Thursday, September 11, 2003

Dangling Dan - A Risk-Adverse Guy

When I broke my wrist, and before the doctors in the ER set it, they hung my hand by the fingers from a set of metal mesh cages.  They crammed each finger and my thumb into a stiff tight tube made of loosly braided strands of wire, which in turn were hanging from strings tied to a stationary horizontal metal rod - and I quietly hung there for a while with a twenty-pound weight dangling from my elbow.  The name they used for this device was “Chinese Finger Traps.” Even in my extreme discomfort and with all the painkillers they’d (eventually) fed into me, I wondered about that name.  It seemed a little insensitive to the chinese people. 

Three weeks or so later I was at my orthopod’s office for a followup.  He’s a typical sawbones - hulking and blonde. He also had another person in the room - another doctor, or an intern?  Medical assistant? Physical therapist?  I was sore and missed some of the details.  But one thing I did notice was that this person was a woman of asian ancestry.  The fact was of no consequence to me at the time. 

She asked me about my treatment in the ER, and I described the mesh traps I’d endured.  I didn’t want to call them the name I’d heard used for them - they’d taken off my cast, my misshapen purple lump of an arm was exposed and unbelieveably tender, and I didn’t want to offend someone who could so easily cause me so much pain.

“Oh, the Chinese Finger Traps,” she said brightly.  I guess I I looked surprised to hear her say it.  “Sure, we use those all the time.  That’s why they hired me - for the whole chinese thing.”

I was still glad I hadn’t mentioned it myself.  Some people will surprise you and some of them won’t.

You should have asked her if there’s a more clinical name...I can’t believe your etiquette got the better of your curiosity.  I guess there’s a first time for everything.

There was only one question in my mind: “Please don’t hurt me.” Really, the discomfort was so intense nothing else could penetrate my head.  I felt like my arm was going to snap in half and my hand would just fall off.  It wasn’t eitquette that got the better of me - it was searing pain. 

And there have been plenty of times, before this incident and afterwards too, when I have found myself silenced by circumstances.  I’m much more articulate in writing than otherwise.

a few years ago, my grandmother flew to san francisco to visit my uncle and meet his “lady-friend.” upon her return, my grandmother talked to no end about how wonderful and kind and beautiful his asian friend was. she talked about this ancient chinese massage device she had given her for her leg pains, and how wonderful the ancient chinese device was, and how the woman must have known a lot about massage because “all the chinese know about massage and bodies and that sort of thing… it’s just their nature.”
the “ancient massage device” turned out to be one of those stupid bug-looking, wooden ball structures that you can get at bath and body works for, like, $5.99.

this reminded me of the seinfeld episode where jerry tries to date a native american woman.

with a title like “dangling Dan”, i was hoping for a different type of post.

tease.

Ouch!

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