Tuesday at the end of our recent monsoon my 80-year-old MIL fell and broke her arm. Pretty bad break at the left humeras shank and ball in her shoulder. Wednesday morning she had an appointment with an orthopedic surgeon and got a very good report...no surgery, keep it restrained and things should heal well. Great news.
We stopped and got some breakfast before starting the 60+ mile drive back home. After eating we were walking to the car and I got a message on my phone that a rescue squad had just picked one of my old and very dear best friends. Initial report was a major heart attack. Heart attack patients are stabilized at our local hospital and then transferred to Montgomery which we were just leaving...I kept looking/hoping to meet an ambulance headed north.
About half way between our hometown and Montgomery I got another call, from the hospital this time. It was a nurse calling me to let me know my friend's wife wanted me down there...I was already coming and I told them I was about 30-35 minutes out. Then I asked about my friend. There was a pause and then she said "he passed". To add to the sadness...his wife was the ER nurse/supervisor and she was working...she was prepping for the incoming patient when they came and removed her from the ER. She said she thought it might be her mother, or maybe one of the older ladies that drops by all along...never did she think it was her husband. There daughter is a floor nurse there, too.
49 years old, great husband and father, married 18 years, loved kids, hard worker, fantastic friend, seemed to never meet a stranger, and in bad times he could come up with a smile and a chuckle. He was working on his mother's old home place, buying it after it had sat idle for several years and had done great things with it...but still had things to do. He was basically 3-years younger than the rest of us in our highschool group after coming back from Iran as an army brat...he got called a punk kid all through the years (and would just wag his head grinning when he heard it and reply with something about old farts
) though I think he was more mature than the rest of us..and smarter, he could work with his hands or mind. He was the kind of fellow that if he saw you in a bullring with ten guys surrounding you with baseball bats he'd bust through the ring to cover your back. He was a fellow that could put a goofy grin on his face and make you bust a gut laughing at/with him and he was the guy that could be serious in reporting to the state legislature and have his report published in the library of congress. I was there when we buried his parents...he was there when we buried mine. He's the guy that would tilt his forehead forward look at you over his glasses and earnestly ask "Are you ok?".
25 years ago we walked out of bars together at sun-up...for the last several years we've been walking out of church together. Thank you Jesus, the Son of the Living God, for Your saving grace.
All truely good things come from God and God is Love....my friend was a good man and he had much love in him. Please pray for his family and his friends, this good man will be very much missed. His name is Dennis.
In Christian Love,
Ed
We stopped and got some breakfast before starting the 60+ mile drive back home. After eating we were walking to the car and I got a message on my phone that a rescue squad had just picked one of my old and very dear best friends. Initial report was a major heart attack. Heart attack patients are stabilized at our local hospital and then transferred to Montgomery which we were just leaving...I kept looking/hoping to meet an ambulance headed north.
About half way between our hometown and Montgomery I got another call, from the hospital this time. It was a nurse calling me to let me know my friend's wife wanted me down there...I was already coming and I told them I was about 30-35 minutes out. Then I asked about my friend. There was a pause and then she said "he passed". To add to the sadness...his wife was the ER nurse/supervisor and she was working...she was prepping for the incoming patient when they came and removed her from the ER. She said she thought it might be her mother, or maybe one of the older ladies that drops by all along...never did she think it was her husband. There daughter is a floor nurse there, too.
49 years old, great husband and father, married 18 years, loved kids, hard worker, fantastic friend, seemed to never meet a stranger, and in bad times he could come up with a smile and a chuckle. He was working on his mother's old home place, buying it after it had sat idle for several years and had done great things with it...but still had things to do. He was basically 3-years younger than the rest of us in our highschool group after coming back from Iran as an army brat...he got called a punk kid all through the years (and would just wag his head grinning when he heard it and reply with something about old farts
25 years ago we walked out of bars together at sun-up...for the last several years we've been walking out of church together. Thank you Jesus, the Son of the Living God, for Your saving grace.
All truely good things come from God and God is Love....my friend was a good man and he had much love in him. Please pray for his family and his friends, this good man will be very much missed. His name is Dennis.
In Christian Love,
Ed
