An Overly-typical August Weekend

Tomorrow’s episode of FAR Future begins, “In the long hot days of August, Murphy’s star is in the ascendent and nothing works right.” Even though it hasn’t been hot, it hasn’t exactly been the best of times. Not that everything is w0rNg: many days were perfect riding weather, Mrs. Fetched bought me an iPhone (!!! still trying to figure out that one), and we’ve been getting lots of goodies out of the garden. Even the disasters have not been all they could have been: Daughter Dearest’s tip-over saw all three involved walk away; Mrs. Fetched’s mom went into the hospital earlier in the week for a possible heart attack that turned out to be a bacterial problem… and there was today’s excitement.

But I cannot let this go by: we got Daughter Dearest off to college yesterday. We spent the morning getting her signed in and unpacked, ate the lunch they provided us all, then had a half-hour gathering that ended with a “if you’re not a student, you have to leave now. Say your good-byes.” Mrs. Fetched, despite threatening to cry all week when this moment arrived, held up very well. I had to generate a tear or two in her stead. But only one or two. I’m really happy for her, getting to start Book II of her life. Like many people my age, I’d love to have the 40-odd (and I do mean odd) years of experience and the 18-year-old body to do it all over again in.

Of course, the texts and phone calls weren’t long delayed. DD forgot a couple of minor things, stuff you can live without if you’re a guy, but… so I figured we’d make a list, toss them in the car, and buzz over to drop them off.

Coming home from church, we topped the hill just before FAR Manor and there was a pack of emergency vehicles just a little farther down, in fact at the top of the dirt road we used to live on. “Go up there,” Mrs. Fetched said. “I want to make sure it’s not any of us.”

I didn’t recognize any of the cars, but saw a woman lying on the pavement… not good. The EMT crouched in front of her blocked her face, but when I saw my nephew Brand X running toward us with his mom’s purse in one hand and her cellphone in the other, Mrs. Fetched said “Oh $#!+.” Yup: her brother’s wife Jam.

Brand X calmed down and gave us a quick run-down of what had happened: they were riding horses, and Jam’s horse had a neurotic episode when it stepped off the grass and onto the pavement, reared up, and Jam hit the pavement butt-first. The EMTs figured her pelvis was broken, and the shrieks when they put her on the stretcher suggested they were right. They figured she’d be a lot more comfortable riding to Atlanta in a helicopter (the nearby hospitals are not set up to handle trauma), and Bill Elliott’s airstrip is the nearest pickup point… so we followed the ambulance there and waited for the chopper. The local EMT told us where they were taking her — Atlanta Medical Center, “the old Georgia Baptist,” and gave us a map. They got her aloft, and we ran back to the manor for a quick lunch and a little strategic planning. Mrs. Fetched isn’t comfortable driving in city traffic, so I got to take Brand X down to the hospital to see his mom while she made the DDDelivery.

The map was good, and we arrived in good order (not much traffic Sunday afternoon) after I gassed up my Civic (spending $20 of the remaining $30 of my gas budget, but there are things you have to do because they’re the Right Thing, and thus want to do them). They told us where Jam was (still the ER ward) and pointed us in the right direction. She was there, in major pain (even with as much Demerol as they thought prudent to give her) but she did her best to reassure Brand X. He was holding up his end pretty well, fielding phone calls from various relatives until her battery gave out. We had yet to call Mr. Sunshine, so we used my phone for that and other numbers I had. They finally took her off the hard-board (which led to more shrieking, of course), but after they did that and changed her cervical collar, she was less uncomfortable.

The only good news in the situation came from the MRI scan — her pelvis wasn’t broken after all, thank God. The doc figures there’s a lot of bruised “soft tissue,” maybe some organs and maybe her spine as well. They’re hanging onto her for a while, and were getting ready to move her into ICU when Brand X and I packed it in and headed back.

So that was my weekend. Not as bad as Jam’s. Brand X is staying with us for a couple of days, and I need to get up early to get him off to school.