Just before I opened the exam room door, my ever-diligent nurse alerted me that my next patient was accompanied by Santa Claus, or at least a spouse in a rundown Santa outfit. I would have been alright even without the heads up, but it’s nice to avoid being taken by surprise in one’s own clinic.
As it turned out, he didn’t have the full-blown Santa outfit. He was sporting a Santa hat, a long white beard, blue-tinted sunglasses, and jeans. The remainder of the typical Santa costume was silk screened on a red T-shirt. The long white beard seemed to be his own, rather than a costume. While I’m not a connoisseur, taken in total, his Santa outfit was shabby in comparison to others I’ve seen. On my office light box (one of those big old-fashioned things that doctors used to use to review radiographs before everything went digital), I have a photo of one of my other patients dressed as Santa. Wearing the traditional red jacket and pants with a big black belt, seated next to his Christmas tree with children and grandchildren, his holiday aura was regal in comparison to the specimen in my exam room visitor chair.
At the end of the visit, the patient, Santa, and I were chatting, and out of the blue, Santa popped a question. "Where do you think I retired from?"
Taken by surprise, I replied without thinking, "the Salvation Army?"
"I love you, too, doc," replied Santa patiently, but with a tinge of irony. Santa pulled out his wallet and showed me his police officer’s badge. I’m not sure what sort of guess Santa expected I might make regarding his previous employment history, but he probably felt that "Salvation Army" was a bit insulting. In retrospect, I could see that a reply of "undercover detective," would have made him feel much better, but now I didn’t know what I could say that would make the situation less awkward, so I didn’t say much.
After he and his wife were safely out of earshot, I mentioned to the nurse that Santa had asked me to guess what his previous career had been, and I had guessed "Salvation Army" rather than police officer. She laughed sympathetically and told me that she too had taken him for "a bell ringer." That made me feel better about my faux pas. If you run into Santa in your office, and he asks you to guess his previous line of work, my advice is to aim high. A little flattery can never hurt Santa’s feelings.
Dr. Greenbaum is a rheumatologist who practices in Greenwood, Ind.