[Drake]

I don't usually post stuff like this, but today, I feel like I need to share it.

I forgot my parking permit in my wife's car this weekend, so on my way to work this morning, I had to stop by the rehab facility/nursing home where she works to pick it up.

Of course, when I arrived, the car was locked, so I wandered inside looking for her to get the key. As it turned out, I ended up four steps behind her as she went into a patient's room to answer a call light for an elderly woman in respiratory distress. (From the conversation, it's apparent that the women is suffering from one of the later stages of COPD, but that's not relevant to this story...or maybe it is.)

Anyway, so I stood in the hallway for about fifteen minutes, no one knowing I was present (except all of the facility employees, nurses and CNA's who wandered past me and smiled...all without asking who I was or what I was doing, but that that is *definitely* another story.)

For fifteen wonderful minutes, I got to listen to my wife do her job as an RN. The woman she was comforting is dying. There's no doubt about that. She's scared. She can't breathe, and knows that at some point in the near future, there won't be any help for her.

My wife was so kind, so gentle and comforting. She was so *present* with this woman, soothing her, explaining every little thing she was doing, asking her questions, making her laugh.

I'm going to get old and die one day. We all are. We know that. All I can say is that when I go, I want a nurse just like my wife there with me, acknowledging me, *seeing me* as something more than a patient, as a whole person worthy of comfort and care, someone who feels like they're fighting for me, even though the outcome of the battle has long-since been decided.

If you have a nurse in your life, hug them today and tell them how wonderful and awesome the work that they do is. It truly is a profession full of wonderful people who daily perform acts of strength and courage of heart that most of us can't imagine.

(Apparently, last week was Nurse Appreciation week, so I guess this can be considered belatedly relevant.)