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Our family friend has always been a bigger-than-life figure. Sharp and not prone to sentiment – and not one to say no to another brandy. During family gatherings, he’s the one discussing the most recent controversy to befall a member of parliament, or regaling us with tales of the notorious womanizing of various Sheffield Wednesday players during the last four decades.

Frequently, we would share the holiday morning with him and his family, before going our separate ways. Yet, on a particular Christmas, some ten years back, when he was planning to join family abroad, he tumbled down the staircase, whisky in one hand, suitcase in the other, and sustained broken ribs. Medical staff had treated him and told him not to fly. Thus, he found himself back with us, doing his best to manage, but looking increasingly peaky.

As Time Passed

Time passed, yet the humorous tales were absent as they usually were. He was convinced he was OK but his appearance suggested otherwise. He endeavored to climb the stairs for a nap but was unable to; he tried, gingerly, to eat Christmas lunch, and failed.

So, before I’d so much as put on a festive hat, my mum and I decided to take him to A&E.

We considered summoning an ambulance, but what would the wait time be on Christmas Day?

A Rapid Decline

When we finally reached the hospital, he’d gone from poorly to hardly aware. Other outpatients helped us help him reach a treatment area, where the distinctive odor of institutional meals and air filled the air.

What was distinct, however, was the mood. People were making brave attempts at festive gaiety everywhere you looked, even with the pervasive clinical and somber atmosphere; festive strands were attached to medical equipment and dishes of festive dessert sat uneaten on nightstands.

Upbeat nursing staff, who no doubt would far rather have been at home, were bustling about and using that great term of endearment so unique to the area: “duck”.

A Quiet Journey Back

After our time at the hospital concluded, we returned home to lukewarm condiments and holiday television. We watched something daft on television, likely a mystery drama, and engaged in an even sillier game, such as Sheffield’s take on Monopoly.

The hour was already advanced, and snow was falling, and I remember having a sense of anticlimax – was Christmas effectively over for us?

Recovery and Retrospection

While our friend did get better in time, he had actually punctured a lung and subsequently contracted a serious circulatory condition. And, while that Christmas does not rank among my favorites, it has become part of family legend as “the Christmas I saved a life”.

Whether that’s strictly true, or involves a degree of exaggeration, is not for me to definitively say, but its annual retelling has done no damage to my pride. And, as our friend always says: “don’t let the truth get in the way of a good story”.