Purposeful Persuasion 7/08/09

Knowing what must be done does away with fear.

Rosa Parks
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Good day. I hope you can read this posting, because I still can't.
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This is a true story, told to me by the two people involved. I will try faithfully to reconstruct as much of it as I can remember.

Many years ago I was visiting my Aunt Emily at her place in upstate New York. While I was there Emily had invited this couple over for dinner. She told me the woman had been crippled for about 25 years, but that her husband would take her out in her wheelchair during the nice weather, they still went places and they had a fascinating story to tell. When they arrived I could see that she was indeed in a wheelchair and he was pushing her into Emily's house. I also noted that they were an elderly couple. After dinner Emily coaxed them to tell me the story of the burning house.

They had been living in a remote place down a country road. He drove home one afternoon to find that the house was on fire. He rushed inside and everything was burning, hot cinders were flying everywhere, pieces of the wall were braking off and the place was think with smoke, He rushed through the flames into the bedroom where his wife was lying unconscious in the bed, The room was full of smoke. It was painfully hot. A burning cinder had landed on the bed and a sheet was burning, He threw the sheet off, picked up his wife and carried her through the flaming house to a field across the road, where he stretched her out on the ground. Then he drove three miles to the nearest neighbor to ask them to call the fire department and an ambulance, which they did. He then drove back to be with his wife who was still unconscious. Soon fire trucks arrived and went to work on the fire. After that came an ambulance. When he saw the ambulance he picked up his wife and took her over to it, explained to the attendants what had happened. They put her on a stretcher and took her to the hospital,

He stayed until the fire was out but the house was destroyed. Then he went to the hospital where his wife was sitting up in bed wide awake.

She told me that when the bedroom was filling up with smoke she called for him but he wasn't there. She said she knew he would be back sooner or later. She said she must have passed out, when she woke up in the hospital she didn't now where she was. She was dizzy.and had a headache. She was glad to see him come into the hospital room. She was relieved that he was okay.

They had lost everything. A neighbor took them in and very soon he had found another place for them to live.

I asked him if he was frightened of the fire when he went into the house. He said no he was only thinking about getting his wife out of there.

It's an amazing story. But here's the most remarkable part. I asked him when all this happened. He said "Just last year." He was 78. His wife was 74.

Vagabond Journeys
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Look up. Things are looking up.
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SUMMER QUIZ

This is not a contest.



A young man out west just took home 88 million dollars from the lottery.



Whether you play the lottery or not, if you suddenly had 88 million dollars, or the equivalent of whatever your currency is, what are the first three things you would do with it?



You have all summer to answer if you wish.

7 responses so far.



DB