Stacy

I had just finished a very interesting ride with a young man who is the intermediary between doctors, organ donors, and recipients.  We were going from central Denver to the Tech Center.  We had an engaging conversation about my days as an ambulance driver and years in pastoral ministry, and his time as a Navy Corpsman.  QI shared with him that when my brother Don was killed in 1979, we were able to donate his eyes.  I was thinking that this ride would make an interesting blog but what it did was really set up my encounter with Stacy.

My mind was stirring from the previous ride when I almost immediately got a call for another ride.  I picked her up in front of one of the many Tech Center buildings that have very little identification.  I admit that I have become an urban snob.  I find suburbia feels a little too much like a giant theme park.  I admit I am part jealous, part lost, and mostly a Pueblo guy from the East side.  She came walking out of the building wearing a radiant smile.  She got in the back seat and we began our 20 minute ride to a medical clinic.  I asked her about her work and she explained that she was a data analyst.  She works for a company that tells businesses that advertise where they can get the most bang for their buck.  I said, “You’re sort of like a media spy”?  She laughed and said, “Pretty much”.  Then she began to tell me of her love of numbers, and logic and statistics.  I remember thinking (“She is too good of a people person to be locked in a cubicle”).  Next came a pretty amazing story.

Two years ago she had a very bad skiing accident which caused a closed head injury.  She spent months in rehab relearning everything.  The long and the short of it was she could no longer analyze data.  She was given a chance to ‘lead a team’.  She found that she was very good at working with people.  She talked about how it shocked her that she had people skills.  “I work a lot more from my heart.  My life became better since I hit my head. You can ask my boyfriend.  There are a lot of things I can not do.  I can’t ski, I can’t drive, I have a hard time remembering things and I can’t go back.  You know what Mark, I would not go back. I am happier”.   I told her about this blog and asked her if she minded if I wrote about this conversation.  She thought for a moment and then looked at me with a big smile and said, “Sure”.  She headed off to her medical appointment.  I sat in my car saying to myself, “Who would have ever thought driving this red car would have given me such opportunities to meet these amazing people.  There is nothing more inspiring to me than when humans take brokenness and find wholeness”!

Onward and Upward,

Mark