Found Recollections

So today I was searching my flash drive for some class activities that I want to work on and found a brief journal entry from a couple of years ago. This is what I wrote then:
11/29/07

Today I helped an old lady into her wheelchair. Her daughter (I assume it was her daughter) was trying to get her into the hospital for an infusion for her anemia. It was clear to see the older woman was fragile, weak. Her daughter got a wheelchair and was struggling with it, getting tangled in her poncho and getting frustrated. I helped, not because it was the “right” thing to do, or because I felt my conscience tugging at me, but because I could see the daughter was scared and frustrated with more than just the chair. I know how it feels to be scared and frustrated with an overwhelming and overwhelmed system. As I looked around the registration area of the hospital I remembered bringing my father to the same hospital for his radiation treatments. We were scared. I was scared. Underneath, I knew he was dying even though he was responding well to the radiation. I tried so hard to keep my attitude positive and I held out hope for a very long time, but it was futile. So I recognized the fear in the daughter’s eyes as she fought with the wheelchair mostly because at that moment, I felt it too. Once you feel a feeling, it’s easy to recapture it. And I’d felt it twice. People who haven’t had a loved one with a terminal illness have never felt that fear, but those of us who have will never forget it.

As I read this, the day came back to me quite clearly. I was in the lobby of Community Memorial Hospital in Toms River, awaiting an appointment with a dietician to draw up my diabetes meal plan, and I saw this little scene play out in front of me. I still can recall not only that daughter's frustration, but my own reaction to it. Tragedy makes brothers and sisters of us all.