I Took a Close Friend of the Family to the Emergency Room – and he went from unwell to barely responsive on the way.
This individual has long been known as a bigger-than-life figure. Clever and unemotional – and not one to say no to an extra drink. During family gatherings, he is the person discussing the newest uproar to catch up with a member of parliament, or amusing us with accounts of the shameless infidelity of different footballers from Sheffield Wednesday over the past 40 years.
It was common for us to pass the morning of Christmas Day with him and his family, prior to heading off to our own plans. However, one holiday season, roughly a decade past, when he was supposed to be meeting family abroad, he tumbled down the staircase, whisky in one hand, suitcase in the other, and broke his ribs. He was treated at the hospital and advised against air travel. Consequently, he ended up back with us, making the best of it, but appearing more and more unwell.
As Time Passed
Time passed, yet the stories were not coming like they normally did. He insisted he was fine but his appearance suggested otherwise. He endeavored to climb the stairs for a nap but couldn’t; he tried, gingerly, to eat Christmas lunch, and was unsuccessful.
Therefore, before I could even placed a party hat on my head, my mum and I decided to get him to the hospital.
The idea of calling for an ambulance crossed our minds, but what would the wait time be on Christmas Day?
A Deteriorating Condition
By the time we got there, his state had progressed from peaky to barely responsive. Other outpatients helped us get him to a ward, where the characteristic scent of clinical cuisine and atmosphere filled the air.
What was distinct, however, was the mood. One could see valiant efforts at holiday cheer in every direction, even with the pervasive clinical and somber atmosphere; decorations dangled from IV poles and portions of holiday pudding went cold on bedside tables.
Positive medical attendants, who no doubt would far rather have been at home, were working diligently and using that great term of endearment so peculiar to the area: “duck”.
Heading Home for Leftovers
When visiting hours were over, we returned home to cold bread sauce and festive TV programming. We watched something daft on television, likely a mystery drama, and played something even dafter, such as a local version of the board game.
The hour was already advanced, and it had begun to snow, and I remember having a sense of anticlimax – did we lose the holiday?
Healing and Reflection
Although our friend eventually recovered, he had in fact suffered a punctured lung and later developed deep vein thrombosis. And, even if that particular Christmas isn’t a personal favourite, it has become part of family legend as “the Christmas I saved a life”.
How factual that statement is, or contains some artistic license, is not for me to definitively say, but hearing it told each year 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”.
