This article is presented as a true first-person account of a physician’s experience among the Siberian Yupik. It describes an elderly Inuit man struggling with feelings of “uselessness” which eventually lead him to bid farewell to his community & walk out over the frozen Arctic Ocean, never to return. The author uses the story to raise issues of cultural sensitivity & end-of-life care. Since publication, the article has come under criticism from peers who claim that no such event ever occurred, & question the usefulness of perpetuating such a myth.