🔗 Share this article I Drove a Family Friend to A&E – and he went from unwell to barely responsive during the journey. He has always been a man of a truly outsized personality. Clever and unemotional – 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 member of parliament, or regaling us with tales of the outrageous philandering of various Sheffield Wednesday players during the last four decades. Frequently, we would share the morning of Christmas Day with him and his family, before going our separate ways. However, one holiday season, some ten years back, when he was planning to join family abroad, he fell down the stairs, with a glass of whisky in hand, a suitcase gripped in the other, and fractured his ribs. The hospital had patched him up and told him not to fly. Thus, he found himself back with us, trying to cope, but looking increasingly peaky. The Day Progressed Time passed, yet the humorous tales were absent as they usually were. He maintained that he felt alright but he didn’t look it. He tried to make it upstairs for a nap but was unable to; he tried, cautiously, to eat Christmas lunch, and failed. Therefore, before I could even don any celebratory headwear, we resolved to take him to A&E. The idea of calling for an ambulance crossed our minds, but what would the wait time be on Christmas Day? A Rapid Decline By the time we got there, he’d gone from unwell to almost unconscious. Fellow patients assisted us get him to a ward, where the characteristic scent of clinical cuisine and atmosphere was noticeable. The atmosphere, however, was unique. There were heroic attempts at festive gaiety in every direction, notwithstanding the fundamental clinical and somber atmosphere; festive strands were attached to medical equipment and bowls of Christmas pudding congealed on tables next to the beds. Positive medical attendants, who no doubt would far rather have been at home, were moving busily and using that lovely local expression so particular to the area: “duck”. A Quiet Journey Back When visiting hours were over, we returned home to chilled holiday sides and Christmas telly. We watched something daft on television, probably Agatha Christie, and engaged in an even sillier game, such as Sheffield’s take on Monopoly. By then it was quite late, and it had begun to snow, and I remember having a sense of anticlimax – had we missed Christmas? Recovery and Retrospection Although our friend eventually recovered, he had in fact suffered a punctured lung and later developed a serious circulatory condition. And, even if that particular Christmas does not rank among my favorites, it has entered into our family history as “the Christmas I saved a life”. If that is completely accurate, or involves a degree of exaggeration, I couldn’t possibly comment, but the story’s yearly repetition has done no damage to my pride. And, as our friend always says: “don’t let the truth get in the way of a good story”.