Gothic Incident Narrative

It’s three o’clock on a brisk fall afternoon on November 3, 2010. I walk into my kitchen and see my mom on the phone. Her face is pale with terror, as if she had seen a ghost. She drops the phone on the tile floor and says with a panicked face, “Get your sister and go to the car”. I follow her as she grabs a sweater and car keys, frantically asking her what is going on. As we are on the highway, I look to my left, seeing tears streaming down her face as her fragile, shaking hands hold a rosary. She keeps muttering “Please don’t let me lose my father today”.

I join the rest of my family under the fluorescent lighting of the emergency room and begin to feel the walls closing in on me. My uncle enters the waiting room and says “He was pinned by the back of his legs while loading lumber into the back of his van. He lost most of his

My grandmother rushes to his side, grabbing his hand, crying “Don’t leave me yet”. He cracks a smile at me and whispers “It’ll be ok”. We are escorted to a dimly lit waiting room, where we anxiously await the outcome of his life for the next eight hours.

A quote I find to be very profound in my life is “What shapes us most isn’t our circumstances, but how we choose to react to them”. This relates to my experience during the three months of my grandfather recovering in the hospital. After his first operation, he had an option; to save his left leg or have it amputated. He replied that he wanted to try to save his leg, and if that deemed unsuccessful, have it amputated. My daily routine consisted of going to school, going to the hospital, and studying for the Scranton Prep entrance exam. My