It's only taken me about twenty-two years to do it, but I've finally managed to pay something forward. I don't mean ever, just this one specific thing.
When I was forty, I needed surgery. My best friend offered to come to the hospital if I wanted, and stay in my room until I woke from the anesthetic so I wouldn't wake alone. She explained that for a previous surgery, someone had stayed with her to keep her from waking alone and how much it had meant. Frankly, being single and independent (as she herself was at the time), it hadn't even occurred to me before. Upon reflection, I wanted. And I was very touched. And she did.
Today I was able to take a friend to the hospital for surgery, stay with her as much as the hospital allowed, and bring her home again. It meant taking a day off work, driving into Minneapolis, sitting in those uniquely un-wonderful waiting room chairs, putting up with the dodos who wanted FOX on the TV (loud), being the one the doctor came and talked to after the surgery to make sure somebody coherent knew the results and the instructions, and navigating home again in a thunderstorm.
It was never far from my mind that this was a debt I owed, and I was happy to pay. Since I couldn't pay it back, I had a chance to pay it forward. And I was honored.
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