Publisher's Synopsis
The D A S HThat tiny horizontal line on gravestones, that one between your birth day and your death date.The DASH - when your heartbeat stops.Ponder that very small yet very significant 'dash' (-) for a moment. Have you, dear reader, filled in all the details you wish your children and their children were told or read about your past? Is your 'dash' very short or is it a nice long one! I certainly hope it's a long dash.My hope is to sow that seed to stop fooling ourselves that we are 'too busy' doing 'things right', rather than doing the 'right things'.Want to re-read that to help the penny drop?18 March 2017 was very nearly a DASH day for me: 1943 - 2017.2017minus1943 equals 74 years old when I suffered a heart attack. My grandfather died when he was 67 years old and my father died when he was but 56 years old. Their 'dashes' were relatively short, especially my hero and role model: Abram Carl Frederick Preller Geldenhuys. I followed his footsteps into an Air Force flying career and we shared many war stories. But not enough.His 'dash' ended before he could answer the many mysteries that confronted me. Oh, how I regretted the treasured moments I squandered when he died. It came too suddenly and unexpectedly - at the very young age of fifty-six.My 'dash' begins 1943.I was a World War II baby, born 20 February 1943, at Rustpan, Bothaville, Orange Free State, South Africa. I have an elder brother Jan, born Johannesburg 1941 and a younger sister Delene, born 1945.We had a second sister, Dawnie, but she had a very short dash. She was six years old when she died. Her dash was 1949 - 1954. She died in a fire on Musenga plots, Chingola, on the 13th August 1954. A day my siblings, Jan and Delene, will always remember.Our beloved grandson Jake Geldenhuys lived a mere twelve days in 2007. His dash; 18:12: 2007 - 30:12: 2007. A day never to be forgotten by his parents Pey and Eloise Geldenhuys.Life begins with the DashI was born 1943 and born again 2017.I suffered a heart attack on Saturday 18 March 2017.Time: - 09h30Place: - Beulah, Paeroa, New ZealandI could or would have died had it not been for my brother Jan and brother-in-law Stu McColl. They rushed me to the Paeroa Medical Centre where Te Korowai doctor Brendan stabilized me and summoned St. John's Ambulance to whisk me off to the Waikato Hospital in Hamilton. St John's medic Rae administered morphine and connected me to all sorts of contraptions in the ambulance. The ambulance was driven by Jenny (whom I met and thanked during July). Drs Mark Davis and Katy Heuser examined me thoroughly in the Emergency Resuscitation reception ward. Dr Katy informed that I had a heart attack but was responding well to treatment. Dr. Mark Davis said there were four options, namely:1.Medication and control via pills2.Insert stents in narrowed veins/arteries3.Fit pacemaker to regulate heartbeats4.Open heart surgery repairsI was then wheeled to a second high-care ward with all the monitors and observers sat in a long, raised platform from where they could monitor all the newly arrived patients. After a short while I was then wheeled to CC3 - Cardiac Care Ward 3 where I joined five other patients with heart defects.With this extension of my Dash so this journey has another beginning.
