Angel May Fly To Your Rescue

photo Laura Kurner

I don't like to read horoscope's normally. They set me up for feeling like some anvil is gonna fall out of the sky as I walk by or, maybe, some kind of good thing is coming my way which increases my feeling of entitlement.

Today my horoscope said this:

"An angel may fly to your rescue today, whether you need the assistance or not. But in any case, accepting help is wise..."

And so I thought, what would it look like if I was given a wish from an angel. Well, first off it would come as money to make my album, perhaps from a well off and well intentioned donor. Or maybe it could come in the form of a great new love; either a person or some unheard music or great piece of art. (If it had been the day before I might have wished that Paul Williams/Crawdaddy would have been included in the Grammy's program handout as they'd hinted at months ago).

Anyways that's as far as I got on that line of thinking, I got dressed and set off about my day. Expecting the best, and then forgetting about it all together.

Between classes, teaching students guitar, a ruckus ensued in the front of the music school.  A young girl, middle school age, maybe 14, ran over to the window nervously peering past the guitars and uke's to watch a policeman attend to a man laying 
horizontal on the cement. 

I asked what was going on and she explained.  She had been next to this elderly man who miss-stepped on the curb and couldn't get his arms out in front of himself quick enough when he fell, so he fell head first. And she heard the terrible noise of skull hitting hard ground. 

She ran to him and then began yelling for help. When some adults came to her aid she was able to run into the school of music and ask for a clerk to call an ambulance. I saw her just after that. 

She was visibly shaken but she wanted to tell her story and she wanted to feel like she was going to be of help to this poor man on the ground. "He hit his head so hard, I could tell by the sound". 

I looked out the window and a man with white hair, was prostrate and barely moving. A few folks standing over him. It did not look good.

There is nothing she nor I nor anyone in the shop could do at this point and we could hear the whine of an ambulance on its way. I made eye contact with her and told her what she did was of great help to the man, just calling out for help and asking someone to call 911, and that she could help him further by telling the police or EMT how he fell. 

Of course I'm thinking of the time that my husband, Paul fell off his bike while riding down a steep hill and incurred a brain injury, and how helpful it was to me and the EMT to know what happened, how he fell, was a car involved etc. from an observer.

She seemed relieved to know she might have been of some help. I told her she could call her parents to come pick her up early from her lesson, that what she just experienced was very traumatic. I asked her if I could give her a hug and she was so relieved and happy to feel like someone was there to understand or be a witness to what she was going through. 

How odd I thought, that I, someone who's life has been forever changed by a traumatic brain injury to a loved one, would be available at the right moment, to help a girl in distress. 

After that her music teacher took her out to talk with the police about what happened and I went in to teach my next class . The man, apparently 79 years old was being tended to by the EMT and questioned for his level of consciousness (that's how they tell if you need a trauma ward or just a plain ol' hospital) and then loaded in the ambulance. 

Maybe that angel, the one I was hoping would bring me a pile of dough and good stuff,  gave me a chance to be someone's angel.