A Big Scare Today [160/365]

What started out as a promising day for a Project 365 idea I had in mind quickly got discarded with a terrifying turn of events today.

I normally don't talk about myself in the description of any given image I post, including how I felt before, during, or after I took a photo. Whether I was happy, sad, energetic, lazy, imaginative, unmotivated, or whatever it is I was feeling at the time is something that is ultimately besides the point, since the whole point for me is the photography itself, which also involves sharing, enjoying, and learning from other people's work -- all of which has helped me to grow as a photographer.

However, today, while my parents were visiting, along with my sister and her daughter, my mother had a severe asthma attack right after lunch. It was so severe that parademics had to be called; she could barely breathe. Each minute that passed she panicked more and more, frightening us since we were helpless to do anything until the ambulance arrived.

Ultimately my mother was stabilized, her breathing was restored, and she was able to leave hours later from the emergency room on her own two feet. However, there was a lot of hand-holding and hand-wringing involved, and a crushing sense of guilt that I haven't spent as much time with my own mother as a son should (and by extension, time that Marcus should be spending with his own grandmother). Needless to say, my desire to do anything interesting, clever, insightful, or otherwise different for Project 365 for today became completely nil. Today I was reminded of something far more important: that too often we take things for granted, even the health of those closest to us, and we should make an effort to spend as much time as possible with those people who are closest to our hearts. You never know if suddenly there will be no time left at all, and it shouldn't take a big scare to remind us of the obvious and what is truly important in this short life we have.

P.S. Sorry if I lag severely in commenting on your own photos, or replying to any e-mails or inquiries. As you might imagine, I'm still feeling rather distraught by the experience.

Maimonides Hospital, Fort Hamilton Parkway & 49th Street, Boro Park, Brooklyn, New York.