-->
Sometimes things are meant to happen, things we don’t really
foresee.
Traveling down to Washington D.C., after a bunch of high
school classmates asked me to start the trip because they wanted to go see the
cherry blossoms, we took a great 3 1/2-day tour of the city.
As we stopped at our restaurant for dinner after our first
full day of sightseeing in our Nation’s capitol, the class of ’64 Bellport High
School, classmates Judy Hunter, Joanne Zukowski, Joanne Tew and Aggie Toronto
settled in for a dinner with my older sister (much older) Tessie, and TLW (The
Little Woman).
Earlier that afternoon I received a text message while on
our tour bus from another old classmate’s husband, Nick DePalo, married to
Michele, a closet Mets fan. He texted me asking where we were having dinner and
what time, and he and Michele would meet us there. He was in Virginia nearby and would stay overnight at our
hotel for breakfast the next morning too. Since I was on a bus just arriving at
the Iwo Jima monument, I texted I would get back to him with the details: did
and we met at the prescribed place.
Here is where the hand of God comes down, saves a life and a
whole bunch of people’s fun. If Nick had not shown up, sat where he did, some
old man in our tour party would be dead right now!
 |
| Nick is at the end, the bus driver has a hat on behind Michele next to Nick |
Nick and Michele arrived a while after we were seated in the
restaurant, and so the restaurant set up another table and we all re-arranged
ourselves to accommodate our expected extras. Nick was seated on the end,
facing the kitchen, this is important.
We all chattered a bunch and suddenly there was some
commotion behind me: that I couldn’t see: however Nick did! Without thinking or
pausing, he jumps out of his chair and races behind the wall that my back is
turned to and out of view, Michele urging him on.
“Lower Nick!” she bellows to her husband.
“If I go any lower I’ll squeeze his balls!” responds Nick.
It turns out he was saving an old man in our party from choking on a piece of
meat. Applying the Heimlich maneuver, the man coughs up the offending morsel,
and Mr. DePalo, our hero, like he does this everyday, returned to his meal!
On a self-invite, one man who might not have been there,
saves another man’s life who might not be here now!
Thank you Mr.DePalo!
The next morning, the bus driver got up in front of the
whole bus of sightseers, and thinking that Nick was part of the tour because he
had seen the event unfold before his eyes begins to thank Nick, and asks him to
stand up. Of course Nick wasn’t on the bus.
The bus driver found out the last day of our tour, that his
own mother had just passed away the day before!
1 comment:
Thank you, Joe, for the tribute to Nick. We both kind of took it all in stride after the incident, but seeing it chronicled in print really brought it home. So, thanks again, from the hero and me.
Post a Comment