In every major ordeal, a hero emerges. The hero of my recent accident was a neighbor.
· She drove and stayed with us.
· She kept us focused on positive thoughts.
· She was what anyone in an emergency needs.
As the ambulance pulled away from our rural summer home to take me to the closest trauma one hospital, a neighbor stepped forward and offered to drive my wife there as well. They arrived shortly after I was admitted, and this wonderful neighbor made sure everything was taken care of while my wife worried about me. Unfortunately, that hospital was unable to locate a medical specialist and we had to be transferred to a hospital 50 miles away. When they were then unable to find an ambulance, this neighbor-turned-angel offered to drive us there as well. Because we arrived in a private car and not an ambulance, we had to walk into the waiting room (rather than be delivered by an ambulance directly into the emergency room); thus began a four hour wait before we were seen. All this while our neighbor talked about anything and everything to distract us from the pain of the moment. It was another 3 hours before a doctor arrived and the surgery began, and 3 more hours after that before we were finally released; she then drove us home as the sun was coming up. It was a long night of pain, uncertainty, and people who seemingly didn't care. Which made it abundantly clear to us that the only people who count are those who can be counted on: our neighbor – our angel and the heroine of this story, is one of those. When the chips are down, be someone who can be counted on today.
Henry Fredrick Cope (1870-1923): A major figure in the rise of the Religious Education Movement during the first quarter of the 20th century.
❤️
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