I took Em back to the doctor this morning and I talked to him about the adenoid thing and got the referral to an ENT. Same one that did Leirin’s surgery so I know him, know he’s good, and I feel good about that. Em will stay out of school again tomorrow and because she will have missed 5 days in a row, she will qualify for homebound instruction which means she gets 5 hours of tutoring and she will be counted as being at school for these 5 days. Cool beans. Thumbs up to Miss Cathy in the office for mentioning it to me. It will come in handy for the days she will miss on visits to the ENT in April. And on the bright side, with all these visits we’ll have our deductible met in no time.
Silver lining and all that.
We had a very long wait at the doctor’s office this morning. There was a sweet little old man sitting on the other side of the room and to our left. Apparently he was very worried about the person he was there with because the nurse kept coming out to give him updates on his friend. It wasn’t very long before another woman came out to talk to the man that was waiting in the room with us. “It was my carelessness that allowed it to happen,” he said to the lady.
All day long I’ve remembered that sweet man and how he cried when he told her how it happened that her father fell while he was walking him to the car.
He dabbed at his eyes with a handkerchief. A real hanky, neatly folded into a square that he had pulled from his pants pocket.
“Now you just stop that right now,” the daughter said, “You didn’t do a thing to cause it, you just couldn’t stop it from happening.”
“But if anything happens to him…” the sweet old man said. And he cried a bit more.
He was that man’s friend. A REAL kind of friend, taking his almost a century old friend out to coffee, and I sat there and watched him torment himself over something he had no control over and I wished I had a friend like that. He made my heart ache. He made me hope that I would have a real life friend like that again sometime.
The sweet old man’s voice cracked and his lips shook as he spoke. “His glasses,” he said, “I have to go find his glasses.” (they flew off somewhere when the man fell and he didn’t take the time to look for them, just drove his friend straight to urgent care because it was faster than waiting for an ambulance). And at one point, the daughter reached over and took his hand and said, “You’re a good friend. You mean everything to him. It is not your fault.” She shook his hand in a fake kind of roughness. The sweet old man broke down, “He means everything to me.”
Broke my heart in pieces.
I figure the lady had to be 70 if she was a day. Her father, whom they rolled by in the wheelchair on his way to x-ray a few minutes later, was 98. Spunky old fart he was too. Talking about how he was on his way to have his coffee when he fell and it was after 11:00 now and he still hadn’t had any coffee. He was awesome.
Once the x-ray was done and the sweet old man felt better because he saw his friend looking for all the world to be in good spirits, he left to find the missing glasses. The daughter’s husband ran out for the spunky old fart’s coffee because he was still complaining about not having any. He had just returned from the coffee run and was walking toward his seat when the daughter opened the door and said, “We’re going to the hospital...he has a collapsed lung.”
And my heart broke again.
All day long I’ve wondered about that 98 year-old man and how he is. Mostly though, I’ve wondered about his friend, the gentleman with the real hankie and the load of blame that wasn’t his to carry, and I wonder how both are doing tonight.
Silver lining and all that.
We had a very long wait at the doctor’s office this morning. There was a sweet little old man sitting on the other side of the room and to our left. Apparently he was very worried about the person he was there with because the nurse kept coming out to give him updates on his friend. It wasn’t very long before another woman came out to talk to the man that was waiting in the room with us. “It was my carelessness that allowed it to happen,” he said to the lady.
All day long I’ve remembered that sweet man and how he cried when he told her how it happened that her father fell while he was walking him to the car.
He dabbed at his eyes with a handkerchief. A real hanky, neatly folded into a square that he had pulled from his pants pocket.
“Now you just stop that right now,” the daughter said, “You didn’t do a thing to cause it, you just couldn’t stop it from happening.”
“But if anything happens to him…” the sweet old man said. And he cried a bit more.
He was that man’s friend. A REAL kind of friend, taking his almost a century old friend out to coffee, and I sat there and watched him torment himself over something he had no control over and I wished I had a friend like that. He made my heart ache. He made me hope that I would have a real life friend like that again sometime.
The sweet old man’s voice cracked and his lips shook as he spoke. “His glasses,” he said, “I have to go find his glasses.” (they flew off somewhere when the man fell and he didn’t take the time to look for them, just drove his friend straight to urgent care because it was faster than waiting for an ambulance). And at one point, the daughter reached over and took his hand and said, “You’re a good friend. You mean everything to him. It is not your fault.” She shook his hand in a fake kind of roughness. The sweet old man broke down, “He means everything to me.”
Broke my heart in pieces.
I figure the lady had to be 70 if she was a day. Her father, whom they rolled by in the wheelchair on his way to x-ray a few minutes later, was 98. Spunky old fart he was too. Talking about how he was on his way to have his coffee when he fell and it was after 11:00 now and he still hadn’t had any coffee. He was awesome.
Once the x-ray was done and the sweet old man felt better because he saw his friend looking for all the world to be in good spirits, he left to find the missing glasses. The daughter’s husband ran out for the spunky old fart’s coffee because he was still complaining about not having any. He had just returned from the coffee run and was walking toward his seat when the daughter opened the door and said, “We’re going to the hospital...he has a collapsed lung.”
And my heart broke again.
All day long I’ve wondered about that 98 year-old man and how he is. Mostly though, I’ve wondered about his friend, the gentleman with the real hankie and the load of blame that wasn’t his to carry, and I wonder how both are doing tonight.
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