A few days ago I rushed to the bedside of a dear friend, in Copenhagen, where she had a terrible accident and had emergency surgery to save her life.
While I was waiting to see her at the hospital, I had this salmon on toast, and many thoughts came up while I ate it: will she make it through the next 24hrs? how will she be when this is over? how life can change in a matter of minutes? is there anything I can do to help her family? Is it right? Why did it happen to her?
Our friendship now spans almost three decades and I was there, in a foreign country, seeing God in every nurse, surgeon and carer who looked after her, and praying for her life. Thinking of all the meals we shared, the emails we exchanged, the hours on the phone, laughs and cries, babies and funerals, husbands and flings, her mum cooking a delicious pizza after she married her lovely husband in Cumbria, the glorious breakfasts we have when we are together in UK or Italy, all this could have gone away in one minute…
She is now back home: recovery will take time, but I am celebrating life with her and her strength and luck. Someone up there must have taken good care of her. I like to think it might have been an angel with a moustache.
