through medical school and residency, a young pediatrician from New York with a wife and three children moved to Montgomery, Alabama, to start a practice and grab some of the good life. They say that if you want to amuse God, make plans; and if you listen on a quiet night, you can still hear the Almighty chuckling over that one. Proving that God does not make deals, two years later, the marriage was over, the house and job were gone, and the world was about as upside down as gravity would permit. With one door definitely closing, a small rural town in Alabama opened its doors and heart to the strange Yankee doctor and made him whole again. For seven years, they nurtured him like a cat taking in a stray duckling, probably thinking, This creature sure is strange, but maybe it will grow into a swan.