On Monday when I drove my son to day-care I saw an ambulance and a fire-truck. The paramedics were carrying out a little girl. Immediately it made me think of last year in May when Benni had his first febrile seizure. It was terrifying and I certainly don’t want to experience anything like that ever again (though we got pretty close again Monday night). The paramedics, police, fire fighters, nurses, doctors, etc were all awesome and responded so quickly and calmly. That day, they were the heroes that they are always claimed to be. But as I was driving past the fire-truck and being terrified, I thought, they were the heroes that day, but everyday there is a different hero for my family. She is no fire-fighter, no paramedic, no medical doctor, just a Ph.D. But over the last three years, she has rescued me and my family on so many occasions in so many ways: emergency baby-sitting; taking care of the dogs while I gave birth in a new town; fighting her way through a snow-storm to pick up my son who got kicked out of day-care for being sick but neither I nor my husband could make it to day-care; excusing me at an important meeting that I totally forgot about and calling me immediately after to tell me what my excuse was; taking turns rocking my son or typing while we were stuck at the Chicago airport and had to finish a paper due the next day; bringing me lunch on days where I can’t get lunch; proof-reading and giving feedback on paper drafts any time or day; reminding me of deadlines; offering to take Benni to the doctor after he fell down the stairs and I had to go to DTW to pick up my parents; offering feedback and advice no matter what the topic; supporting the German language maintenance of my entire family; sharing hotel rooms at conferences with me and my son and helping take care of him; … and she does it all with a smile. I would not be able to stay sane, let alone do my job without her. She deserves a special entry into the blog – could be our inspiration to finally finishing that co-authored paper on blogging.
And she is not just a hero in our lives, but also a great resource. On Monday alone, I sent three students to her because I thought she had more information than I did. More amazingly, she actually takes the time and helps people who are not related to her job responsibilities. All the while, she seems to work around the clock to actually keep up with her job responsibilities.
How do you thank a person like that? No gift seems big enough and no gesture grant enough to express how much we appreciate everything that she does.
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She is a hero! I totally understand what you mean and I don't have a kid. She is just there for me!
ReplyDeleteAnd there is really nothing you can do to thank her enough but she probably expects you to same things for her when your kid is older and she has her own ;)