An Open Letter to the Guy Still Wearing a Stethoscope to My Local Bar
I have the utmost respect for our essential workers. But this guy is really milking it.
Dear Sir,
It’s time to hang it up. We were impressed in April. We expressed it every night, in fact. With clapping and cheering and potting and panning. There’s a guy in my building who’s still doing all four of those things every night at precisely 7 p.m. Apparently, he was more impressed by you than any of us. Anyway, we all hate him now. And I’m starting to hate you, too.
Enough’s enough. It’s October. You’ve been rocking that stethoscope at Mel’s happy hour for months now. We get it. You’re essential to the health of the community, and you deserve to get laid for it. And I’ll be the first to admit that it frames your deep v-neck quite nicely. But at this point, let’s face it: you’re milking it.
First of all, the stethoscope-v-neck combo invalidates your “I came straight from work” excuse. Nobody changes out of scrubs but forgets to remove the dangling medical apparatus from around their neck. I appreciate your sacrifice, but it’s time to stop using it as an accessory until our next global health crisis. The device exists to help you nurse people back to health, not pick up young professionals at 2-for-1 margaritas night.
And just to clear up any speculation that this might be coming from a place of jealousy, I can assure you it absolutely is. I have a journalism degree, a degree that contains just enough specificity to conceal the general aimlessness with which I approach my life, but not much more. I didn’t have the discipline, work ethic or self-confidence to go to medical school. I never believed in myself the way you do, and I’m reminded of that every time I walk by that bar and see you flirting with various women as they laugh and scream and fiddle with that stethoscope, which I’m sure you’ve used to save thousands of lives over the last few months.
I, on the other hand, will probably never save anyone’s life; I can barely handle my own. The only reason I laid eyes on you in the first place is because Mel’s is on my weekly route to the cheapest neighborhood grocery store, and I happened to spot you and your stethoscope mingling with a few ladies while I hauled the most affordable ground beef in the vicinity back to my mini-fridge. If I was like you, we never would’ve crossed paths. I’d be rocking my own stethoscope at a different bar across town, buying rounds of shots for strangers and entertaining attractive women with wild tales of my valiance as an essential member of society.
But I’m not like you. I didn’t come to New York to save lives. I came here to find myself, a life choice typically made by those of us who aren’t really “essential” to anything. By the way, we non-essentials were banging our pots louder than anyone six months ago. It was a great way for our crew to get in on the essentialness of it all while bringing absolutely nothing to the table. Sure, it was a genuine expression of my appreciation for the selfless work you did for our reeling city. But it was also a pretty effective daily ritual that allowed me to absolve myself for watching three hours of “Tiger King” that afternoon.
But now it’s October, we’ve moved on from the nightly kitchenware symphonies, and we’re finding our way back to normalcy. And for you, normalcy means hanging up the stethoscope when you clock out. Look, I’m not telling you to keep it out of the public eye forever. COVID-20 might be just around the corner, and by then, I’ll have my own stethoscope, which I’ll be wearing around the local bar scene every weekend. My point is, your time to shine will come again. We could have a lifetime of coronaviruses ahead of us. Imagine that! Every few years, the citizens of New York begin praising you from the rooftops on a nightly basis while you hold court at various sidewalk bars, accompanied by the greatest pandemic wingman ever: the stethoscope.
But for now, put it away. Give that v-neck a chance to shine on its own.