A tough Old Bird

The last several weeks have been filled with daunting news from all sorts of people around me. So many people seemed to be having ill parents, brothers, in laws. I felt for all of them and prayed my small and private prayerful words for all of them.

I'm not a big 'P' prayer, I'm more of a little 'p' prayer, and I don't honestly know if I pray to a deity or if I pray to humanity or just simply believe that good thoughts about a loved one are a prayer. I only know that I feel better if I think about a person who needs a hand for a while. It might not help them, but it helps me and I know my friends appreciate my thoughts.

Suddenly last Monday, I had cause to include a a fellow I worked alongside of for the last 15 years, in my list of people to think about and pray about.

I did not work for his business, but when you share the same small office building for 15 years, you get to know a lot about one another and this guy, well we talked a lot over the years. We became friends one day when the power was out for an entire business day. Without phones and power, everyone else left, but he and I stayed to hold down the fort. He stayed ostensibly to work on his filing, and I stayed to get the door, direct couriers, and be there in case the power came back on.

What we really did was get a case of beer and proceed to drink the afternoon away and just talked, about life, kids, family, things we wanted to do in life. Since then we have just been good office friends and his wife and I have become good office friends. A comfortable work family of sorts, if you will.

He has had a tough go of it the last few years. He lost one of his three good functioning fingers in a home construction incident a few years ago, and took that in stride, considering he is left with several non functioning fingers and a couple good thumbs. He has had a few bouts of pneumonia and worst, a period a few years ago, where he almost died due to a perforated bowel.

Monday last week, his family called the office and told us that he was in an induced coma, and they did not expect him to live. His bowel had become diseased again, and he lost another third and worse, he had pneumonia, and it seemed to be drug resistant. He was in tough tough shape. This Monday, I heard he was doing a bit better, and yesterday I took the time to visit him.

This man is the definition of tough old bird, even if the term usually means a woman. He is in pretty good spirits, just really really tired. We had a good talk about just how he felt surviving all this, how this time his life really is changed, how he is just is not going to lose this second chance at a good life, and how having is not really the point, how good days, and bad days really doesn't matter anymore, he is is going to enjoy them all with equal relish so long as his lovely wife is there with him. That is his only fear. That he won't get to have enough days with her. It was very very sweet. I am thrilled that my good old buddy is going to make it. It is going to be a long road, but he will make it. Nothing pleases me more than when a person figures out what really matters to him and makes his peace with it.

His wife said later that she had not realized how good of friends we are and that he must really feel close to me to speak about his very closely held feelings . I think it is the years, and his need to speak. The way things went at the office, when he needed an ear and someone to talk to, I was there, non-threatening and safe, and just listened.

Sometimes isn't that what we all just need? A place to just be free to speak and know that at the other end, there was a willing listener?