Reading: "Satran Kaevon" (A.Glass 2017) *In three parts*. New book due August 2023. Title and Cover Art soon.

Dr Casey Ellis

461 E 57th Street,

New York

"How have you been Caitlin?" Dr Casey Ellis asks, as he sits down opposite Caitlin Feldstein, a senior psychologist in his late forties, slightly balding, shorter man. Who has been Feldstein's colleague and mentor, but more as a trusted fellow psychologist who she has conferred with over the years.

"Thinking about Dad a lot at the moment, dreams, some recollections..."

"You were eleven when he was in combat in the first Gulf War. Like we have discussed, it is still a vivid memory. A parent who was not at home, your father, and he was in danger. Both you and your mother would have bore the brunt of that distress. Maybe more so with you, in the sense of not fully understanding why he was serving overseas, as a soldier. In combat."

"Yes, we have talked about that..." Feldstein looks out from Dr Ellis window, she then looks at her colleague. "...I have reconciled a lot of issues, especially with the relationships that I had with my parents. Obviously more with my mother. It's the memories..."

"And they will be persistent, that is what we also talked about, the memories, trauma and mourning...It just doesn't disappear overnight."

"I know, that is what I say to my patients," Feldstein replies smiling.

"Yes, but we are not talking about them Caitlin...You're only human. We're all good at detaching oneself from the self. In most cases, it is done to not deal with the self. An act, by simply putting on a face, going out, interacting while casting a projection of calm."

"Which is false"

"That's right...like I said, as you are aware as a fellow psychologist, that we all create an act. Which is a mechanism for survival. But, at the cost of suppressing built up emotions that we need to unravel. Not suppress."

"I don't feel like I am suppressing anything in relation to my father, it has been along time with therapy...You've helped a lot Casey, also my own training, self analysis...No, it's just..."

"The dreams Caitlin, this is of a recent occurrence?"

"Yes, but it's different...The mourning, knowing that I would never see my father again, even though I was eleven when he left to Iraq. I can, very clearly, remember him taking me to the local park, buying me an ice-cream. Making me laugh...feeling safe with him. When he was killed..." Feldstein pauses, she looks down. "...So long ago…". She then looks up at her colleague. "...I don't think it is necessary to go through the events that lead up to his death."

Dr Ellis sits back into his chair, looking at Feldstein.

"Lifelike?"

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Reading:  "Satran Kaevon"  (A.Glass 2017) *In three parts*