The New Fitness Center - Arbor Acres

the
President’s Message
My Night With Emma
The call came as it always does,
inconveniently. I had just sat down for
dinner. When Arbor Acres appeared on
the caller ID, a cavern of dread opened
within me. A resident had fallen and cut
her head. Her family could not meet her
in the Emergency Room so the task fell
to me. Why? Because at Arbor Acres no
resident goes to the Emergency Room
unaccompanied regardless of the hour,
ever. If a family member is not available,
the Arbor Acres staff person on call goes
to the ER to support the resident.
When I came to Arbor Acres in 1985,
the weight of this commitment felt
manageable. Arbor Acres was small
then. The founding staff had shaped
Arbor Acres out of the new clay of
their idealism, largely un-tempered by
experience, learning by trial and error,
often deciding matters without full
consideration of long-term implications
of the precedents they were setting. But
soon the Health Center would open,
and the numbers needing Emergency
Room assessment would explode. Why
had the staff made a promise that time
and growth would inevitably render
unsustainable? My conclusion: they
were nuts.
Brilliant ideas seldom survive because
when they surface the chorus of the
world dismisses them as insane. I was
a voice in that chorus early on. But
administrative call as it is known, which
now requires a small army to carry its
considerable weight, call by call has
opened me to the peculiar insanity that
is the essence of the Gospel. Literally,
I have gone kicking and screaming on
Christmas Day to stand with a resident
in the netherworld of the Emergency
Room, feeling
utterly mad in
all respects, only
to find there the
infant Christ
in the most
unwelcome and
unwelcoming of
places. How insane is that!
W. David Piner
Each time that Arbor Acres has grown,
our ability to sustain this one promise
falls under scrutiny. Has the time
come to allow the wisdom of the world
to prevail? The head says yes, but
experience says no. Which brings me to
Emma, whose fall thwarted my dinner.
I confess I was mad at her for falling.
But I went. I found Emma alone,
her head awash in blood, her pillow
saturated, her scalp full of staples.
Bewildered, when she saw my face she
smiled, and called me by name. For
the next four hours Emma rambled.
Staples were removed, a frightening and
painful process; staples were replaced;
then staples were removed a second
time. And still the wound bled. The
physicians did their difficult work.
Emma and I talked. We laughed. We
shared our mutual love for Arbor Acres,
which even in her confused state would
always prompt a blazing smile. Over a
long, bloody night something magical
occurred, a private spell cast through
hands touching, eyes gazing, and love
given and received.
Emma survived her ordeal. I bowed
before mine, grateful for the foolishness
of idealistic lovers who first fashioned
Arbor Acres out of idealistic clay, then
poured into it the new wine of the
Gospel’s holy insanity.
2
“At Arbor Acres, no resident goes to the hospital
unaccompanied, regardless of the hour, ever.”