I Drove a Family Friend to the Emergency Room – and his condition shifted from unwell to barely responsive during the journey.
He has always been a man of a larger than life character. Witty, unsentimental – and hardly ever declining to an extra drink. At family parties, he’s the one chatting about the newest uproar to catch up with a local MP, or amusing us with accounts of the outrageous philandering of various Sheffield Wednesday players over the past 40 years.
We would often spend the holiday morning with him and his family, then departing for our own celebrations. But, one Christmas, roughly a decade past, when he was planning to join family abroad, he tumbled down the staircase, 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, doing his best to manage, but appearing more and more unwell.
As Time Passed
The morning rolled on but the stories were not coming as they usually were. He insisted he was fine but his appearance suggested otherwise. He tried to make it upstairs for a nap but was unable to; he tried, carefully, to eat Christmas lunch, and did not manage.
Therefore, before I could even don any celebratory headwear, we resolved 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 Worrying Turn
By the time we got there, he had moved from being poorly to hardly aware. Other outpatients helped us guide him to a ward, where the distinctive odor of institutional meals and air filled the air.
Different though, was the spirit. People were making brave attempts at festive gaiety all around, even with the pervasive clinical and somber atmosphere; decorations dangled from IV poles and bowls of Christmas pudding congealed on tables next to the beds.
Cheerful nurses, who no doubt would far rather have been at home, were bustling about and using that charming colloquial address so unique to the area: “duck”.
A Subdued Return Home
When visiting hours were over, we headed home to cold bread sauce and Christmas telly. We saw a lighthearted program on television, likely a mystery drama, and played something even dafter, such as a local version of the board game.
By then it was quite late, and snowing, and I remember experiencing a letdown – had we missed Christmas?
The Aftermath and the Story
Although our friend eventually recovered, he had truly experienced a lung puncture and went on to get deep vein thrombosis. And, while that Christmas is not my most cherished memory, it has gone down in family lore as “the Christmas I saved a life”.
If that is completely accurate, or a little bit of dramatic licence, I am not in a position to judge, but its annual retelling has done no damage to my pride. In keeping with our friend’s motto: “don’t let the truth get in the way of a good story”.
