I Drove a Family Friend to A&E – and his condition shifted from unwell to scarcely conscious during the journey.
Our family friend has always been a truly outsized personality. Witty, unsentimental – and never one to refuse to another brandy. At family parties, he would be the one chatting about the latest scandal to befall a local MP, or entertaining us with stories of the notorious womanizing of assorted players from the local club during the last four decades.
We would often spend the morning of Christmas Day with him and his family, prior to heading off to our own plans. Yet, on a particular Christmas, roughly a decade past, when he was supposed to be meeting family abroad, he took a fall on the steps, holding a drink in one hand, suitcase in the other, and fractured his ribs. The hospital had patched him up and advised against air travel. Consequently, he ended up back with us, doing his best to manage, but seeming progressively worse.
The Morning Rolled On
Time passed, yet the humorous tales were absent as they usually were. He insisted he was fine but he didn’t look it. He endeavored to climb the stairs for a nap but was unable to; he tried, gingerly, to eat Christmas lunch, and was unsuccessful.
Thus, prior to me managing to don any celebratory headwear, my mum and I decided to take him to A&E.
The idea of calling for an ambulance crossed our minds, but what would the wait time be on Christmas Day?
A Deteriorating Condition
Upon our arrival, his state had progressed from poorly to hardly aware. Fellow patients assisted us get 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 holiday cheer all around, despite the underlying clinical and somber atmosphere; decorations dangled from IV poles and portions of holiday pudding went cold on bedside tables.
Cheerful nurses, who certainly would have chosen to be 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 chilled holiday sides and holiday television. We watched something daft on television, likely a mystery drama, and engaged in an even sillier game, such as a local version of the board game.
The hour was already advanced, and snowing, and I remember experiencing a letdown – was Christmas effectively over for us?
Recovery and Retrospection
Even though he ultimately healed, he had in fact suffered a punctured lung and went on to get deep vein thrombosis. And, while that Christmas isn’t a personal favourite, it has gone down in family lore as “the Christmas I saved a life”.
How factual that statement is, or involves a degree of exaggeration, is not for me to definitively say, but its annual retelling has definitely been good for my self-esteem. In keeping with our friend’s motto: “don’t let the truth get in the way of a good story”.
