inluminent

Today I got a call from my mom towards the end of the day (I was in a meeting and took it because she wouldn’t call during work hours unless it was important).

I answered the phone:

“Mom, I’m in a meeting. Can you make this quick?”

She answered:

“Bob had a heart attack this morning and is in the hospital there in Austin.”

I thought to myself…

“Holy shit!”

Bob is a friend of mine that is my age. We grew up together. We played little league baseball together, and went to grades 1 - 10 together. We played junior high football with each other and lived less then 5 blocks from each other (realize that I grew up in a small town here in Texas that wasn’t much bigger than 10 blocks by 10 blocks in size when I was a kid).

I watched his sister grow up, and knew his grand-parents. I looked out for his sister when she was just starting to date…

I wouldn’t say that Robert and I were best of friends, but we were friends. We haven’t spoken since I left high-school for college in the 10th grade, not for lack of wanting to, mainly because I grew up, and left that little town as quickly as I could.

So, back to the story:

This friend of mine had a heart attack sometime this morning (most likely around midnight). He was in the hospital and I hadn’t seen him in almost 10 or 12 years. The hospital wasn’t far from the office, so I worked late, and called another high-school buddy of mine that lives here in Austin and coaxed him into going with me to visit our old friend.

We arrived at the hospital around 7:30 and our friend’s Dad was there. I opened the door to two big smiles and we all remenisced while talking about the heart attack. The doctors couldn’t explain it, but he’d definitely had a heart attack, and his family doesn’t have any bad heart history, so they’re keeping him in the hospital for 3 days. We talked for a bit, and then excused ourselves. There is plenty to catch up on with this old friend of mine, but visiting hours were ending, and he was kind of tired…

Did I forget to mention my friend’s age?

He turned 27 years old five days ago.