My John Deere Cap

I am a small-town boy now living in a big town. I graduated high school with 92 friends and, although I enjoy my big town, I miss the values and ways that accompany small-town living. Apparently, I'm not alone in my thinking, since four of my six siblings still live in our small town, all within a few miles of my parents' home.

Part of being small-town is that the work and entertainment varies greatly. Work, besides the obvious, may also include mill and factory work, forestry, and farming. Entertainment may include cow-tipping, four-wheeling, snowmobiling, hiking, fishing and hunting. And sports. How did I almost forget about our small-town sports?

Most recently, after visiting my family, I brought one of my dad's baseball caps home to big-town with me. It was a bright-green John Deere hat, one I had borrowed to wear outside for an afternoon while visiting. Besides breaking-in easily, it fit well.

Now, how many of you are familiar with farming? And forestry? John Deere is a stellar company, one that has stood up through the worst of our economy. My father's business relies on the excellence of their heavy-machinery products, especially their skidders and bulldozers. The people who don their John Deere hats are typically farmers and industrial sorts, salt-of-the-earth types. In my small-town hometown, when you wear a John Deere cap, you wear it with pride.

Returning home to big town, it didn't take long for me to learn that wearing a John Deere hat in a suburban area seems to make certain people assume that you are "slow" or "a hick." Or that you are a country-music lover. Or that you pick your nose freely in a big crowd.

That assumption would be wrong. Completely off-base, actually. Frankly, though, I couldn't care less what other people want to assume, but I find it surprising that this assumption actually exists. Anybody who is familiar with farming or knows a farming family is aware that these are some of the most intelligent, brilliant, and hard-working people you will ever come across. What one assumes might be a simple mind could actually be quiet confidence, introspective intelligence, and humility. I'll take this person over a dim-witted owner of a suit and European car any day.

My father and my brothers? Kind and humble, intelligent and easy-going. After obtaining their college degrees, my brothers chose to follow in my father's successful forestry footsteps. If someone chooses to judge them based on the cap they're wearing or their Carhartt overalls, it won't take that person long to realize that their judgment was premature. And it will only take minutes for my brothers to intellectually bulldoze through those wrong assumptions.

Anyway, back to the John Deere cap. I returned to my big town and proudly started wearing my green baseball cap everywhere--to hockey games, the local mall, my children's sporting events, and restaurants. About the only place I didn't wear my cap was at work in the ER. Don't think, though, that I didn't give that some thought.

The first time I noticed that I was being treated differently, for lack of a better word, was in an up-scale department store check-out line. The cashier spoke freely, easily, to the people ahead of me. Then it was my turn. And it was as if the cashier had a control switch to slow down her voice. And s..l..o..w.. down she did, even going so far as to raise her slowed-down voice while she gave me my change back.

"H..e..r..e.. i..s.. y..o..u..r.. c..h..a..n..g..e.., s..i..r..," she shouted, nearly exhausting herself.

I thanked her and walked away scratching my head, puzzled, and not quite connecting that it was all about my John Deere cap.

Next, I was at a local hockey game and the beer caller--you know, the one walking up and down the aisle with a tray of beers to sell--kept stopping beside me and asking if I was ready for a beer yet. Why, I wondered, was he just stopping to ask me? And again, he talked slower. And louder. I would have given him the benefit of the doubt, except I had heard him talk in regular voice to the people across the aisle from me. As bad as I wanted that damn beer, though, I passed each and every time.

More scenarios followed and by then, I knew the reason. My green John Deere cap. Each time, I walked away not knowing whether to smile at these sporadic ignorances or just brush off them off. I do have to say, though, that it was enlightening, this social experiment for one that I was conducting, to see how certain people responded to my cap.

Most recently, I was at my eleven year-old son's basketball game. I, with another father, had run the clock and kept the score during the home games all season. Before the start of this particular game, the referee approached our table to review some last-minute rules. Of course, he talked in normal voice to the other father before turning to me.

"D..o..n..'t.. f..o..r..g..e..t.. t..o.. s..e..t.. t..h..e.. c..l..o..c..k.. f..o..r... ." You get the idea.

After the ref finished and walked away to start the game, the other father turned to me and asked "What was that?" I pointed to my hat and he looked up, read it, and said "You're kidding, right?" He must have been a small-town boy himself. But no, I assured him, I wasn't kidding.

Well, I'm still wearing my hat. Only now, I don't give much thought to the occasional slow-talker whom I may encounter. This experience has enlightened my perceptions of how quickly others can judge you without knowing you. It's not only my John Deere cap, either. It can be cowboy boots, a certain hairstyle, the car you drive, where you're from, your accent, and how you're dressed, among many other things. That list is l..o..n..g.. .

If anything, now I'm a bit more guarded about my first impressions when I walk into a patient's ER room. Heck yeah, first impressions matter. I'm not denying that. But we should give the person an opportunity to show their true colors before we label them as a simpleton, or otherwise. In fact, why do we even need to label them? And what's wrong with being a simpleton? The medical field seems to be filled with them.

So, if you own a John Deere hat, wear it with pride. Let me hear you yell, "Hell, yeah!" Or, better yet, yell "H..e..l..l.. y..e..a..h!"

And if any of you know a good place to purchase some Yosemite Sam mud-flaps, I would be anxious to hear from you. I've been looking for a set to put on my European car.

