The Doctor is in The House

Julie couldn’t believe anyone could survive a fever like this. 

The Doctors had done everything they felt was ethical to try to bring Lenny’s temperature down, but thus far they had had no success.  In fact, several times within the span of an hour, they had misdiagnosed Lenny’s condition and prescribed treatment that nearly proved fatal.  This team was lead by the legendary Dr. Herman Johnson (no relation).  Dr Johnson was unwavering in his disdain for the Hippocratic oath.  “It’s not that I disagree with it.  I would just add the line, “Unless I feel like doing otherwise,” to the end of it.”

His main function as team leader at the big huge hospital job was to, like sit around with his group of interns and teach them how to properly diagnose certain puzzling cases that came through the door.  The interns themselves were among the world’s brightest and most diverse.  There was an Asian girl, an African American guy, an Australian guy, and a cute white girl, and a middle-aged Jewish guy who always cheated on his wife and stuff.  See.  Really diverse.

But it was hardly his brilliance that Dr Johnson was best known for.  It was just that he was so damn likable.  And he had a really smooth walk.  People usually used the word “buttery” upon seeing the smoothness of his gait.  Anyway, head Doctor Johnson (no relation), was totally cool with all of his young upstarts, and was careful to provide a positive experience for them.  Some would have said he was too nice …

Doctor Johnson lived modestly in a shabby little place near the free clinic where he spent a good deal of his free time.  His time at the free clinic had earned him no end of relatively harmless pranks from the neighbor kids.  They loved the good Dr and considered it a tribute to totally screw with him.  He understood their intentions so he didn’t get too shook up about the occasional bucket of dog diarrhea dumped on his porch, etc.

Even though it was 3 miles away, he usually walked to the hospital too.  Particularly when he was mulling over a stumper of a case.  Currently, he was puzzling over an undergrad from the Veterinary school.  The kid was brought in a couple of mornings before.  His right hand had been mangled and burned in some horrible lab accident.  The burns may have saved the kids life.  Or maybe not.  Dr Johnson and his crack team of racially diverse geniuses had no guess as to what could be the cause of the fever.  The symptoms were like nothing he’d ever seen in real life.  They were eerily similar to a paper he had written about a science fiction movie he had seen.  He postulated that the frog DNA introduced into the genome of a dinosaur would certainly cause uncontrollable fever.  The reason, was of course real sciency and certainly beyond the scope of this blog.

This morning was bright and sunny and Johnson had some thinking to do.  Unfortunately, last night some of the neighborhood kids overheard some adults talking about Johnson and got a brilliant idea. Let’s coat his front gate with butter.  Actually, it was margarine, but the result was similar.  As Doctor Johnson was leaving for work, reading his notes on the strange Johnson case, apple in his mouth, he absentmindedly turned to open his gate with his backside, unwittingly smearing margarine all over the back of his trousers. Head in his notes, he almost tripped over the homeless guy, propped up against his fence.

“Sorry Burt, I guess I’m a little distracted.  Didn’t see you down there,“  Dr Johnson apologized.

“No problem Doc, I’ll be movin’ on in a minute, I just needed to rest my dogs a spell,” came the cheery reply of Burt Rasson, an old school mate of Doc Johnson’s. 

When Johnson looked down at the dogs in question, he saw that the soles of Burt’s shoes were more mudcaked skin than shoe leather. 

“Burt.  That reminds me.  I have to get rid of some shoes I bought a while ago.  They’re just too big for me.  Do you know anyone who could use them?”

“Nobody comes to mind,” Burt grinned, revealing a mouthful of gunk that gave a whole new meaning to the word toothpaste.

“Well, if you think of anyone,” Johnson said, “here’s the card to get into my front door.  I’m going to be gone a couple of days.  You just give those shoes to anyone who might need them.  Promise?”

Burt took the credit card like key from Dr Johnson and turned it over and over, confused.  Dr Johnson chuckled, “It’s like they have at the hotels now, Burt.”

“Of course Doc, like the one I have for my room at the Hilton …”

“Take care of yourself Burt.  I’ll see you next week.”  And with that, Herman Johnson began to take his leave.

“One last thing there, Physician …”

“Anything old pal.”

“ I see you still have that same buttery gait,”  Burt noticed.

“Damn kids.  Be careful about that if you go get those shoes,” Doc warned.

“I have no idea what you’re talking about Doc.  But then I didn’t go to college.”

“So long, Burt”

“I may have bigger feet than you, Herman, but you’ve got the biggest heart of anyone I ever knew,”  a tear cutting through a thick layer of disgusting goo on Burt’s sun weathered, scarred up face.

“Don’t mention it Burt.  You know how I feel about it.  I owe you.  I always will.”