Dr. Steven L. Orebaugh, a veteran and professor of anesthesiology at UPMC in Pittsburgh, has released his fifth book, "The Six-Lined Racerunner" (Sunbury Press, Inc.), a memoir detailing a year of his childhood in Spain on a U.S. military base, where he discovers a passion for biology in the local lizard population and overcomes a pathological shyness.
“As the son of a senior master sergeant in the U.S. Air Force, we moved every few years,” says Orebaugh. “This book details a single year in which our family lived just outside the military base in Torrejon, and it chronicles my life of chasing lizards, playing baseball and developing confidence in and out of the classroom - which was an essential moment in my life, given how shy I was.”
"The Six-Lined Racerunner" offers a yearlong snapshot of U.S. military life and provides a mini-travel log of Spain, as 10-year-old Orebaugh explores Madrid, Segovia, Sevilla and other cities throughout the country with his family, while highlighting his grandfather’s panic attack at the top of a gothic tower, a classroom AV projector catastrophe, embarrassing moments on the baseball field and, of course, searching for the elusive six-lined racerunner lizard.
“This was a transformative year in my life,” says Orebaugh. “This was the year I began to develop my own self-confidence and break out of my shell. Most importantly, this was the year I learned to love biology as we pursued lizards in central Spain, a passion which became the foundation for my desire to become a doctor later in life.”
"The Six-Lined Racerunner" is dedicated to U.S. military families the world over, whose support of our soldiers, sailors, Marines and airmen makes their overseas deployments possible - a nod to Orebaugh’s childhood, his father and his young comrades. Although it doesn’t appear in the book, Orebaugh is a veteran himself, having served in the Navy medical corps, and eventually achieving the rank of captain.
Orebaugh is also the author of the novels "The Stairs On Billy Buck Hill" (Milford House) and "A Night in the Life" (Pocol Press), as well as the textbooks "Atlas of Airway Management: Techniques and Tools" (Lippincott Williams & Wilkins) and "Understanding Anesthesia: What You Need to Know About Sedation And Pain Control" (Hopkins Press).
