Chapter Three in \u201cDecades with the Squad,\u201d by my father, William Palmer Jervey, Jr.
<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cI\u2019m OK. Help the girls,\u201d pleaded the elderly gentleman as he stood shakily beside his demolished car. As was later determined, he was indeed alright, having sustained no injury. Most remarkable, considering the tattered wreck that had been his automobile. In fact, no one was badly hurt in this one.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cThe girls\u201d turned out to be two ladies, one middle aged and the other somewhat older. I don\u2019t recall the exact nature of any injuries, but I will never forget the older of the two girls.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
We found her seated on the floor of the back seat, her right foot painfully pinched beneath the front seat which had been knocked askew. She was the most adorable little old lady I have seen in many moons. She wore an ankle length dress of dark taffeta, a narrow black ribbon around her throat, a little black hat firmly in place on her head which was a mass of the most beautiful silver ringlets. The expression on her face was a combination of resignation, mild defiance, patient expectancy. She sat with her fingers laced together in her lap.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
I said, \u201cMa\u2019am, we\u2019ll have to do some prising to get your foot loose. We won\u2019t hurt you any more than we can help.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cVery well, young man,\u201d she replied, \u201cand I hope you won\u2019t think ill of me if I cry out. The pain is quite excruciating!\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
I said, \u201cMa\u2019am, you go ahead and holler all you want to.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
It didn\u2019t take us long to get her loose, and in a few minutes we were in the ambulance speeding to the hospital. I was filling out the run report and timidly suggested that I needed to know how old she was. She snapped her head around, fixed a suspicious gaze upon me, and through pursed lips said, \u201cYoung man, are you going to put this in the paper?\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
I said, \u201cNo, Ma\u2019am, this is for our records. It\u2019s just routine.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Her stern expression softened, and she said, \u201cVery well, I am eighty years of age, but I don\u2019t like to publicize that fact because they won\u2019t let you go places and do things.\u201d I assured her that my report would in no way restrict her future activity.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
We rode on to the hospital, engaged only in intermittent conversation. When I left her, she regarded me sweetly and said, \u201cYoung man, I am deeply indebted to you and your kindness. I shall remember you in my prayers.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
I said, \u201cCertainly, Ma\u2019am, glad to help when I can.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
What a priceless encounter!<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Chapter Three in \u201cDecades with the Squad,\u201d by my father, William Palmer Jervey, Jr. \u201cI\u2019m OK. Help the girls,\u201d pleaded the elderly gentleman as he stood shakily beside his demolished car. As was later determined, he was indeed alright, having sustained no injury. Most remarkable, considering the tattered wreck that had been his automobile. In […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_feature_clip_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[421],"tags":[425,424],"class_list":["post-1080","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-decades-with-the-squad","tag-first-responder","tag-rescue-squad"],"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/rightasrainonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1080","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/rightasrainonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/rightasrainonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rightasrainonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rightasrainonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=1080"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/rightasrainonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1080\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1081,"href":"https:\/\/rightasrainonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1080\/revisions\/1081"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/rightasrainonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=1080"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rightasrainonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=1080"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rightasrainonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=1080"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}