The hand is the mind's window into the world. It gives thoughts shape and color, and gifts matter with spirit.

Abdominal Aortic Aneurysm (AAA) is characterized by a triad of Ssx:

- Severe abdominal pain
- pulsatile abdominal mass
- hypotension (especially orthostatic, even when the supine is normal)

It can be misdiagnosed in about 16% of cases (usually diagnosed as a renal colic). But the history (like smoking history, which is the most important risk factor) and physical exam should point you to the right diagnosis.

بالمُنى ألقى حبيبًا ضَنَّ عني باللقاء

Leonardo da Vinci's anatomy of the human smile

Mona Lisa's smile in the making

I could never believe there was another man born in this world who knew as much as Leonardo, and not only of sculpture, painting and architecture, and that he was truly a great philosopher.

- Francis I, King of France

I even began to appreciate the genius inherent in his designs left unexecuted and masterpieces left unfinished. By skirting the edge of fantasy with his flying machines and water projects and military devices, he envisioned what innovators would invent centuries later. And by refusing to churn out works that he had not perfected, he sealed his reputation as a genius rather than a master craftsman. He enjoyed the challenge of conception more than the chore of completion.

What distinguished Leonardo’s genius was its universal nature. The world has produced other thinkers who were more profound or logical, and many who were more practical, but none who was as creative in so many different fields. Some people are geniuses in a particular arena, such as Mozart in music and Euler in math. But Leonardo’s brilliance spanned multiple disciplines, which gave him a profound feel for nature’s patterns and crosscurrents. His curiosity impelled him to become among the handful of people in history who tried to know all there was to know about everything that could be known.
There have been, of course, many other insatiable polymaths, and even the Renaissance produced other Renaissance Men. But none painted the Mona Lisa, much less did so at the same time as producing unsurpassed anatomy drawings based on multiple dissections, coming up with schemes to divert rivers, explaining the reflection of light from the earth to the moon, opening the still-beating heart of a butchered pig to show how ventricles work, designing musical instruments, choreographing pageants, using fossils to dispute the biblical account of the deluge, and then drawing the deluge. Leonardo was a genius, but more: he was the epitome of the universal mind, one who sought to understand all of creation, including how we fit into it.

ما يميّز عبقرية ليوناردو هو أنها ذاتُ طبيعة شاملة. لقد أنتجَ العالَم مفكّرينَ آخرين كانوا أكثر عُمقًا أو منطقيةً، والكثيرُ منهم كانوا أكثرَ عمليةً من ليوناردو، لكن لا أحد كان مبدِعًا في كل هذه المجالاتٍ المختلفةِ مثلَه. بعضُ الأفراد يكونون عباقرةً في حقلٍ معين، مثل موزارت في الموسيقى وأويلر في الرياضيات. لكنّ ذكاء ليوناردو غطّى مجالاتٍ كثيرة، مما منحه معرفةً غريزية بأنماط الطبيعة وتعقيداتها. فضولُه دفعَه ليكون واحدًا من ثلّةٍ قليلة من الأفراد في التاريخ ممن حاولوا أنْ يعرفوا كلّ ما يمكن معرفتُه عن كلّ شيءٍ يمكن معرفتُه.

يوجدُ بالتأكيد موسوعيّون آخرون، حتى عصرُ النهضة أنتجَ رجالًا آخرين جسّدوا روح العصر. لكن لا أحدَ منهم رسمَ الموناليزا، بل وأكثر من ذلك، رسمَها وهو في ذات الوقت مشغولٌ يشرّح الجثث ويُنتج رسوماتٍ تشريحيةً لم يُشهَد مثلُها من قبل، ويفكّر بطرقٍ لتغيير مجاري الأنهار، ويحاول تفسيرَ انعكاس الضوء من الأرض للقمر، ويستكشفُ كيفيةَ عملِ القلب عبر النظر إلى القلبِ النابض لخنزيرٍ مشرَّح، ويصمّم آلاتٍ موسيقية، وينسّق المهرجانات، ويستخدمُ الأحافير لينفي القصة التوراتية للطوفان، وبعدَها، يرسُمُ الطوفان. ليوناردو كان عبقريًا، لكنه أيضًا: كان المثالَ الحي للعقلِ الموسوعي الشامل الذي يسعى ليفهمَ الوجود بأسرِه، بما في ذلك مكانتَنا فيه.

“Tell me if anything was ever done,” Leonardo repeatedly scribbled in notebook after notebook. “Tell me. Tell me. Tell me if ever I did a thing. . . . Tell me if anything was ever made.”

What about all of the scholars and critics over the years who despaired that Leonardo squandered too much time immersed in studying optics and anatomy and the patterns of the cosmos? The Mona Lisa answers them with a smile.

ماذا بشأنِ جميع الباحثين والنقّاد الذين ملأتهم الخيبة على مر السنين لأنّ ليوناردو أضاعَ وبدّد الكثير جدًا من الوقت في دراسته للبصريّات والتشريح وأنماط الكون؟ الموناليزا عندها سوف تردّ عليهم، بابتسامة.

As a well-spent day brings a happy sleep, so a well-employed life brings a happy death.
— Leonardo da Vinci

مثلما أنّ اليومَ إذا استُغِلّ جيدًا فإنّنا في نهايته ننام هانئين، كذلك فإنّ الحياة التي استُغِلّت جيدًا تنتهي بموتٍ سعيد.
— ليوناردو دافنشي

في الوقت الذي يُحرِق الجنونُ به العالم
هناك من يغني من أجل السلام

يا عراق ترجع شي أكيد بحيلك

Leonardo da Vinci's description of the aortic valve

It wasn't until the 1960s when we reached his 400-year-old conclusion about how the aortic valve works