The saga of Paratrooper Harry ...

    Let me tell you about Paratrooper Harry.
    He was in the emergency room near the beginning of my stay at Texas Health Harris Methodist two weeks ago. He was, as I figure it, at least 90, a tall, thin man sitting erect in his wheelchair, white hair cropped short, very large hearing aids behind each ear. 
      He was dressed -- keep this in mind -- appropriately in a tan flight suit, with brown loafers. 
      Really, he could hear little, except maybe his very loud son sitting next to him most of the time. Everyone could hear the son -- the 35-50 patients-to-be, plus all emergency-room personnel, and also people in Aledo and Granbury.
      Son -- about 50, ruddy-faced, barrel-chested, short sandy hair, let's call him Black Shirt -- wheeled Harry in not long after we arrived. As he did, he announced that he would have been there sooner but he first had to help a man having a heart attack from his car near the emergency-room drive-in area. 
       (To be sure, Bea also heard the same story out in the waiting area.)
       Black Shirt told everyone that Harry's legs were hurting badly.
       Harry did not want to be there. Not that any of us did. But he made it pretty clear. If he bellowed "LET'S GO HOME!" once, he did it 25 times. Usually followed by "WE CAN COME BACK TOMORROW."
       Each time Black Shirt told him "no," or "keep quiet," or "they'll get to us," or "just sit there and wait" -- and often they were not gently admonishments. My stomach was hurting plenty already, but hurt as much for Harry.
       And because on this day the emergency-room area was -- as my Dad would have said -- loaded, we all had long waits. (Personally, we spent 10 hours before I was placed in a hospital room.)
       At one point, Black Shirt announced that he had to go move his car and asked people nearby -- also hurting and/or waiting -- to look after Harry. While the son was gone for some 15-20 minutes, Harry sat and never said a word; a couple of people checked on him. 
       Black Shirt returned and I remember cringing when he said to Harry that his insurance was all in order, and so was the inheritance he would leave the family. 
       A couple of times, he put his cellphone to Harry's ear -- "to talk to Mama," he proclaimed -- and it was obvious Harry could not hear a thing. But, as Black Shirt noted, he wanted Harry to know that his family cared.
       And then this ...
       Coming back from one bathroom break for Harry, Black Shirt rolled him back through and said -- loudly, of course -- to those around him, "Harry (name) ... paratrooper, U.S. Army, World War II."
       That stuck with me. Let's see, 72 years since the end of WW II, so if Harry had gone in the service at age 17 or close, he had to be about 90.
       All that passage of time to come to this.
       The reporter in me wanted to hear his story. But there was that stomach pain -- this was 6-7 hours before we were given the  "bowel obstruction" diagnosis -- so I wasn't in the mood, and the timing wasn't right.
       After an initial consultation, an EKG, my first-ever CT scan and then insertion of an IV when it was obvious that I was going to be admitted to the hospital, I returned to the waiting area for another hour. 
       Harry was still urging "LET'S GO HOME" to Black Shirt, who announced to everyone that the EM doctors felt that Harry's problem was sepsis in both legs. I heard that and thought, "Oh, gosh."
       Had to feel, too, for the son, who obviously wanted the best for his father, and it was fairly obvious that Harry was limited mentally (dementia? Alzheimer's?). Tough spot for Black Shirt.
       Not sure how it came out, but Bea heard that if sepsis -- a potentially life-threatening complication from infection --  was the correct call, it was likely that both of Harry's legs were going to be amputated. 
       To think how much this man had done and seen in his years, how he had served his country. What a life he must have had, what adventures.
       No words, other than, God bless Harry the Paratrooper.