Reporting From Allentown ...
... and terribly glad of it.
Here's a quick anecdote from this past workweek to explain why this lady is such a catch.
In case you don't know this about me, I'm epileptic. Fully controlled now, but had some bad times there in my teens. So of course, I had long ago let Vicki know.
Well--one of the employees she supervises was in tears the other day, unsure of what to do because his adult son had just been diagnosed with epilepsy and has been having frequent absence seizures and other minor seizures. On that day, she calmed him as best she could, made sure he went home early, and made sure he GOT home safely, even to the point of offering herself as a chauffeur home (which offer he didn't take, but still.).
So. Caring. This is what Vicki IS; she's beautiful inside as well as out.
The next day, Thursday, she made sure to get ME, an epileptic, whose years of seizures were far worse than the employee's son's, to explain everything to him. First, I guess she knew the employee would see me as a positive example of an epileptic with a full and free life: He knows I drive, he sees me working hard and clowning hard at work, and he knows I'm a pretty nice and very truthful guy.
So I told this also=-very-nice fellow what he could expect, what could be done, and what SHOULD be done in case of an epileptic seizure.
(This and this are good primers.)
So. The next day, Friday--the day I was set to follow her to her home--I get a call at the union office as I was working with a somewhat bellicose employee. The other steward who took the call relayed it as, "Alex, meet me at Door #5 [the main door]. It's an emergency."
I cut the employee short as best I could (making sure her issue was addressed) and sprinted down the block-long hallway. When I got out the door, I see a small crowd milling about, and not thirty feet from the door, I see Vicki and her manager Mike (a really funny, great guy) kneeling by the side of a fallen employee, with the workplace nurse just coming to her side and two security guards standing over. I get closer but not too close, not wanting to horn in where I can't help, and am horrified to see that the fallen employee is someone I know, "C____", a really sweet lady whom I always joke with--who, though she works scant feet from Vicki and Mike, neither of them know. That woman's manager (another exceptionally good guy) started to her side as I caught Vicki's eyes and saw her relief that I was there. There was nothing I could do, so I came over to the small crowd of people nearby to find out what happened.
Apparently, C___ had had an episode or seizure or whatever and, toppling like a stricken tree, banged the back of her head something fierce on the blacktop. Mike saw it and was running to her side in a heartbeat. Vicki was conversing with Miss Odessa, perhaps the sweetest person at the entire 4500-employee worksite, and, seeing her admittedly-chubby manager uncharacteristically hauling ass, herself took off (in Miss Odessa's words, "like a bullet"; in Vicki's less-measured and -sanitized words, "like a bat out of fucking hell").
And Vicki--my Vicki (and how sweet it is to be able to pair those words!)--did exactly the right thing--as Mike cradled C___'s head, Vicki got a blanket and put it over her, got her turned as best she could to the left, stopped her whipping about (largely through the expedient of giving her something to hold onto under her and to comfort her ... which turned out to be Vicki's outstretched leg), and kept talking soothingly to her while Security, 911, and the nurse were called. And Vicki stayed in that horribly scary and uncomfortable position for twenty minutes, until the ambulance came.
I took down the names and pertinent information of the witnesses to the fall to later give to Security and to the nurse, and did my tiny bit to calm the rubberneckers and ensure no one else tried to crowd the area.
When she finally was taken over to the ambulance, Vicki all but hurled herself trembling into my arms as I stroked her hair and whispered into her ear again and again, "You did good" and "I'm so proud of you" and other similar sundries. (When I went up to Mike not long afterward, he--by no means a physically-demonstrative man--accepted a half-hug, showing just how shaken HE was.)
After C___ was taken off to the hospital, with her manager riding along so he could get in touch with her daughter, I made sure that Vicki and Mike were able to calm down. Mike had done time working at a mental health facility, so he regained his equilibrium pretty quickly; Vicki, for her part, recovered with good speed as well.
And all the more impressive after that twenty-minute eternity, they performed an entire eight-hour stressful workday with grace and aplomb.
Then, I followed her up to her home.
