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In the early part of this dark COVID-Fall, I found myself in a hospital emergency room after having my first cardiac event. I was one of ten on the East side of the ER, and there were over twenty on the West side. Most of us were wearing masks properly. A handful had their masks over their mouths so they had easy access to blowing their noses. A couple of others flaunted the rules and wore their masks on their chins. Most of the nurses, orderlies, security guards and doctors wore no masks at all (an excellent example they were setting, yes?).

I tried to ignore my chest anxiety and my increasing corona-virus exposure anxiety by continuing A Man Called Ove. I recognize now that it wasn't the best choice for this hospital trip, but it was all I had, and I was in the early stages of reading and enjoying it immensely. I had a hard time concentrating, though, despite my efforts, and I didn't get too far in the book. I closed it up then watched and listened while my waiting room neighbours coughed, cried, moaned, or sat as anxiously as myself. An hour and a half later I was finally hooked up to an EKG.

The moment the technician saw me, his tension was palpable. He didn't like me. Now maybe I imagined this. Perhaps I am wrong about his feelings. It is possible. Yet I don't tend to jump to conclusions (especially of this sort); I spend a lot of time interacting with folks, and I have long had a pretty solid ability to read the way folks respond to me. I am confident he didn't like me from the moment he saw me, and I think at least some of that has to be because of the way I look.

How do I look? These days, I probably look like your stereotypical Trump supporter. I'm a white, overweight, salt & pepper haired and bearded, nearly fifty year old who wears cut-0ffs, sneakers, a t-shirt and a fleece no matter the time of year or the occasion. Most who see me assume I am a working class, CIS gendered, conservative. My exterior belies my interior, however. I am a bisexual, anarcho-syndacalyst, academic and author (though I grew up in a poor blue collar family). His mistake was, I suppose, understandable, but it was a mistake.

He was terse and unfriendly, then he saw my copy of A Man Called Ove sitting beside me. He decided to turn my EKG into a teaching moment and proceeded to lecture me about the meaning of Fredrik Backman's book, making sure I understood that A Man Called Ove's entire purpose is to teach people like Ove that immigrants are important. There was no other meaning in A Man Called Ove, despite the myriad meanings and themes contained in any work of literature. For him, the meaning was that immigrants matter. And that if only "people like Ove could accept people like [himself]" the world would be a better place.

I was stunned by his assumptions of who I was, but I took his condescension gracefully, understanding at least some of where his anger must be coming from. I nodded. I said something about how important acceptance is to our world and how we need more of it, then I wished that he'd just leave. His attitude had done nothing to assuage my heart attack and coronavirus fears. I was even more stressed after his lecture than I had been when I came in. But his work took a while longer.

After a few more minutes of being schooled, he finally left, and I went back to my waiting room seat even shakier than I had been when I arrived at the ER.

It took me months to get back to reading A Man Called Ove. My encounter had soured my time with the novel, and I quite simply didn't want to read it any more. I did pick it up again, though. I am even sure what brought me back, but I did get back ... eventually.

Now that I am finished, I think my EKG technician could spend some time reflecting on his own biases. He's not wrong that acceptance would make our lives better (and I accept that he, as an immigrant to Canada, has surely struggled for acceptance in our society of white privilege), but that acceptance cuts in many different directions. While A Man Called Ove does show us the importance of accepting "others," it also shows us the importance of accepting others that we may not consider "others" -- like a man called Ove. His exterior belies his interior, and he is a man worth getting to know, worth loving, worth caring for, and his gruff exterior contains an accepting interior. Acceptance is important. Acceptance heals. Acceptance is something we should all strive for because whatever someone's exterior suggests, it doesn't tell the whole tale of the person.

That night in the ER will always be connected to A Man Called Ove for me. I don't think my encounter enriched my reading experience. But it is a night I will never forget. And I will never forget the man who tried to teach me to be something I already am because of what he mistakenly assumed me to be. But hey ... it has happened before, and it is sure to happen again. As I am sure it will to him. I will simply have to accept moments like those and empathize with my interlocutors.