86123-3
Requests for information should be addressed to:
Zondervan, Grand Rapids, Michigan 49530
* * *
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Larimore, Walter L.
Bryson City secrets : even more tales of a small-town doctor in the Smoky Mountains / Walt Larimore.
p. cm.
ISBN-13: 978-0-310-26633-4
1. Larimore, Walter L. 2. Physicians — North Carolina — Bryson City — Biography. 3. Medicine, Rural — North Carolina — Bryson City. I. Title.
R154.L267A3 2005
610'.92 — dc22
2005017451
* * *
Some Scripture quotations are taken from the Holy Bible: New International Version®. NIV®. Copyright © 1973, 1978, 1984 by International Bible Society. Used by permission of Zondervan. All rights reserved. Some Scripture quotations are taken from the Holy Bible: Today’s New International VersionTM. Copyright © 2001, 2005 by International Bible Society. Used by permission of Zondervan. All rights reserved.
All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means — electronic, mechanical, photocopy, recording, or any other — except for brief quotations in printed reviews, without the prior permission of the publisher.
Published in association with the literary agency of Alive Communications, Inc., 7680 Goddard Street, Suite 200, Colorado Springs, CO 80920.
* * *
06 07 08 09 10 11 17 16 15 14 13 12 11 10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1
To my dad — Philip B. Larimore Jr.
Only recently did I learn he was one of the most
decorated heroes of World War II.
But he’s always been my hero.
He lovingly counseled me through the difficult
and dark year described in this book.
I wish he had lived to see it in print.
To Rick Pyeritz, M.D. — my partner,
colleague, and teacher for seven years.
He was our family physician and our dearest friend.
His love and care for the Larimores will always
be appreciated and
never forgotten.
CONTENTS
Cover Page
Title Page
Copyright
Map of Bryson City
Prologue
Part 1
1. Bloody Mess
2. The Scene Speaks
3. Hearts of Darkness
4. Satan and Bacon
5. Aromatherapy
6. A Healing Potion
7. First-Day Memory
8. Sorrow and Speculation
9. Too Late?
10. Terror
11. A Threefold Cord
Part 2
12. Good for Business
13. Baby’s First Words
14. Live and Learn
15. Hornet’s Nest
16. King Arthur
17. Womanless Wedding
18. A Glorious Sadness
19. Makin’ Moonshine
20. Three Amigos
21. The Rifle
22. The Shot
23. The Quilts
Part 3
24. The Golden Hour
25. Beer and Breathing
26. A Bitter Pill
27. Azar
28. The Ultimate Healing
29. A Tough Decision
30. The Shock
31. The Puppets
32. The Confrontation
33. Three Wise Men
34. Leaving
Epilogue
Author’s Notes
About the Publisher
Share Your Thoughts
Prologue
I had just arrived home after a particularly difficult Friday at work where nothing seemed to go right. I was looking forward to a quiet evening with Barb, my soul mate and spouse of twenty-nine years, and I didn’t like to bring home any negative emotional baggage to the woman I had known since our kindergarten days and had married when we were both twenty-one.
I had learned over the years of my career as a family physician to “dump” while traveling home from the office or hospital each evening any anger, frustration, and irritation that had collected during the day. I always wanted to arrive home with a good attitude when I began an evening with my family — which at this point in our family life meant Barb. We had been in the empty nest for two years and were enjoying every moment.
While working together to prepare the evening meal, we talked about the day. Even though I had left behind the day’s frustration, I knew it was important to Barb that I share what had happened — and I enjoyed hearing about her day. These times together gave us the opportunity to debrief. It was a habit we developed when she put me through medical school in New Orleans more than twenty-five years before.
While we were doing the dishes that night, the phone rang. Barb pushed on the speakerphone with a soapy finger. “Hello,” she cheerfully greeted the caller.
“Mom?” I heard the voice of our twenty-four-year-old daughter, Kate.
“Hi, honey.” I could hear the smile in Barb’s voice. Her winsome and positive attitude usually won her instant friendship with strangers.
Kate’s voice, however, was somber and heavy. It didn’t have the light and merry cadence she had inherited from her mother and usually displayed. “Mom, I need to tell both you and Dad something before I lose my courage, so can you get Dad on the line?”
Barb’s voice became serious and concerned. “Are you OK, honey?”
I was immediately on the alert. Kate was an intern at the White House in Washington, D.C. The semester before graduating from Samford University in 2002 with a bachelor of arts degree in English, she had been selected to serve in the speech-writing office for the president of the United States. For a young woman with cerebral palsy — one who was never supposed to walk or talk — she did both very well.
Because she lived in Washington, D.C., we were concerned about her safety and were always delighted to hear from her. But when I heard Kate’s voice and my wife’s concerned question, I turned to face the phone.
“I’m fine physically. Just get Dad on the line!” I immediately looked at Barb with alarm. Kate’s voice sounded so desperate — it had an almost snappish quality. My eyes met Barb’s, and I walked over to her. I spoke toward the phone so Kate could hear me. “Hi, honey. I’m here. Mom’s got you on speakerphone. What’s up?”