As always, big thanks for reading. Next post will be Friday, March 5. See you then...

Why Medicine?

One of the more frequently asked questions I face is "Why did you become a doctor?"

Trust me, that's a question I have asked myself on more than one occasion. In fact, I think the last time I asked myself that question, it was 4 a.m. and the obnoxious, drunk guy had just finished puking on my new running shoes. Why exactly did I become a doctor? It certainly wasn't so the kind people at Dick's Sporting Goods would know me on a first name basis.

I come from a large family, both immediate and extended. I am the fifth of seven kids, three of us boys. On my father's side, every male is or was involved in the forestry industry. This includes my father, three paternal uncles, my two brothers, and multiple cousins. Since I was a young boy, around age five, I have strong memories of waking up before the morning darkness dissipated, jumping with my father and brothers into one of the company work trucks, and heading out into the pristine Pennsylvania woods. It was expected that I, like my brothers and cousins, would someday pursue a college education in forestry and then continue in our family's international business.

I always knew, though, that I was made from a different cloth. My paternal grandmother, our family matriarch, encouraged me to pursue my dreams, even if those dreams did not include the forestry business. She knew I had a different calling and I loved her for her easy acceptance of this. As much as I enjoyed the beautiful woods, the fresh air, and hard work that came with my family's business, I needed something different.

So, until then, during summer vacations and on Saturdays during the school year, I could be found in the woods carrying a Stihl chainsaw or steering a John Deere skidder loaded with freshly cut logs down a narrow path to an accessible landing where logging trucks would pick them up. Smiling. And ducking behind the occasional tree, convinced that I had seen Bigfoot yet again.

When, then, did I discover my illuminated path toward medicine?

I'd like to say I had one defining moment where it just popped with me, that I would be a doctor, but that wasn't the case. During my tenth grade year in high school, however, multiple happenings occurred in my life that exposed me to medicine and reinforced my belief that I would be a doctor someday. That year, I lost both of my grandfathers to medical illnesses, and I was a firsthand witness to their struggles. I also witnessed my father's leg, crushed in a freak logging accident, be saved by incredible surgeons who refused to look at amputation as an option.

Personally, before these deaths and my father's injury, I also sustained an injury that reinforced my pursuit of medicine.

Chainsaw lacerations were very common in the forestry business, at least before protective chaps gained widespread use. This injury did not spare me and, as a result, I had my first and only ER experience as a patient when I needed a laceration repair.

Right after lunch on that death-defying summer day, I was trimming some obstructing tree branches to reach a felled log. Suddenly, my saw kicked back and cut into my thigh just above my left knee. At first, I thought the pain was just another tree limb poking at my leg. When I looked down and saw my cut denim pant leg outlined with a circle of red blood, though, I knew that I had just been initiated into the Lacerations Are Us Forestry Club.

Trying not to panic and fighting off the dizzying angst of near-death that accompanies a two-inch superficial laceration, I quickly ran out of the woods and jumped onto the skidder, driving it without abandon (yes, 10 mph on a rocky trail) to find Louie, one of the crew guys. Louie, not known for his strong work ethic, was only too happy to drive me to the local hospital's ER. I still don't know to this day how he could eat his bologna sandwich (with ketchup) and listen to Paul Harvey while I sat beside him in the pickup truck, hemorrhaging. And now, page two. The kid sitting beside you in the truck is bleeding to death, Louie. Put the bologna sandwich down and drive faster.

By the time we arrived at the ER, the bleeding had slowed considerably and thoughts of my family catering to my every whim after such a tragic accident waned. As Louie called my Dad from the waiting room, I was placed in an ER room, given a gown to change into, and waited for my Dad's arrival. When he arrived, he was, of course, sympathetic. His face was a hard read, though, bordering between pride for my initiation and disappointment that it wasn't worse.

What happened next for me was nothing short of a miracle. Within minutes of Dad's arrival, the doctor walked in and repaired my laceration. He was kind. He was normal. He was compassionate. And he was thoughtful enough to ask me if I wanted to watch him repair my cut. Absolutely, I said. He propped a pillow behind my back and lifted my cot upright to 90 degrees.

With precision, the doctor explained every step of my laceration repair, from numbing the wound edges with lidocaine to how he would close the laceration in two layers--the buried, dissolvable stitches that would hold my muscle together followed by the external sutures that would closely approximate my skin. Fifteen stitches later, he was done. The nurse, lacking any dramatic flare, applied a big, bulky dressing and antibiotic ointment and I was discharged to home.

Needless to say, I had seen the light. I had experienced medicine. I had been snatched from the jaws of death by the brilliance of medicine (and fifteen measly stitches). From this experience to how the rest of that year played out, I had no doubts about what I wanted to do with the rest of my life.

Is that enough to explain why I went into medicine? I hope so, although at 4 a.m. with that fresh puke all over me, I sometimes wish my personal revelations to pursue a career in medicine held more flare.

So, if you are in my ER in the middle of the night and I smell like bile, please do me a big favor and ignore the stink. And if you see me rubbing my scar above my left knee, don't pay me any attention. I'm just remembering why I went into medicine. Again.

As always, thanks for reading. I hope everyone is having a great holidays. Thanks for all the kind holiday wishes. Next post will be Wednesday, December 30. Until then...