In contrast to the patients described in many medical memoirs, my clients have never reached into the infinite depths of their psychological cores to spontaneously expound philosophical profundities (at least none that I noticed). They have, however, come up with at least a couple of felicitous phrases:
1. While Mencken’s original observation, “Those who can – do. Those who can’t – teach,” is plenty pithy and more than a little cranky, I have a certain fondness for my patient’s indisputably valid revision:
Those who can — do
Those who can’t — don’t
2. The culturally embedded idiom, “If it’s not one thing, it’s another,” seems accurate enough and the commonly available parody, “If it’s not one thing, it’s your mother” does smack of comic possibilities. Nonetheless, my cynical nature leads me to favor the version set forth by another of my clients:
If it’s not one thing, …. it’s two things
My patients were also prone to using a few medical mondegreens (a word or phrase resulting from a misinterpreted statement or song lyric); my three favorites follow:
Screaming Meemie Jesus — Spinal Meningitis
Fireballs Of The Eucharist — Fibroids of the Uterus
The Roaches Of The Liver — Cirrhosis of the Liver
I wonder if those are universal medical malaprops — virtually the same ones made the rounds of Duke Medical School in the sixties. Smilin’ Mighty Jesus was Spinal Meningitis.