Home

He was fairly happy...I promise.



A couple of the many cards Andy has received over the past few weeks...these two from a homeschool group in Texas. Thank you to everyone who has sent cards, gifts, and letters.

And now for the story about the police officer...no I wasn't arrested or anything fun like that.

My flight out on Sunday morning was pretty early so I wanted to get as much done on Saturday night as I could. I did some laundry for Andy, made the aforementioned spaghetti, and picked up extra Sunny D on Saturday evening. Around 9:30pm I decided to make one more trip over to his room to deliver some of the stuff I needed to take him, so I would have such a large number of things to carry on Sunday morning. Thinking ahead is not my forte, but I was trying to make Sunday morning go as smooth as possible.

So I trek over to the unit entrance with my arms loaded down.
It's not a long walk necessarily.
Maybe the length of 2 football fields.
I don't know exactly.
It's far enough to be annoying if you forget something and have to go back...

Or if you walk over with your arms loaded down, only to discover that the doors are locked.
Which is what happened to me.

So I was frustrated.
I had told Andy I would come back and say goodnight and deliver the stuff...
Not anticipating that the entrance would be locked.

So I set the stuff down on a bench by the doors for a minute, to mutter a few choice words and re-load the items I was now going to have to carry back with me.

And then a police officer appeared at the doors (big glass sliding doors), opened one of them manually and asked if I needed something. "I just needed to deliver this stuff to my brother in the SCID unit if that's possible. I'm leaving tomorrow and was hoping to get as much done tonight as possible."

"Come on in" he said "I'll walk you down there."

I was so grateful and I told him so.
How easy it would have been for him to stay seated at his security desk and not bother with me.

So we walked down that long silent coridoor. He asked about my brother...and I gave him the short version. We got to Andy's door and I went in and did what I needed to do. As it turns out Andy was still awake, so I got to say "goodnight" and make sure his drink was within reach. I could tell he was pretty settled in for resting, but I think it helped us both to be able to close the day together.

I went back out to find my escort waiting at the nurses station. We walked back down the long hallway, talking about all sorts of things. I found out that this time last year he was finishing his third tour as a soldier in Iraq. He had an injury that forced him into retirement. Now he's a Tampa Police officer.

He let me out and I thanked him again.
His kindness was indeed a special part of my day.

It's the little things...ya know.

Happy Monday.