I've learnt something wonderful in the last few days. It is that some rare human beings are so kind to each other that it is almost impossible to believe.
On Friday, my brother, who has been in dialysis for almost three years, was given a kidney by a friend. The story of how the two of them became friends has a miraculous quality to it, but I won't go into that for the moment. The point is that my brother's friend made the decision some time ago that handing over a kidney was something that needed doing, and after that they would not be dissuaded. Ignoring the danger they were putting themselves in, undeterred by the knowledge of the considerable pain they would have to endure in the recovery period, they took no notice of my brother's protestations and went ahead and did it.
Forget celebrities. Forget all the shiny, sharp-elbowed people we are encouraged to be interested in. It is the rare individuals like my brother's friend that we need as models to aspire to. But of course they don't want adulation or attention. They don't think what they do is hard. They think it is simply a matter of doing the right thing.
I think George Eliot summed it up:
ReplyDelete"...for the growing good of the world is partly dependent on unhistoric acts; and that things are not so ill with you and me as they might have been, is half owing to the number who lived faithfully a hidden life, and rest in unvisited tombs".
Is that from Middlemarch? I find that book so teeming with wisdom, and yet I cannot get through Adam Bede or Silas Marner. Perhaps I will go and try them one more time
DeleteYes, Middlemarch.
DeleteDoes a better novel exist?
DeleteYes, there are people like this. My wife is one. She gave a kidney to a friend with no desire for reward except to see him live.
ReplyDeleteIt is very hard on both donor and recipient, not that I want to dissuade anyone from donating who has thoroughly investigated what they are doing. Organ donation in this country has a pitiful record.
I was delighted to read that it had happened for Mark. I don't go for bucketlists but this was definitely one on mine. Ticked. May the rest of the journey be safe and successful.
I had a memory of you mentioning that your wife did that, and that the health authorities were not great to her. I was being tested (with great trepidation) when this courageous and altruistic soul came along. I have unending admiration for the person in question. I must say I had the sort of experience I think your wife may have had with the medical establishment down here but meeting the team at Prince of Wales Hospital made me wonder if it was just my particular health authority that was rather inhuman, as they up there all seemed great.
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