Life Lessons

I had just sat down to have dinner this evening when there was a knock at our window. My sister answered the door to find our cleaning lady who had just left minutes before. “There’s a man on the pavement opposite, he’s bleeding really heavily. What shall we do?”

Concerned it was an elderly man [who may potentially be my 84 year old grandfather who likes to leave his house without notifying anyone to go on midnight strolls], I quickly slipped my boots on and ran onto the road.

There, slumped over a small brick wall, was a woman covered in blood. Drenched in the rain, on her knees, with one shoe a couple of feet away and appearing as though she were hiding from thugs [which was my first assumption], she blinked away the blood from one eye to look up at me as I approached. One side of her face was covered with blood; so much, in fact, that I could hardly work out where exactly she had been hurt.

“Are you okay?” I asked
She mumbled a “yes”, but appeared obviously disheveled. It was only until I peered through the darkness that I realised she had slipped in the rain and smashed her head against a plant pot, the shattered pieces of which were scattered over my neighbour’s driveway.

As I dialed for an ambulance, more people started to gather around the woman. I explained the situation to the emergency helpline guy and listened to his instructions of keeping her awake and trying not to move her.

By this point, she had started to tremble vigorously (either from the cold or the shock or both). As I lent in to reassure her that she would be okay, I managed to recognize the side of her face that wasn’t covered in thick blood.

“Mrs. Hooper?”

Mrs. Hooper was my primary school receptionist. I remember her, as being a mean, strict and difficult woman who didn’t like children and most certainly didn’t like me. In fact, she used to look at me with great disdain. I never understood why but it affected me then. Why did this woman not like me?

More than 10 years later, the same woman was lying helpless on my doorstep. And then I realised that for these past 10 years, I had seen Mrs. Hooper on many occasions. She walked down the same road, with her black shopping trolley [which had now been completely soaked in the rain and lay upside down on the pavement] looking as mean and unfriendly as ever. I had always seen her alone.
In the darkness of a freezing February evening, here she was again, completely vulnerable and alone.

“Mrs. Hooper?”
Trying hard to recognize me, she peered into my face.
“You probably don’t remember. My name is Ayman, I used to go to Christchurch?”
She mumbled something and began to slump over the brick wall.
“No, no. You must try and stay awake for me. Are you feeling dizzy at all?”
“I want to talk to you. Alone. Can we go inside? I need to talk to you,” she slurred.

“I’m afraid I can’t move you. You’ve had a fall. But it’s going to be okay, I’ve called an ambulance. You’re going to be fine.”
“No. No. No ambulance. I just want to speak to you.”
“I’m right here. What is it that you want to say?”
“No. You’re not here,” she answered clenching her teeth.

Thirty minutes later, no sign of a paramedic or the ambulance. After countless phone calls to find out why an ambulance hadn’t been dispatched, I was told that there ‘weren’t enough cars’. I yelled down the phone at the man, “since when is this a third world country?! What kind of excuse is ‘there are no cars’? What am I supposed to do if she falls unconsciousness or worse?!”
“Please don’t shout. I’m having difficulty understanding you, ma’am.”

By this time, a neighbour trained in first-aid came out to see what all the commotion was about. After doing a quick analysis, she informed me that Mrs. Hooper appeared to be heavily drunk – the stench of alcohol on her breath giving it away, I guess.

“I want to talk to you,” mumbled Mrs. Hooper.

"I’m right here,” I reassured her.

Now shaking uncontrollably, she tried to hold her head up. “Hold my hand.”

Having covered her in numerous blankets and coats, I noticed that she had lost a sufficient amount of blood. It was all over her face, her clothes, the driveway and my hands. At this point, the first aider made the decision to put her into the recovery position as the ambulance was still no where to be seen.
I paced up and down the road, my heart pounding relentlessly. Why was I so concerned? Yes, it was a horrific sight – I had never seen so much blood in my life. I could see now that she had split her forehead open just above the eyebrow. The blood was now clotting more than seeping and I didn’t know what to do. But there was a first aider and plenty of neighbours, why was I freezing in the cold for this woman who meant very little to me and at one point in my life, made sure to make me feel small?

When the ambulance finally arrived and got her strapped into a stretcher, the paramedic asked me to collect her belongings. I picked up the black trolley; her bag and blood soaked glasses and loaded them onto the ambulance. Mrs. Hooper caught my eye and slurred something. She hadn’t recognized me at all, I was sure of that. She was so intoxicated, she had trouble remembering where she lived and what she was doing out. But at that point, I couldn’t help but wonder the mystery of God’s lesson.

Was it for me or for her or maybe us both? This was the first time I was seeing a woman I disliked and who I believed to be cruel, completely vulnerable and weak. But was it the first time? Maybe it was just the first time that I recognized it because I have learnt now what this world is capable of; what people are capable of. I won’t make excuses for her but perhaps she had been vulnerable all her life.

And what did she learn? I’m certainly not falling for that ‘Good Samaritan’ spiel. There were plenty of people on the road ‘till the moment the ambulance came. But perhaps she wasn’t supposed to learn something about me, like I did about her. Instead, maybe she was supposed to learn something about herself.
I’ll never know what, but I’ll wonder.

I’ve come to realise now that in life, we are made examples of. We learn from each other; from each other’s misfortunes, sorrows and joys, trials and tribulations. What better example is there? Nothing can communicate pain like witnessing it in another being. Compassion is innate, we just choose whether to let it play or sit on the bench. Association is also innate. We are naturally inclined to put ourselves in other people’s shoes – to experience what they’re going through, to understand. But again, we have a choice. Which do you let play and which do you bench?