Paul "Doc" Darrah Young

Dr. Paul "Doc" YoungJune 6, 1938 - October 12, 2020
Dr. Paul Young, age 82, of Buena Vista, Oregon died in his sleep on Monday, October 12, 2020.
On the crest of a hill near Paul's home of fifty-two years, the limbs of an ancient oak tree reach out across grasses and wildflowers. Nearby several other large oaks grow in a loosely configured line that runs north to south. Paul had a theory about these trees and their position on the farm to which he and his youthful family had moved in 1968. He imagined that the oaks had been left to grow on either side of a long-abandoned wagon trail that had wound its way over the hill and past the farm's original homestead. Paul liked to walk this imagined trail, stopping to pick up fallen limbs for winter fires, concocting ways of securing gates to fencing posts, planning irrigation lines, which field to cut, what battery to jump-start, and daydreaming about additions to his herd of cattle, and breeds of English sheep he might inquire about. Paul would walk the hill, study the horizon and watch his children grow, his grandchildren arrive, and the yearly migration of geese overhead. Mid-thought his pager would often interrupt and alert him. Over a period of thirty-six years, the pager would sound, calling his attention to the needs of the patients and staff he worked within his role as a physician and - not a few times when at work - a pager that would alert him that he had a message telling him that his cows were running free and grazing the grasses along Buena Vista Road.
Paul, sitting in a doctor's lounge wearing a medical coat paired with cowboy boots and reading a biography of Thomas Jefferson or heading to a barn near midnight in a wool jacket, muddy Wellies, and carrying a flashlight and a newly sterilized lambing rope, lived a multifaceted life. He was fascinated with the elements of farming culture, animal husbandry, the discoveries of science, recent medical advances, and the potential of travel. The simple and practical lifestyles of colonial Americans called to his spirit and his never-ending acquisition of biographies and historical accounts led to his collection of nearly one thousand books.
Paul, with his wide smile and even broader sense of humor, was born in Portland, Oregon to his parents Paul Sr. and Janet Young. An early athlete, Paul formed several life-long friendships in high school, and over the course of two marriages became a father, a grandfather, and eventually a great grandfather. He received his undergraduate degree at Willamette University in 1960 and completed medical school at Oregon Health Sciences University in 1965. He served his residencies in the U.S. Air Force in Washington, D.C., and Ventura, California.
Paul joined the Independence Clinic as a family practitioner in 1968. He subsequently worked in various settings including three public jail systems and as the medical director of several nursing homes and he served on the advisory board of Blue Cross.  Throughout his career Paul was known locally as "Doc Young."
In 1981 he married his second wife, Linnda. Together they built a house reminiscent in character to colonial Williamsburg, traveled the country, retired on the same day in 2004, visited the British Isles, spent weekends at the Oregon Coast, and for sixteen years shared their life, bed, and food with their rough-coated terrier friend "Jack."
In addition to his wife of 39 years, Linnda Young and her children, survivors include Paul's daughters Kathy Heide, her husband Tony and their children Ashlee, Travis, and Tony and his two children; Jenni Carter, her husband Bruce, and their children Jake and Mollee, and Paul's surviving son Aaron Young and his wife Amy. Paul was predeceased by a youngest son Michael D. Young. Michael was born to Paul and his first wife Sylvia Quiring, the mother to their children Kathy, Jenni, and Aaron. Michael was survived by a daughter Darrah and two children by a second marriage to Irma Young, Michael and Mikayla. Married since 1981, Paul's wife Linnda Young has two children, Deena Fitts and T.J. Smith. T.J.'s daughter Bethani has three sons. Paul's sisters, Joan Eichinger, and Katherine Swan reside in the Portland area.
The circumference of the oak on the high point of the imagined trail on Youngoaks farm hints to its having been a seedling in the 1700s. The bark on the tree has large crevices scaling its trunk, trough-like fissures that are deep enough to embrace your imagination and your fingers to their knuckles.  The tree's branches reach into the sky; its gigantic roots spread far into the ground. Like trees we live in two worlds; the earth and the sky; the endeavors that ground us, the passions and curiosities that carry our souls into the light. When Paul was a young man he memorized a poem by Joyce Kilmer. He could recite the poem with his fingers in sign language. He told his brother-in-law that he liked the rhythm of the poem's cadence, the metaphors of the poem, and the way words "looked" when translated into motion. Prophetically the poem was about a tree.
"I think that I shall never see A poem lovely as a tree. A tree whose hungry mouth is prest Against the earth’s sweet flowing breast; A tree that looks at God all day, And lifts her leafy arms to pray; A tree that may in Summer wear A nest of robins in her hair; Upon whose bosom snow has lain; Who intimately lives with rain. Poems are made by fools like me, But only God can make a tree."
Those of us who have known and loved him are comforted in believing that Paul has been reunited with his memories and the deep troughs his dreams, efforts, and endeavors have made across the land and through the lives of people he encountered. In the first weeks of October, as Paul's family was preparing for his journey, deltas of Canada Geese were tracing southward the trail of the oak trees under which Paul walked for so many years.
Peaceful and loving journey "Doc Young".
A ceremony will be held in Paul's honor in the summer ahead - after the geese have returned and the old oak has once again lifted "her leafy arms to pray."
Farnstrom Mortuary is caring for the family.  Thoughts and memorials can be left at the Farnstrom Mortuary website, FarnstromMortuary.com.
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