Found: On a Park Bench

“Sir, are you all right?” It was around noon when Lynda, an avid jogger, found Zack, an eighty-one year old patient with severe Alzheimer’s disease.

“I found an elderly man lying on a park bench,” she advised the 911 responder. “I tried to awaken him, but he may be in a coma. Please hurry.”

By the time the police and ambulance arrived on the scene, it was almost too late.

The doctor at the local hospital suggested to his family that it could be touch and go for Zack, as he had Type 1 Diabetes and his blood sugar level was far too low. Not having had anything to eat or drink since suppertime the evening before, he was seriously hypoglycemic.

Later, when the police spoke to Lynda, she had no idea who the man was, or where he came from. She had been concerned about him, because he was not wearing a coat.

A further investigation by the police revealed that earlier, he had walked approximately a mile from his Nursing Home. A new bus driver had let him board the city bus. Not having a bus pass or any change, she had given Zack a free ride, on compassionate grounds.

“He looked upset,” the young female bus driver explained to the police. “The man told me that he had to attend his daughter’s funeral. How could I possibly deny him a ride across town on the bus?” She realized that she should have alerted the police, when he got off the bus across from a park on the other side of town, several hours later.

“I am sorry,” she said to Zack’s wife. “He stumbled a bit as if he was dizzy, but he did not smell like alcohol.”

“Zack has done this before. He has gone to his daughter’s funeral many times,” his wife explained to her, gently.

What she did not tell the bus driver was that their only daughter had died at birth, fifty-two years prior to that time.