Green Ribbon

It really does look like I’ve got a new home lined up for Vogie. I’m hoping that later this evening I can spend some last quality time with her (not that she’ll appreciate it). The person who will be taking her sounds like they’ve put a lot of time into researching how to take care of aquatic turtles (not an easy task). Vog will be going to a better home than she has now. I just hope she doesn’t bite the twelve-year-old kid whose mom is adopting Voglinde before the deal is finalized.

About four years ago, when I had only been at this job a short while, I met a guy in MIS who shares a love of Tolkien and Star Trek with me. He set my computer up to play CD’s, and I baked the computer guys brownies.

He has a picture of a young boy on his desk. The kid looks to be twelve or so, and you can tell by looking at him that Mr. MIS is his father. Not long after I became friendly with Mr. MIS, I asked him about his kids. He has a daughter, college age. He had a son.

His son was killed in a traffic accident in his early teens. Mr. MIS and his wife agreed that it was right that their son become an organ donor. Mr. MIS hasn’t told me much more about it than that, but the day he told me about it, he gave me a green ribbon lapel pin, which he asked me to wear in his son’s memory. It’s the pin that you see at the top left hand side of my diary page, the graphic at the top of my menu. I have worn it often, during the last year the pin took on an even greater significance to me.

Today I went over to Mr. MIS’s desk. I asked him to hold out his hand. I told him I had something to give him. He did, and I dropped this into it:

I told him to consider it a repayment on the pin that he gave to me years ago, and to consider it a thank-you for the support he and his wife gave The Socialist and I when things started to look a little bleak. Neither one of us said much after that, and I had to return to my desk soon after. I felt his thanks though, every bit as much as I know he felt mine.