RIP Simmi Goyle, MD

I first met Simmi about 20 years ago when she joined my advanced online screenwriting class. She was an absolute pro in all aspects of that profession from the beginning. My basic responsibility came down to showing her editing and polishing tricks, after which I introduced her work and her very self to my then agent Paul Weitzman.

Now that she was genuinely in showbiz, an arena she said she’d always wanted to try even though she was a very successful Locum Tenens physician, Simmi settled down in Southern California and got a gig as Medical/Technical advisor on the series “Grey’s Anatomy,” where writer-producer Zoanne Clack, whom I knew because of a website called WriterAction.Com, became a friend and mentor.

Simmi’s experience on “Grey’s Anatomy” led to a gig as Story Editor on a first season medical series the name of which I don’t remember because it didn’t last very long. What I do remember is that Simmi, never one to speak anything but the truth and absolutely brilliant at knowing exactly what she believed in and wanted, took one look at the pilot for the show and loathed it.

The way Simmi saw it, not only was it totally wrong about medical procedures, its producers cared not one wit about either her medical expertise or her truly wonderful ability as a writer. She had been hired, she realized, primarily because she was a new writer, a woman writer, and a woman of color, which meant the production company was able to tap various financial breaks for which they otherwise wouldn’t qualify. (What? I didn’t tell you she was born and raised near Delhi India, and that her sister and father were also MDs? I guess because I never perceived her as anything but a good friend.)

For Simmi, this was the absolute worst kind of disrespect.

She quit, of course, because she couldn’t pretend to believe in anything the show was doing and went back to medicine, establishing a successful local medical practice and, she always said to me, a fulfilling life. She also started writing a book about her life, called, simply, “I Am,” about her search for self-awareness and self-knowledge.

Here’s the opening page:

  Chapter 1

I am Birth

In meditation once, I saw the moment of my conception in the Universe. The memory was a flash, a few milliseconds at the most, but it stunned me completely. I saw a golden Nebula. Unlike the nebulae we view through our star gazing telescopes, this one was conscious, it was aware and it had an idea. It then withdrew into itself as it went about creating its idea, with passion, fervor and mostly with love. When it was done, it reemerged and was so in awe of its creation, that celestial music filled its being as it broke out in song.

At that instant, within the sacred passages of my mother’s womb, a divine union took place. A single cell, carrying the blueprint of life, divided, multiplied and twisted as it grew stronger and stronger. A small heart began beating to that very same song.

A few months later, in a sterile hospital room, on the 9th day of November, at the 9th hour of the new day, I entered the world crying out to the Universe, “Koham,-Koham”, “Who am I, Who am I?”

Little did I know, my life would be a journey in search of the reply….

I thought – and still believe – that the writing here was brilliant. What did Simmi the Perfectionist write and tell me?

“Thank you for understanding how I feel. I’m the happiest I’ve ever been and mostly I’m at peace. I’m in love with healing people.”

After that exchange, a long time passed during which I assumed she was continuing to be “mostly at “peace,” but just two weeks ago I went to her personal Facebook page and discovered that she had cancer and that the treatments she’d been having hadn’t gone well, so she was closing her practice. I reached out to her and told I also had cancer, mine with an indefinite prognosis. (Well, one part of it was/is definite and similar to hers. I’m going to die sometime between now and five years from now. So it goes.)

Simmi and I talked on the phone and via FB Message and just plain texting. She told me she’d lost a lot of weight during her tribulations and had quite the svelte figure, which seemed to her to be something her friends cared about although she sure didn’t. She also told me she was sick of being in the hospital and disgusted with having to wear a colostomy bag, and that she’d finally convinced the team of oncologists she was working with to remove it and “let me out of this place.”

The oncologists said, “You’ll die.”

Simmi said, “I know.”

Because she knew as well as, or maybe better than, anyone, that she was going to die anyway and wanted to be as much like her “genuine” self as she could be when she did.

We texted briefly a couple of days after the surgery, and I learned she still hadn’t gone home because of a law-grade fever and would call me back when everything was in a better place, to which I could only respond with:

“Hang in there, kiddo. One thing I’m learning going through my own illness is that love is strong and loving life can make all of us stronger.”

To which she replied,

“Agreed!”

Those were her last words to me.

That was September 22nd. Since then I’ve been checking with her websites, (one personal, one professional) and saw posts from people mourning her death. I refused to believe them. I was sure it was a mistake. It had to be a mistake. One of the strongest people I’ve ever known, who never backed down to anyone about anything, a woman filled with joy, she couldn’t be dead at a mere 55.

Yesterday I received a text announcement about The Simmi Goyle memorial service.

I’ve left a short and pretty much standard message on the website handling the service. Here’s another, possibly more fitting one:

It’s been a joy and a privilege to be a friend and mentor to you, Simmi. You’re the first person in my adult life for whom I ever have truly mourned. Fly on, sweet angel. See ya when I get to where you’ve already gone.

Love You Really Mean It

The Brodys