[C404]Chapter 1 The End

The time and place was New York's Lennox Hill Hospital on Wednesday at 11:30 in the antemeridian during the warm month of May; where we see Britta Swen welcoming her patient and friend Rosa Diaz O'Leary. Britta is a gynecologist who like many of New York's doctors had immigrated. Britta having done so from her native country of Sweden to the USA where she did her postgraduate studies at Cornel University.
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Britta originally had not intended to stay on in the USA but to go back to her hometown in Sweden where she had always wanted to practice medicine. Her plans were changed however when her father, Thomas Swen was given a post at the Swedish consulate in New York City. Britta was a person who many considered to be impractical when it come to things such as money so it would be fare to say that financial reward was not what prevented her from going back to her hometown but the wanting to be close to her mother whom she allowed for better or for worse to guide her life.

Britta was a woman who to many in America represented their stereotypical idea of what the Nordic woman was like. She was light skinned in a rosy tone that made it easy for her face as well as the rest of her body to freckle up in the summer given the low amount of pigmentation she had. Her eyes were blue so much so that it was difficult not to take notice of them even for those who tended to be nonobservant of such details.

On the whole hers was the kind of face that was nice to look at as all her features were ideally proportioned from her nose which was perfectly straight to her lips which could not have been better suited to the rest of her face had Michael Angelo himself painted them. All those features which also included high check bones were served to the viewer in a face that was oval in shape while being framed with golden; almost yellow locks of hair that came down from her head and went past her shoulders. How lovely was this ever so slightly wavy hair which she took great pride in, almost as much as she did in her blue eyes. This long thin hair which flowed down resembling honey pouring out of a jar when ever the sun's ray would strike it just right made her as imposing a sight as those pagan Nordic goddesses whose magnificence had impressed her so when she was in her childhood.

Yes, she was definitely pretty perhaps overly some might say to make her beautiful as she did not posses any of those perhaps faults that create character which in the opinion of some were the essence of what true beauty was.

Body wise, her height was one that could be considered tall with her standing at 175 cm while being thin weighing in at 65 kilograms with small breast which were not uncommon for women in her country given that statistically speaking they were said to have the smallest in Europe.

Britta was born in Gothenburg, a city situated north of Sweden's capital Stockholm; where she spend the first years of her life as the only daughter of Thomas Swen and Inga Johansson who had her only daughter at the age of thirty after having started her profession as pediatrician. To many people the marriage of these two individuals who were her parents was a union of opposites if not two people who should have never joined one another in any kind of union let alone one of holy matrimony. Inga was a woman of great beauty (her daughter being almost an exact replica of her) which was not to say that Thomas was really ugly but the truth was that all those around could not imagine why she had chosen him. She was a woman who though her ambitions did not include fame or fortune; they at least did make her want to be the best she could be in her chosen medical profession. Perhaps it was not only professional desire but the caring person she was who did really care about her patients in a way that went beyond her medical profession. It was all this that really made her an outstanding doctor; contrary to those in the hospitals were she had worked at who only sought to perform their duties well so they might be promoted to the head of a department or perhaps hospital, she was more then content to simply be a doctor who had her patients? trust.

All this in her was in clear difference to her husband who was not only plain in looks with features that followed the norm of his country men which were the blue eyes and the blonde hair but contrary to his wife, his face was not nice to look at. His eyes being small with a nose that like his mouth was simply unpleasant which perhaps made him look nastier then his demeanor really was. Professionally speaking was another place where these two separated as unlike his wife; Thomas was not a man of ambition in any sense of the word. He not only did not care to make money but he did not necessarily even care to be good at the job he had; believing that work was a place where one spend time till one got paid. It was precisely this reason why he never rose above that of a minor government worker who on many an occasion more for his wife's family connections then his skill had been sent abroad to represent Sweden in minor posts which though not overly important had granted him a very good salary. This income being the standard for all government workers when ever serving abroad. As for Inga she had been the one who to a large part had sacrificed her own career in favor of her husband as she was not allowed to practice medicine in many of the countries were they had been sent to given that she did not have a license.

In many ways Britta had had a life that many might want and even envy. She had traveled to many places with her parents; spending a lot of time in those countries in which her father had held positions for the Swedish government. All this allowing her to learn several foreign languages that included Portuguese along with French added to English and all those Scandinavian languages such as Danish and Norwegian which the average Swede could understand without major difficulties.

Her childhood had been nice in many ways but happiness was something that had never been hers and this was basically due to her father who in his intensions had wanted else then what he would accomplish which was to have his daughter dread him. He being one of those who had never really accomplished much made it that he desired to push his daughter to what he had not achieved but instead of being a motivator turned in to a small minded tyrant who often made his daughter cry when ever she turned to him for support.

Compounded to this was the fact that Britta was a complicated person in the meaning that she was one who had about her so many contradictions and inner conflicts that she was in constant struggle not only with herself but with everything around her from her strong faith in God to her body to her sexuality to her career. Everything to her was complex as was her life and the way she had made it which influenced all the relationships she had with all those around her like parents, relatives, suitors and even God whose judgment she was in constant fear of.

Britta was a woman of thirty three years of age who had graduated medical school at a relatively young age more because of the long hours she had dedicated to her studies then to being a student of brilliance. She also earned what she considered to be a good deal of money as it was more then she would have made in her own country where the social medical system did not allow physicians to become wealthy.