“We sure are in a booger aren’t we?”

The man in the wheelchair struck up a conversation with my family in the emergency room.

We smiled at him and replied, “yes.”

My daughter continued to press the ice pack against her eye. She had split open her eyelid during basketball dribbling practice at school.

The man turned to his wife and said with a slight twang, “Well, I just sure am glad we ran across that bobcat.”

This peaked my interest.

They were quiet for awhile.

But then the man turned to us to explain his injuries.

“Me and my wife were campin’. We was trying to get some pictures of some critters. We crossed a ravine. We saw a bobcat and some birds!

“Then I slipped. Like this.”

He motioned with his hands a slope.

“And I just fell down.

I was just layin’ there.

It hurt so bad.”

Then he chuckled through his pain.

He said with a smile, “You know, I’m a hill billy. I am from East Tennessee. I should not be stupid enough to fall down a mountain!”

He shook his head sheepishly.

We were called back to claim our bed in triage. I wrote this story from the E. R. waiting room. My daughter kicked me out of her room when she was about to receive her stitches. She just wanted my husband to stay.

Can you imagine I am not good in a crisis?

She said I would stress her out.

I fought back my tears.

I made my walk of shame down the long emergency room hallway, past the fallen mountain man.

I made my way to my chair. I thought about crying. But I’m a mom from Southern California. I should not be stupid enough to think that this heart break will be my last.