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This individual has long been known as a truly outsized character. Clever and unemotional – and not one to say no to an extra drink. During family gatherings, he’s the one gossiping about the latest scandal to catch up with a member of parliament, or regaling us with tales of the shameless infidelity of various Sheffield Wednesday players during the last four decades.

Frequently, we would share the morning of Christmas Day with him and his family, then departing for our own celebrations. However, one holiday season, roughly a decade past, when he was planning to join family abroad, he fell down the stairs, whisky in one hand, a suitcase gripped in the other, and broke his ribs. He was treated at the hospital and advised against air travel. Thus, he found himself back with us, trying to cope, but appearing more and more unwell.

The Day Progressed

The hours went by, however, the anecdotes weren’t flowing as they usually were. He insisted he was fine but his appearance suggested otherwise. He attempted to go upstairs for a nap but couldn’t; he tried, gingerly, to eat Christmas lunch, and failed.

So, before I’d so much as placed a party hat on my head, we resolved to take him to A&E.

The idea of calling for an ambulance crossed our minds, but how long would that take on Christmas Day?

A Deteriorating Condition

When we finally reached the hospital, his state had progressed from peaky to barely responsive. Fellow patients assisted us guide him to a ward, where the generic smell of hospital food and wind was noticeable.

Different though, was the spirit. There were heroic attempts at festive gaiety all around, even with the pervasive depressing and institutional feel; tinsel hung from drip stands and bowls of Christmas pudding congealed on nightstands.

Positive medical attendants, who undoubtedly would have preferred to be at home, were bustling about and using that lovely local expression so particular to the area: “duck”.

Heading Home for Leftovers

When visiting hours were over, we returned home to lukewarm condiments and festive TV programming. We watched something daft on television, perhaps a detective story, and engaged in an even sillier game, such as a regionally-themed property trading game.

By then it was quite late, and it had begun to snow, and I remember experiencing a letdown – did we lose the holiday?

Healing and Reflection

Even though he ultimately healed, he had truly experienced a lung puncture and later developed a serious circulatory condition. And, although that holiday isn’t a personal favourite, it has become part of family legend as “the Christmas I saved a life”.

If that is completely accurate, or involves a degree of exaggeration, is not for me to definitively say, but hearing it told each year has done no damage to my pride. In keeping with our friend’s motto: “don’t let the truth get in the way of a good story”.