‘Come on, Angel’

The first Saturday in May was the first time I cut our lawn this year. It’s a ritual normally carried out without much fanfare. Our property beyond the house and detached garage is rather small. The lawn can be mowed in about 20 minutes, front and back.

That morning, though the day was cool, I found myself struggling with the uneven patches of backyard turf, so much so that by the time those cuts were finished, I decided to come inside for a rest. At the time, I was out of breath and a little disoriented.

I called to my wife, who was on the phone, as I came through the front door and proceeded to sit down on the loveseat in our living room. Within a few minutes, the fogginess in my mind dissipated and I felt ready to resume my work. My wife urged me to first get checked at a nearby health clinic to make sure nothing was wrong. I ignored that advice, figuring that I would be able to finish the front lawn without any further problems.

And so the cutting of the front lawn began. It continued evenly, orderly until the final couple of strokes when I again began to feel disoriented. This time, there would be no breather on the couch, as I went down in a heap on our front lawn, or so I am told.

When my wife heard the lawnmower automatically turn off, thanks to an ignition kill triggered when the machine’s guiding bar is released, she came outside and discovered me on the ground.

Just then, my teenage son joined her and dialed 911.

With help on the way, she told me she encouraged me to hang on to life while massaging my chest area. “Come on, angel,” were the words she said over and over.

In short order, some of our neighbors seeing what was transpiring began to gather. My wife directed one to fetch a medical doctor who lives diagonally across the street from us. Just then, another neighbor pulled up with his two small kids in tow. After guiding them into the house, he rushed across our lawn and began performing what were described as “textbook” chest compressions that restored my heart to regular function. Turns out, unbeknown to us, we have had a cardiologist living across the street for about a year now.

Within a couple of minutes, police and emergency medical technicians were on the scene and I was loaded into the ambulance. The first thing I remember is an EMT asking me if I knew what day it was. I had to admit I had no clue. By the time we arrived at the hospital, however, my mental faculties had returned and I was able to answer any question they asked.

The results of an angiogram necessitated swift transit to St. Francis Hospital in Roslyn for bypass surgery. It all came off very smoothly, and as I write this a little more than two weeks later, I am well into my recuperation at home.

Many people, both medical professionals and family and friends, have asked whether there were warning signs before the fateful day.

Looking back, I have to honestly say that they began to arrive this winter. Each day, the first leg of my commute involves a 15-minute walk to the station where I catch the train to New York City. A few times during February and March, I would tire about halfway through the walk and would sometimes have to stop for 30 seconds to catch my breath. I attributed the shortness of breath and even occasional pain in my lungs and chest to the winter weather and vowed to visit the doctor soon.

That is one of the lessons I will take away from this experience: pay more attention to what your body is telling you.

Another is to put the right kind of food and drink into that body. For me, that means being especially sensitive to drinking enough water and watching what I eat, because a predisposition to high cholesterol means I have to curb fatty foods that contribute to it.

Maybe the greatest, and toughest, lesson is that I am not invulnerable or impervious to the world around me. In my professional life, especially, I’ve been an iron man who tends to plow through things without realizing the toll they take. This episode has taught me I have to give a little ground or I might not be around to enjoy the rest of my life.

The eyes of faith leave me feeling grateful to God who remains close to us no matter where we have fallen. My wife and I have marveled about at least half a dozen things that fell into perfect order and enabled us to better handle this situation. Not the least was my falling unconscious in the front yard, where I would be discovered and where the response of others would be swift and abundant.