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.