I Drove a Close Friend of the Family to A&E – and he went from unwell to scarcely conscious on the way.
Our family friend has always been a bigger-than-life figure. Sharp and not prone to sentiment – and hardly ever declining to another brandy. Whenever our families celebrated, he would be the one gossiping about the latest scandal to befall a regional politician, or amusing us with accounts of the notorious womanizing of various Sheffield Wednesday players during the last four decades.
Frequently, we would share the morning of Christmas Day with him and his family, before going our separate ways. However, one holiday season, roughly a decade past, when he was planning to join family abroad, he fell down the stairs, with a glass of whisky in hand, his luggage in the other, and sustained broken ribs. The hospital had patched him up and advised against air travel. So, here he was back with us, doing his best to manage, but looking increasingly peaky.
The Morning Rolled On
Time passed, yet the anecdotes weren’t flowing like they normally did. He insisted he was fine but he didn’t look it. He endeavored to climb the stairs for a nap but found he could not; he tried, cautiously, to eat Christmas lunch, and was unsuccessful.
Therefore, before I could even placed a party hat on my head, we resolved to drive him to the emergency room.
We thought about calling an ambulance, but what would the wait time be on Christmas Day?
A Rapid Decline
When we finally reached the hospital, he had moved from being unwell to almost unconscious. Fellow patients assisted us help him reach a treatment area, where the characteristic scent of clinical cuisine and atmosphere filled the air.
The atmosphere, however, was unique. There were heroic attempts at holiday cheer in every direction, despite the underlying sterile and miserable mood; decorations dangled from IV poles and dishes of festive dessert sat uneaten on bedside tables.
Cheerful nurses, who no doubt would far rather have been at home, were moving busily and using that charming colloquial address so peculiar to the area: “duck”.
Heading Home for Leftovers
When visiting hours were over, we returned home to cold bread sauce and holiday television. We watched something daft on television, perhaps a detective story, and took part in a more foolish pastime, such as a regionally-themed property trading game.
The hour was already advanced, and snow was falling, and I remember experiencing a letdown – did we lose the holiday?
Healing and Reflection
Although our friend eventually recovered, he had in fact suffered a punctured lung and subsequently contracted DVT. And, although that holiday does not rank among my favorites, it has entered into our family history as “the Christmas I saved a life”.
How factual that statement is, or involves a degree of exaggeration, I couldn’t possibly comment, but its annual retelling certainly hasn’t hurt my ego. And, as our friend always says: “don’t let the truth get in the way of a good story”.
