Paging Dr. Gonads
The day before I left for my month-long tour of the Southeast, I had arranged a coffee date with a Washington-based doctor. As this was a first date for us, I fully expected that we would take an hour or so to exchange vital statistics and small talk over cafe lattes and then promise to email each other at some future point in time. As it turned out, we had an intriguing conversation as we exchanged personal stories of interest and dysfunction, and so we arranged to meet later in the week after I had begun my road trip.
Dr. Gomez is of Cuban descent, but his family moved to the United States when he was two years old. Although he speaks fluent Spanish, as a result of growing up in Atlanta, GA, one can trace a bit of Southern drawl in his voice whenever he speaks English. I'm sure in most situations, his diction is more refined and polished, but whenever he is around me, I think I must draw out his Southern pronunciations because of my own backwoods twang. I would never have guessed that Dr. Gomez was otherwise Cuban had he not told me, and as such, I said that I thought his name really wasn't Gomez and that he really wasn't from Cuba. Instead, I deduced that he really was a native of Atlanta and that his true name is Gomer, as in Pyle, as in, "Shazaam!"
Dr. Gomez told me the story of how he previously practiced medicine in the outer fringes of Appalachia, and often times he treated patients whose educational backgrounds probably had not included instruction in any rudimentary level of Spanish vocabulary. One such patient apparently encountered problems pronouncing the name "Gomez," so she instead called him by the name of "Dr. Gonads." I decided that the name "Dr. Gonads" was much more descriptive and fun to say than "Gomer," so I've taken to calling him that any time I address him or describe him to my friends.
Dr. Gonads drove down to Lexington to visit me before I left that charming small town, and we spent a wonderful evening together walking down Main Street, eating Italian food, and slurping ice cream out of homemade waffle cones. The next morning as we were leaving town, he suggested that I follow him out to the interstate, as I was unfamiliar with which direction I should drive to get there. After we pulled out of the parking lot and were only a few hundred feet away from the bed & breakfast where we had stayed the previous night, Dr. Gonads pulled his car over to the side of the street, directly in front of the town cemetary. I pulled my car in behind his, imagining that he had forgotten to tell me something important and wanted to do so before we parted ways.
He got out of his car and approached mine, and he asked me to humor him by coming sit in the passenger seat of his vehicle. I did so, and he immediately started playing a song that he had loaded into his stereo system. I did not immediately recognize the artist or the song, so he informed me that the singer was Neil Diamond. As we continued to listen, I finally recognized the song as "Red, Red Wine." Of course, I furthered the romantic mood as I blurted out, "I didn't know this song was a remake!" As there is just enough of an age difference between us to say that I am not well-versed in any Neil Diamond trivia, Dr. Gonads just rolled his eyes at me and my lack of 70's pop culture. In turn, as I swiveled my head to the right to take in the aging tombstones of the cemetary, I began laughing hysterically. When he asked what was so funny, I remarked that this was perhaps one of the most romantic settings I had ever encountered: Sitting next to a cemetary, listening to Neil Diamond perform "Red, Red Wine" at 10:30 in the morning.
As Dr. Gonads shooed me and my sarcasm out of his car, he kissed me and promised to call, despite the fact that I had killed the moment that he had attempted tenderly to create. As I thought about the situation, though, I recalled that living in a small Southern town often forces people to create their own entertainment and special moments due to lack of big-city resources. For, I'm sure, this was not the first time that a budding romance had been explored in a deserted cemetary with a Neil Diamond serenade or the mention of red wine before noon.
Dr. Gomez is of Cuban descent, but his family moved to the United States when he was two years old. Although he speaks fluent Spanish, as a result of growing up in Atlanta, GA, one can trace a bit of Southern drawl in his voice whenever he speaks English. I'm sure in most situations, his diction is more refined and polished, but whenever he is around me, I think I must draw out his Southern pronunciations because of my own backwoods twang. I would never have guessed that Dr. Gomez was otherwise Cuban had he not told me, and as such, I said that I thought his name really wasn't Gomez and that he really wasn't from Cuba. Instead, I deduced that he really was a native of Atlanta and that his true name is Gomer, as in Pyle, as in, "Shazaam!"
Dr. Gomez told me the story of how he previously practiced medicine in the outer fringes of Appalachia, and often times he treated patients whose educational backgrounds probably had not included instruction in any rudimentary level of Spanish vocabulary. One such patient apparently encountered problems pronouncing the name "Gomez," so she instead called him by the name of "Dr. Gonads." I decided that the name "Dr. Gonads" was much more descriptive and fun to say than "Gomer," so I've taken to calling him that any time I address him or describe him to my friends.
Dr. Gonads drove down to Lexington to visit me before I left that charming small town, and we spent a wonderful evening together walking down Main Street, eating Italian food, and slurping ice cream out of homemade waffle cones. The next morning as we were leaving town, he suggested that I follow him out to the interstate, as I was unfamiliar with which direction I should drive to get there. After we pulled out of the parking lot and were only a few hundred feet away from the bed & breakfast where we had stayed the previous night, Dr. Gonads pulled his car over to the side of the street, directly in front of the town cemetary. I pulled my car in behind his, imagining that he had forgotten to tell me something important and wanted to do so before we parted ways.
He got out of his car and approached mine, and he asked me to humor him by coming sit in the passenger seat of his vehicle. I did so, and he immediately started playing a song that he had loaded into his stereo system. I did not immediately recognize the artist or the song, so he informed me that the singer was Neil Diamond. As we continued to listen, I finally recognized the song as "Red, Red Wine." Of course, I furthered the romantic mood as I blurted out, "I didn't know this song was a remake!" As there is just enough of an age difference between us to say that I am not well-versed in any Neil Diamond trivia, Dr. Gonads just rolled his eyes at me and my lack of 70's pop culture. In turn, as I swiveled my head to the right to take in the aging tombstones of the cemetary, I began laughing hysterically. When he asked what was so funny, I remarked that this was perhaps one of the most romantic settings I had ever encountered: Sitting next to a cemetary, listening to Neil Diamond perform "Red, Red Wine" at 10:30 in the morning.
As Dr. Gonads shooed me and my sarcasm out of his car, he kissed me and promised to call, despite the fact that I had killed the moment that he had attempted tenderly to create. As I thought about the situation, though, I recalled that living in a small Southern town often forces people to create their own entertainment and special moments due to lack of big-city resources. For, I'm sure, this was not the first time that a budding romance had been explored in a deserted cemetary with a Neil Diamond serenade or the mention of red wine before noon.
posted by Ritchie Miller at 8:40 AM
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