Knowledge Part 3: “Boy, what are you doing?”

I ate barbecued ribs today.

As I did so my memory went back to many years ago. I was at a food court and there was a barbecue place that had ribs. I settled into a seat in the food court with my plate. I struggled with a little plastic fork and knife as I tried to carve up my ribs. It seems that I was being watched by a cleaning woman. Eventually she pushed her cart closer toward me and then walked over to me.

“Boy?!” she said to me. “What are you doing?!”

I was somewhat startled, but I politely answered, “I am eating ribs.”

“No you ain’t. You might think you be eatin ribs, but whatever you are doin, that ain’t eatin ribs.”  She walked over to the utensil area and grabbed a huge stack of napkins. She plopped them on the table in front of me.  “Now boy, you roll up them sleeves.” She waited for me to unbutton and then roll up my sleeves to above my elbows. “That’s right. You pull them sleeves way up. Now get rid of that fork. You get in there with your hands and you get messy!!” 

I can still hear her voice in my head with how she said the word, “messy” dragging it out in a way that I could instantly picture myself with barbecue sauce all over my face, hands, and arms. 

I said, “yes ma’am,” and dug in and started ripping the ribs apart and eating away. She came back a few minutes later to check on me.  “Now you got it! Now you be eaten ribs!”  She walked away with a smile, having done her good deed for the day.

Today, I walked by the napkin dispenser and pulled and pulled to get enough napkins. I sat down and I felt warm inside thinking back on my formal training by the expert instructor in eating ribs. “Get messy!” I laughed quietly to myself. 

I learned valuable lessons that day. Yes, I learned how to eat ribs, but I learned much more important things than that. Before she spoke with me, I hadn’t really noticed or paid any attention to her. After she did, I was forced to see her and in seeing her it was clear that there was a lot to her. She had her own passions and interests. She had an entire life of experiences that I knew nothing about. What was there about her that would push her to correct a naïve young west Michigan boy and teach him how to properly eat his ribs?

Even now I wonder about her back story. Who was she really? What was her life like? What was her family like? Who did she love? What did she like or not like? Who was she?

It seems that day I learned:

1. How to eat ribs.
2. The complexity of each and every person. There is wisdom that can be learned from every person I come in contact with. I often foolishly ignore it, focused so much on myself, my interests, my worries. Could I be so wise as to look and listen instead? Could I go from being the customer thinking about my day, my activities, and my food and for an instant learn from the person cleaning up for me?
3. I learned about passion and pride and enjoyment of life. She couldn’t stand to let me eat my ribs wrong. She was a professional when it came to ribs. She didn’t need a title or formal training. She was a professional because she took pride in it.

It reminded me of another incident. In 1987 I was accepted in the Navy scholarship program for medical school. At that time, I stood in the recruiter’s office in Lansing in front of the American flag and a picture of Ronald Reagan, raised my right hand, and was sworn in as an officer. I didn’t know anything about the military. In 1988 I went to OIS (Officers Indoctrination School) in Newport Rhode Island. OIS was the 6-week training for the doctors, dentists, nurses, lawyers and hospital administrators. OIS was the school to teach us to be the officers that we had already been declared to be. Since we were already officers this was not the usual “boot camp” where you enter as a nobody and slowly gain rank. Instead of drill sergeants, we had more senior officers as our instructors. We still had to do physical fitness training, run floor buffers, clean windowsills with Q-tips, etc. We also had to do close order drill (marching).  We were expected to march to and from each class. If 3 or more of us were walking somewhere we were expected to get in formation and march instead of just walking. 

One day Charlie company was marching back from class. Our formation marched up to the residence hall. We came to a halt and attention before we disassembled to go inside. As we did so, a US Marine gunnery sergeant leaned out of an upper floor window. 

He called down to us, “What are you doing? No disrespect, sirs, but what are you doing?” 

Our leader called back to him, “We are marching back from class.” 

The marine called back to us again, “Well that may be what you think you were doing but I know marching and what you were doing was not marching. I don’t mean any disrespect, but marching is my life and whatever you are doing is hurting me!” 

We laughed a bit but then invited him to come down and talk with us. We admitted that we really didn’t know much about marching. We asked him if he would be willing to help us. The next day he took us out onto a hot paved area (“the grinder”). He marched us back and forth and left and right and starting and stopping. He talked to us about the techniques and disciplines of close order drill. I don’t know that we ever got quite as good as he would have liked but by the end of our little training session, he told us that  we were doing a lot better. We thanked him for his time and the rest of our time in training, Charlie company worked just a little bit harder on our form whenever we marched. At the end of our training there was a competition and partly thanks to our marine gunnery sergeant expert, Charlie company won the award.

I learned that day when the gunnery sergeant called down to us. Certainly, I learned about close order drill, but just like in the food court, I learned more important lessons. Both incidents taught me of the multiple forms and shapes that wisdom takes in life.  There is so much that I can learn from others. Both people had lived completely different experiences than me. Sometimes because of our years of college and medical training, people expect us to be wise about life. The truth is that often my patients or the other people who are working with me have great wisdom in areas that I lack. 

I wish I could go back and find the cleaning woman. If I could, I would love to sit and listen to her. I would hope to just let her tell me stories and teach me about her background, her love for good barbecue and somehow to get a glimpse into her world. Maybe then I could learn just a little bit more about the wisdom of how to enjoy the good things in my life.

I think of the gunnery sergeant. He too was an expert with real wisdom. I loved his passion and professionalism. He wasn’t just doing a job. He wasn’t just a drill sergeant. He insisted on pushing himself to excellence. There is so much that I could learn from him about his discipline, patriotism, and pride in what he did. Maybe if I could have more time and training from him, I too would have a better understanding of the wisdom of excellence.  Maybe I could understand that it doesn’t matter as much what you do but how you do it. 

My patient was 91 years old. His daughter brought him to see me as a new patient. I spoke with him about his symptoms, did a physical exam, reviewed all his labs and testing, and then made some changes in his treatment. I was about to the leave the room when I stopped myself. “By the way, what did you do for a living?” I asked him. 

“I was a chemist,” he replied.

As we spoke, I discovered that he had PhD in chemistry. He was an expert in colors and dyes. He had his PhD from Ohio State and had a long career in industry. His daughter had, like me, graduated from Hope College. I talked with them about my BA in chemistry from Hope. There was a lot more to him than just another 91-year-old with heart failure. I bet I could learn a lot from him. Over the few years that he was my patient, I looked forward to each visit. It saddened me to see his eventual decline, but we enjoyed each visit together as colleagues and friends.

Today I was eating ribs. 

I picked up some more of the ribs. The barbecue sauce was now all over my hands and squeezed into the space under my fingernails. I had barbecue sauce on my cheeks. “Now you get in there and you get messy!” I laughed to myself. In that moment I didn’t worry about the mess. I decided to enjoy it all. For you see I have been trained in how to eat ribs by an expert.