(DISCLAIMER: I was more than just a little drunk and emotionally beat when I wrote this, so my apologies if there are any grammatical or personal offenses contained therein, they were not intentional)
Isn't it funny. Life can be going along just fine--you've made plans to see your friends, everything's going fine during spring break--then WHAM, some higher power with a sick and truly twisted sense of humor drops a big old shit bomb on you and turns your life completely upside down in an instant, scaring the hell out of you in more ways than one in the process. This happened to Tim and me this week...actually in the last 12 hours.
We have two sets of friends (quite close friends) Leeann and Dave, and Bekka and Lesley, who have each needed us simultaneously today--though for extremely different reasons. Dave (yes, the Dave for whom I posted the birthday wish) completely blew-off Leeann without so much as a phone call to hang out with his friends. Doesn't sound that big, but he did it after making plans with her, and then waited 24 hours before calling her back. During that 24 hour period Leeann tortured herself with endless hypotheticals in an attempt to understand Dave's callous and cruel indifference toward her feelings. This all started yesterday afternoon, and finally ended tonight when he decided to call her back, via me. Meanwhile...
Bekka called us this morning to tell us that Lesley was in the hospital, put there by a heart virus. Around noon yesterday, St. Patrick's Day, she suddenly grabbed Bekka and told she wasn't feeling very well, the next moment she was on the floor, not breathing. Tim has known Bekka since tenth grade, about ten years; we have only known Lesley for a few months. They have been together for just over a year, are building a life together, and planning to move from their apartment into a house soon. They are truly one of the greatest examples of love. In the short time I have known them I have seen this, anyone who knows them sees this--Ray Charles can see the love they share for its genuineness.
They, like Tim and I are in their early twenties, all of us are for that matter. While one expects the kind of drama incited by the likes of Dave's actions, one never expects an ailment such as this to strike a close friend down in her prime without warning. The randomness of such an event inspires a spiraling sense of surrealism that is never quite alleviated. I have never experienced anything like this, and perhaps for that I am fortunate; however, the lack of experience makes such a thing all the more harder to bear.
Now Tim and I can't ever not be able to get a hold of each other without fearing the worst. We will never part without saying "I Love You," maybe never even be able to leave the room without saying it. These things can happen in an instant, and you never know when your last talk truly will be your last talk.
Leeann and Dave's relationship may not be long for this world, while Bekka fights desperately to hold on to the hope that her relationship won't be cut short by fate's random and indiscriminatory bitch-slap--we all are hoping and praying to our selective deities that Lesley pulls through. The doctor's at Arlington Memorial can't give a prognosis, they just know she must be kept heavily sedated and in the intensive care unit, with defribulating paddles close at hand. Tonight, we did receive word that she has not suffered any brain damage from her heart stopping twice in 24 hours, according to her EEG. Tomorrow, Lesley will be transferred to Baylor Medical Center in Dallas, where cardiac specialists will hopefully be able to tell Bekka and Lesley's family and friends something more definite. But after a day of it, now we face a night and another day of "wait and see." That is the most painful part of it all.
Say a little prayer for Lesley, for us all.
Isn't it funny. Life can be going along just fine--you've made plans to see your friends, everything's going fine during spring break--then WHAM, some higher power with a sick and truly twisted sense of humor drops a big old shit bomb on you and turns your life completely upside down in an instant, scaring the hell out of you in more ways than one in the process. This happened to Tim and me this week...actually in the last 12 hours.
We have two sets of friends (quite close friends) Leeann and Dave, and Bekka and Lesley, who have each needed us simultaneously today--though for extremely different reasons. Dave (yes, the Dave for whom I posted the birthday wish) completely blew-off Leeann without so much as a phone call to hang out with his friends. Doesn't sound that big, but he did it after making plans with her, and then waited 24 hours before calling her back. During that 24 hour period Leeann tortured herself with endless hypotheticals in an attempt to understand Dave's callous and cruel indifference toward her feelings. This all started yesterday afternoon, and finally ended tonight when he decided to call her back, via me. Meanwhile...
Bekka called us this morning to tell us that Lesley was in the hospital, put there by a heart virus. Around noon yesterday, St. Patrick's Day, she suddenly grabbed Bekka and told she wasn't feeling very well, the next moment she was on the floor, not breathing. Tim has known Bekka since tenth grade, about ten years; we have only known Lesley for a few months. They have been together for just over a year, are building a life together, and planning to move from their apartment into a house soon. They are truly one of the greatest examples of love. In the short time I have known them I have seen this, anyone who knows them sees this--Ray Charles can see the love they share for its genuineness.
They, like Tim and I are in their early twenties, all of us are for that matter. While one expects the kind of drama incited by the likes of Dave's actions, one never expects an ailment such as this to strike a close friend down in her prime without warning. The randomness of such an event inspires a spiraling sense of surrealism that is never quite alleviated. I have never experienced anything like this, and perhaps for that I am fortunate; however, the lack of experience makes such a thing all the more harder to bear.
Now Tim and I can't ever not be able to get a hold of each other without fearing the worst. We will never part without saying "I Love You," maybe never even be able to leave the room without saying it. These things can happen in an instant, and you never know when your last talk truly will be your last talk.
Leeann and Dave's relationship may not be long for this world, while Bekka fights desperately to hold on to the hope that her relationship won't be cut short by fate's random and indiscriminatory bitch-slap--we all are hoping and praying to our selective deities that Lesley pulls through. The doctor's at Arlington Memorial can't give a prognosis, they just know she must be kept heavily sedated and in the intensive care unit, with defribulating paddles close at hand. Tonight, we did receive word that she has not suffered any brain damage from her heart stopping twice in 24 hours, according to her EEG. Tomorrow, Lesley will be transferred to Baylor Medical Center in Dallas, where cardiac specialists will hopefully be able to tell Bekka and Lesley's family and friends something more definite. But after a day of it, now we face a night and another day of "wait and see." That is the most painful part of it all.
Say a little prayer for Lesley, for us all.
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