Next post for that.
Here's a quick anecdote from this past workweek to explain why this lady is such a catch.
In case you don't know this about me, I'm epileptic. Fully controlled now, but had some bad times there in my teens. So of course, I had long ago let Vicki know.
Well--one of the employees she supervises was in tears the other day, unsure of what to do because his adult son had just been diagnosed with epilepsy and has been having frequent absence seizures and other minor seizures. On that day, she calmed him as best she could, made sure he went home early, and made sure he GOT home safely, even to the point of offering herself as a chauffeur home (which offer he didn't take, but still.).
So. Caring. This is what Vicki IS; she's beautiful inside as well as out.
The next day, Thursday, she made sure to get ME, an epileptic, whose years of seizures were far worse than the employee's son's, to explain everything to him. First, I guess she knew the employee would see me as a positive example of an epileptic with a full and free life: He knows I drive, he sees me working hard and clowning hard at work, and he knows I'm a pretty nice and very truthful guy.
So I told this also=-very-nice fellow what he could expect, what could be done, and what SHOULD be done in case of an epileptic seizure.
(This and this are good primers.)
So. The next day, Friday--the day I was set to follow her to her home--I get a call at the union office as I was working with a somewhat bellicose employee. The other steward who took the call relayed it as, "Alex, meet me at Door #5 [the main door]. It's an emergency."
I cut the employee short as best I could (making sure her issue was addressed) and sprinted down the block-long hallway. When I got out the door, I see a small crowd milling about, and not thirty feet from the door, I see Vicki and her manager Mike (a really funny, great guy) kneeling by the side of a fallen employee, with the workplace nurse just coming to her side and two security guards standing over. I get closer but not too close, not wanting to horn in where I can't help, and am horrified to see that the fallen employee is someone I know, "C____", a really sweet lady whom I always joke with--who, though she works scant feet from Vicki and Mike, neither of them know. That woman's manager (another exceptionally good guy) started to her side as I caught Vicki's eyes and saw her relief that I was there. There was nothing I could do, so I came over to the small crowd of people nearby to find out what happened.
Apparently, C___ had had an episode or seizure or whatever and, toppling like a stricken tree, banged the back of her head something fierce on the blacktop. Mike saw it and was running to her side in a heartbeat. Vicki was conversing with Miss Odessa, perhaps the sweetest person at the entire 4500-employee worksite, and, seeing her admittedly-chubby manager uncharacteristically hauling ass, herself took off (in Miss Odessa's words, "like a bullet"; in Vicki's less-measured and -sanitized words, "like a bat out of fucking hell").
And Vicki--my Vicki (and how sweet it is to be able to pair those words!)--did exactly the right thing--as Mike cradled C___'s head, Vicki got a blanket and put it over her, got her turned as best she could to the left, stopped her whipping about (largely through the expedient of giving her something to hold onto under her and to comfort her ... which turned out to be Vicki's outstretched leg), and kept talking soothingly to her while Security, 911, and the nurse were called. And Vicki stayed in that horribly scary and uncomfortable position for twenty minutes, until the ambulance came.
I took down the names and pertinent information of the witnesses to the fall to later give to Security and to the nurse, and did my tiny bit to calm the rubberneckers and ensure no one else tried to crowd the area.
When she finally was taken over to the ambulance, Vicki all but hurled herself trembling into my arms as I stroked her hair and whispered into her ear again and again, "You did good" and "I'm so proud of you" and other similar sundries. (When I went up to Mike not long afterward, he--by no means a physically-demonstrative man--accepted a half-hug, showing just how shaken HE was.)
After C___ was taken off to the hospital, with her manager riding along so he could get in touch with her daughter, I made sure that Vicki and Mike were able to calm down. Mike had done time working at a mental health facility, so he regained his equilibrium pretty quickly; Vicki, for her part, recovered with good speed as well.
And all the more impressive after that twenty-minute eternity, they performed an entire eight-hour stressful workday with grace and aplomb.
Then, I followed her up to her home.
Next post for that.