It's amazing how we take someone or something for granted until something takes your breath away and you look at life differently. Yesterday, November 7th, 2016, will be a day embedded in my memory forever. Scott had left work early to ride motorcycles with some friends and I was going to meet them for dinner after I got off work, but that never happened. As he left work I gave him a kiss and told him to be careful. You know, the usual act and words we take for granted not realizing they could very well be the last time.
At 4:01 my phone rang and Scott calmly said that he'd just laid his bike down in the middle of the road and that I needed to come to the end of Alabama Street and get him because it wouldn't crank. Because he was so calm, I didn't even think about him being hurt. Before I could really react , our amazing friend and pastor, Dusty, was out the door of the church to go check on him. As soon as he left I realized maybe Scott had been hurt, so I called him back. He calmly told me I needed to meet him at the house, so I was immediately on my way. When I pulled up in the yard, Derrick had already arrived with his bike on his trailer and Scott was walking extremely slow. Dusty remarked very low that he needed to go to the hospital and that's exactly what we did. We arrived a few minutes later at SRMC and they took him right back and assessed him. The physician said his collarbone crunched, so it was probably broken. Wonderful! Scott's left side around his heart was hurting as well as his collarbone, so they took x-rays. The doctor said he had good news and bad news. The good news was it wasn't his heart. Praise God! The bad news was his collar bone was severely broken and so were a few of his ribs. No wonder he was in excruciating pain. They gave him morphine, but it didn't even cut the pain. They put his arm in a sling, gave us a script for pain, and the nurses told us that if he couldn't breathe or had a sharp pain, call an ambulance because that meant his rib had punctured his lung and could be bad. Really? That was reassuring to know. They sent us on our way with instructions to see the ortho doctor in a few days. As we're leaving the hospital all the doctors and nurses are telling him that the next day will be the worst. It was a bad day, but he feels just as bad today.
When I asked Scott to recount what had happened, he said they were at the end of our street and they were going to turn left. When he gunned his bike a little bit, the oil on the chain he'd just greased got on the tire and the bike went out from underneath him. Instead of letting go, he held on and was pummeled into the pavement on his left side. You can see the indention marks in the asphalt where the bike slid across the road. He immediately knew he'd broke something because he felt the intense pain. A police officer was behind him and he and a Good Samaritan came to his rescue. He hurt so bad he couldn't even talk. They wanted to call an ambulance, but he wouldn't let them.
He's in such pain, he's miserable. Last night I lay listening to his breathing, realizing this ordeal could have turned out so differently. I could be planning a funeral; he could be in traction; he could have injured the lower portion of his body; had he not had his helmet on, he could have had a traumatic head injury; he could have hit the curb and flipped over the handlebars. So many scenarios, but thank God they didn't happen. I'll take a sleepless night over any of the aforementioned situations.
If you have something against someone, forgive them. Hug a little longer. Don't let pride get in the way if you need to apologize. Laugh at silly things and talk instead of being so involved in life that you don't even enjoy it. Listen to your loved one's breathing. Hold their hand a little tighter. Because before you know it, the children will be gone, you'll be retired, and life will have slipped by and you have no memories to cling to. Every single day that you wake up is a precious gift from our Heavenly Father, so stop and smell the roses. You'll be glad you did.
