Breathless Haste

We were halfway through the four-and-a-half-hour drive from our home in Greenville, South Carolina, to Birmingham, Alabama, with our six-month-old son, Brock, and we had stopped for a break. Rebecca is a connoisseur of Diet Coke; she insists it’s best when dispensed from the fountains of specific fast-food establishments, so we had stopped at a McDonald’s. While Rebecca stood in line, she struck up a conversation with a mother who was there with her child. Rebecca asked how old the woman’s son was, and the woman responded that he was eleven months old. Rebecca told the woman that we had a son who was six months old, and then she blurted out that we were taking him to Birmingham for heart surgery.

This woman, a complete stranger, replied, “My son has tetralogy of Fallot. He was operated on when he was six months old.”

In a state of disbelief, Rebecca shared that this was Brock’s condition as well.

The woman said, “Don’t let anyone tell you that there won’t be complications, because there will be.” She went on to say that the recovery period had been horrible, but they had been able to go home two weeks after surgery. She wished us well, and they went on their way.

We climbed back into the car, buckled our seatbelts, and continued on our journey to Birmingham, grappling with the meaning of this surprising encounter.