I Took a Family Friend to the Emergency Room – and he went from peaky to scarcely conscious during the journey.
Our family friend has always been a bigger-than-life personality. Witty, unsentimental – and never one to refuse to a further glass. Whenever our families celebrated, he is the person gossiping about the most recent controversy to befall a member of parliament, or entertaining us with stories of the notorious womanizing of various Sheffield Wednesday players over the past 40 years.
We would often spend Christmas morning with him and his family, then departing for our own celebrations. Yet, on a particular Christmas, some ten years back, when he was scheduled to meet family abroad, he took a fall on the steps, whisky in one hand, his luggage in the other, and broke his ribs. The hospital had patched him up and told him not to fly. Thus, he found himself back with us, making the best of it, but seeming progressively worse.
The Day Progressed
The hours went by, however, the stories were not coming in their typical fashion. He maintained that he felt alright but his condition seemed to contradict this. He endeavored to climb the stairs for a nap but couldn’t; he tried, carefully, to eat Christmas lunch, and was unsuccessful.
So, before I’d so much as don any celebratory headwear, my mother and I made the choice to get him to the hospital.
We considered summoning an ambulance, but what would the wait time be on Christmas Day?
A Worrying Turn
By the time we got there, he had moved from being unwell to almost unconscious. People in the waiting room aided us guide him to a ward, where the generic smell of clinical cuisine and atmosphere was noticeable.
The atmosphere, however, was unique. There were heroic attempts at Christmas spirit everywhere you looked, even with the pervasive depressing and institutional feel; tinsel hung from drip stands and bowls of Christmas pudding congealed on bedside tables.
Positive medical attendants, who no doubt would far rather have been at home, were bustling about and using that lovely local expression so particular to the area: “duck”.
Heading Home for Leftovers
After our time at the hospital concluded, we made our way home to lukewarm condiments and Christmas telly. We saw a lighthearted program on television, likely a mystery drama, and engaged in an even sillier game, such as a regionally-themed property trading game.
It was already late, and snowing, and I remember experiencing a letdown – did we lose the holiday?
The Aftermath and the Story
Even though he ultimately healed, he had truly experienced a lung puncture and went on to get a serious circulatory condition. And, even if that particular Christmas does not rank among my favorites, it has entered into our family history as “the Christmas I saved a life”.
Whether that’s strictly true, or involves a degree of exaggeration, is not for me to definitively say, but the story’s yearly repetition has definitely been good for my self-esteem. And, as our friend always says: “don’t let the truth get in the way of a good story”.