I will conclude my Mom and Her Christmas Story trilogy today by telling you about her worst Christmas.
It was a couple of days before Christmas in 1998 when Buzzy called me at work. We were having our office Christmas party and I was in a fairly upbeat mood until I heard Buzzy inform me that “Your Mom was just in a real bad car wreck and they’ve taken her to the hospital. You better get over there.” When I asked him “How bad?” he was so shook up he just said “I don’t know, but it’s bad.” I told him I was on my way and I’d call him once I got to the hospital.
Driving from Pax River to Leonardtown I couldn’t think straight and feared the worst that she might be outta here. As I didn’t have a cell phone back then I had no way of calling to find out how she was or wasn’t doing. Let’s just say that it was a very long and anxious drive to Leonardtown.
Once at the hospital, I hustled into the emergency room and located Mom in a room resting quietly. She was conscious and seemingly ok but also in a lot of pain. I was expecting the worst, but seeing that she was ok, I was immediately and secretly very relieved.
Greeting her then, I tried to make light of her situation by saying “You know what they say, any car accident you walk away from is a good one.” She just shook her head slowly and correctly informed me “Well, this must have been a bad one then, because I didn’t walk away. They carried me here on a stretcher.” I immediately kicked myself for not thinking my way through that quote a little more given her circumstances.
Turns out that she had suffered a collapsed lung, a couple of broken ribs and was very bruised up. Overall though, she had survived an awful accident but would spend the next several days including Christmas in the hospital recovering.
She had been on her way to take her friend Judy Raley a Christmas gift. As she drove through Ridge on Rt. 5 at the Wynne Road intersection, a lady coming out of Wynne Road ran the stop sign and T-boned her. Mom was not wearing a seat belt at the time and ironically that may have saved her from further injuries. When she got broadsided, instead of being crushed in her seat, she was hurled over to the passenger side of the car.
On Christmas day that year we all visited her in the hospital. Here are a couple photos:
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| My niece Katie and sister Donna Jean with Mom: |
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| Judy, Donna and Father Karl |
Music-wise here is a Christmas hymn that is among my favorites and not just because there are some good looking Celtic women singing it here: