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A Memoir
by Carolyn Jourdan
Book Reviewed by:Heart in the Right Place, an alternately laugh-out-loud-funny and cry-your-eyes-out-serious memoir about the down-sizing of Carolyn Jourdan's life from white marble columns, gilded domes, and Neiman Marcus to naugahyde, peeling linoleum, and Wal-mart.
Carolyn Jourdan had it all: the Mercedes Benz,
the fancy soirees, the best clothes. She moved in the most exclusive circles in
Washington, D.C., rubbed elbows with big politicians, and worked on Capitol
Hill. As far as she was concerned, she was changing the world.
And then her mother had a heart attack. Carolyn came home to help her father
with his rural medical practice in the Tennessee mountains. She'd fill in for a
few days as the receptionist until her mother could return to work. Or so she
thought. But days turned into weeks.
Her job now included following hazmat regulations for cleaning up bodily
fluids; maintaining composure when confronted with a splinter the size of a
steak knife; distinguishing between a "pain," a "strain," and a "sprain" on
indecipherable Medicare forms; and tending to the loquacious Miss Hiawatha,
whose daily doctor visits were never billed.
Eventually, Jourdan gave up her Mercedes and made do with a twenty-year-old
postal jeep. She shed her suits for scrubs. And the funny thing was, she liked
her new life. As she watched her father work tirelessly and uncomplainingly, she
saw what making a difference really meant: being on call all hours of the day
and night, tolerating the local drug addict's frequent phone calls, truly
listening to Miss Hiawatha. It meant just showing up, every day, and taking care
of every person in Strawberry Plains and beyond, whether he got paid to do it or
not. And for his daughter, it meant learning that her real place to change the
world was right here—in her hometown—by her father's side.
The observant wit and wisdom of James Herriot lives on in Carolyn Jourdan's tales of life among the people of rural Tennessee - people as eccentric, tough, stubborn and stoical as the Yorkshire farmers of Herriot's time...continued
Full Review
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(Reviewed by BookBrowse Review Team).
Carolyn Jourdan is a former U.S. Senate Counsel to the Committee on Environment and Public Works and the Committee on Governmental Affairs (now Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs). She has degrees from the University of Tennessee in Biomedical Engineering and Law. She lives on the family farm in East Knox County, Tennessee, and has seven stray animals (four dogs and three cats). Heart In The Right Place takes place over the course of a year in the early 1990s when her life changed dramatically when her mother, Elise Jourdan, had a heart attack and had to be hospitalized, and Carolyn returned to East Tennessee to help her father, Dr Paul Jourdan, in his Strawberry Plains medical practice.
According to theKnoxville News Sentinel, ...
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If you liked Heart in the Right Place, try these:
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Dolly Parton
This is a wonderful book. I would have enjoyed it even if Carolyn wasn't a neighbor of mine in East Tennessee. She is a great writer.
