🔗 Share this article I Took a Family Friend to the Emergency Room – and he went from peaky to scarcely conscious during the journey. Our family friend has always been a larger than life character. Witty, unsentimental – and never one to refuse to an extra drink. During family gatherings, he is the person discussing the latest scandal to catch up with a regional politician, or regaling us with tales of the outrageous philandering of assorted players from the local club over the past 40 years. 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 planning to join family abroad, he tumbled down the staircase, whisky in one hand, a suitcase gripped 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, making the best of it, but appearing more and more unwell. The Morning Rolled On The morning rolled on but the humorous tales were absent like they normally did. He maintained that he felt alright but his condition seemed to contradict this. He tried to make it upstairs for a nap but found he could not; he tried, cautiously, to eat Christmas lunch, and failed. Thus, prior to me managing to don any celebratory headwear, my mum and I decided to drive him to the emergency room. The idea of calling for an ambulance crossed our minds, but what would the wait time be on Christmas Day? A Worrying Turn When we finally reached the hospital, he’d gone from unwell to almost unconscious. People in the waiting room aided us get him to a ward, where the generic smell of clinical cuisine and atmosphere filled the air. Different though, was the spirit. There were heroic attempts at festive gaiety in every direction, despite the underlying sterile and miserable mood; festive strands were attached to medical equipment and dishes of festive dessert sat uneaten on nightstands. Positive medical attendants, who certainly would have chosen to be at home, were moving busily and using that great term of endearment so peculiar to the area: “duck”. A Subdued Return Home After our time at the hospital concluded, we made our way home to chilled holiday sides and Christmas telly. We saw a lighthearted program on television, perhaps a detective story, and took part in a more foolish pastime, such as a local version of the board game. By then it was quite late, and it had begun to snow, and I remember experiencing a letdown – was Christmas effectively over for us? Healing and Reflection Although our friend eventually recovered, he had truly experienced a lung puncture and went on to get a serious circulatory condition. And, while that Christmas does not rank among my favorites, it has become part of family legend as “the Christmas I saved a life”. Whether that’s strictly true, or involves a degree of exaggeration, I couldn’t possibly comment, but hearing it told each year has done no damage to my pride. True to his favorite phrase: “don’t let the truth get in the way of a good story”.