Dan Anderson, M.D., Ph.D., almost wasn’t either.
A year and a half out of high school, he worked in a factory, on an assembly line, hanging car shocks. Eight hours a day, for $8.20 an hour (hey, that was pretty good), that’s what he did.
He was 20. College hadn’t seriously occurred to him.
He took welding and shop classes in high school. He’d been planning to farm.
And there he was. What was it like?
“It was boring,” he said.
Boring, but not miserable. It was honest labor, and as a farm kid, he knew how to work.
He was good at it, and the bosses saw him as a diamond in the rough. Maybe someday he could become a foreman or line leader, department manager or shift manager, even a plant supervisor.
Maybe this is what he would do with the rest of his life.
But then, he met a woman.
“This very nice, verbally colorful lady, who one day in four-letter words, told me, ‘Why in the (bleep) are you sitting here?'”
(I’m thinking R-rated Rosanne Barr.)
Young Dan Anderson was perplexed. Why was he sitting here? I’m working. Putting on parts.
“‘No, why in the (bleep) are you sitting here?’
“She goes, ‘I’ve been working here for 20 years. If you want to do that, that’s fine. But go get an education and then come back and see if you want to do something else when you get done with that.'”
His parents had been telling him much the same thing. But for the first time, the words sunk in.
“If you don’t want to do anything with your life, that’s OK,” the woman said, throwing in a few more bleeps for good measure. “But I don’t know that you know that.”
He realized that he didn’t.
He went to school. His curiosity blossomed. Today he’s Dan Anderson, M.D., Ph.D., associate professor of cardiology at UNMC.
What’s the reaction of the people he grew up with when they hear that?
“Flabbergasted,” Dr. Anderson said. “They’re like almost mortified. ‘What?!'”
Him?
And it all goes back to the woman in the factory, who saw something special in him.
Or maybe she just says that to everybody.
“She probably does,” Dr. Anderson said, and he laughed. “She didn’t want to be there.”
Maybe he’ll go back and thank her someday.
He should go back and thank her – she inspired him and she needs to know how she made a difference in his life. It could just be that by doing so he will have made a difference in hers
I love that you shared that story. You may have already shared it with high school groups, but if you haven't you should.
Wonderful story! I hope Dr. Anderson passes that advice on to other young men. Thank you for sharing…you're a great doc, speaker, and motivator!
Congrats! Glad you listened to her!