There was a very pregnant pause — which indicated to me that Kate was upset about something. As I waited, I could hear her sniffle. Then she answered softly. “Three weeks ago, I had a horrible thought . . .”
Barb and I slowly sat down at the table in our breakfast nook, with its marvelous view of the Colorado Front Range and of Pike’s Peak softening in the cool evening’s twilight. As I dried my hands, I said, “Tell me about it, precious.”
Kate paused again. “. . . about Mickey Thompson.”
I felt my heart skip a beat. I always tried to keep Mickey as far from my mind as possible — for just about every time I did think of him, I was overcome with emotion.
Almost uncontrollably, my memories rushed back in time, to eighteen years earlier when we still lived in Bryson City. How could something so far in our past still cause so much pain? I wondered, as I felt my heart pounding in my chest.
I took a deep breath. “Tell us about it, Katel.” Katel was one of my nicknames for Kate. It came from seeing “Kate L.” on a label on her backpack the first day she went to school.
I reached out and took Barb’s hand.
As Kate continued, I could feel a cold clammy sadness penetrating into the deep recesses of my soul. Barb squeezed my hand as her eyes filled with tears.
Kate burst into fresh tears. “Daddy, tell me it’s just a bad dream. Tell me it didn’t happen,” she pleaded. “Can you have nightmares during the day?” Kate implored.
My mind went blank. My hands were trembling.
Yes, I thought to myself, you can have a nightmare during the day.
And another one had just begun for the Larimores.
part one
chapter one
BLOODY MESS
Hey, Walt.”
I recognized Rick’s voice on the other end of the line. Rick Pyer-itz and I were both family physicians and had practiced together for four years. Before moving to Bryson City in 1981, we had been family medicine residents together at Duke University Medical Center.
“What’s up?” I asked him.
“I need some help, partner. I’m over in the ER sewing up a woman who stabbed herself several times. When the EMTs brought her in, she was hysterical, so I had to sedate her pretty heavily. Anyway, Don and Billy said she apparently murdered her husband in their home and then tried to do herself in. Since I’m going to be here awhile, would you be willing to go to the crime scene and do the medical examiner’s report?”
My heart began to beat a bit more quickly, as it always did when I received a call from the emergency room or a summons to the scene of a crime, and I suspected that the suspense of the unknown — of the surprises one might find waiting — would keep on giving me a sense of nervousness and trepidation every time a call came. Nevertheless, I tried to sound cool, calm, and collected. It’s a skill doctors are taught early in their training. “Be glad to help, Rick. Where’s the house?”
“It’s up a hollow just off Deep Creek. Don and Billy are taking the ambulance back over there. They say you can follow them.”
“Let me throw on some scrubs. Five minutes?”
“I’ll have them wait in their unit at the end of your driveway.”
“Sounds good, Rick.”
I hung up the phone and walked to our bedroom to put on my scrubs. I smiled as I looked at the bedroom furniture I had given to Barb, my wife, for our tenth wedding anniversary over a year earlier. Right out of medical school in Durham, North Carolina, we had moved to this quaint little house in this charming village with our then nearly three-year-old daughter, Kate. Bryson City is the county seat of Swain County, in the heart of the Great Smoky Mountains. The county is spread over 550 square miles, yet in 1985 i
t only had about 8,000 residents. Less than a thousand people lived in the town. The population was small because the federal government owned 86 percent of the land — and much of it was wilderness.
Since pathology-trained coroners lived only in the larger towns, the non-pathologist doctors in the rural areas often became certified as coroners. We were not expected to do autopsies — only pathologists were trained to perform these — but we were expected to perform all of the non-autopsy responsibilities required of a medical examiner.
Having obtained my training as a coroner while still in training at Duke, I knew the basics of determining the time and suspected cause of death, gathering medical evidence, and filling out the copious triplicate forms required by the state authorities. Not long after receiving the fancy certificate of competence from the state of North Carolina, I was required to put my new forensic skills to work. Through the subsequent years as a medical examiner, the work had become more routine, but never boring.
After putting on my scrubs, I left our house, which was located across the street from the Swain County General Hospital, and jumped into our aging Toyota Corolla. Billy was in the driver’s seat of the ambulance as I pulled up to the end of the driveway. He smiled and waved as he gunned the accelerator and disappeared behind the hospital and down the backside of Hospital Hill.
I had no idea what awaited me at the murder scene, and I tried not to think about it as I followed the Swain County ambulance.
Because medical examiners were required to gather medical evidence for all deaths that occurred outside the hospital, during my first four years in practice I was called on as a coroner in dozens of cases. Nevertheless, I still found my stomach in knots whenever I approached the scene of a crime or unexpected death.
After observing the scene, determining the cause of death was usually straightforward, at least from a medical perspective. But every instance continued to remind me of the finality of death, helping me realize again that death almost always comes unexpectedly, without warning or opportunity for preparation. An even more troublesome aspect of my work as an ME, at least when exploring a murder scene, is that it was an unnerving reminder of people’s inhumanity to people — of the intrinsic evil that can potentially bubble out of any person’s heart, even in an idyllic town I had come to love and call home.
Bryson City Secrets: Even More Tales of a Small-Town Doctor in the Smoky Mountains Page 1
