These 2 patients were a young man of 21 and a young boy of 15 or 16. The oldest, lets say, is Steve and the youngest, Charles. Both require a great deal of care especially with their umpteen medications. They could do their own personal care. I made their beds, gave their meds and ordered their lab and xrays etc. Steve and I were talking and he asked me if I was going to cook supper for my husband and what was I going to cook. I told him that I had pork chops thawing out for supper. We talked of other things, sports, cars, girlfriends, etc.

Later when I was with Charles he asked me the same question about supper. So I thought well he is tired of hospital food and just wanted to hear of someone's cooking besides the hospital's cooks. Charles told me that he had his new/old truck in the parking lot and would get to drive it home when he was discharged and his grandfather would be the licensed driver to be with him or his mom. He only had a learner's permit.

After my shift ended, I looked forward to getting home and get supper over with so I could sit back and prop my feet up.

I was half way through cooking when the doorbell rang. There stood Steve and Charles. Since Steve was of age, he signed Charles out on a pass and one for himself. They came to eat supper. I just had to peel and extra tater or two. After supper they helped clear the table and helped with the dishes. Then they left to go back to the hospital. Sometime during the day these two got together and schemed this up between them.

Steve died about 3 months later, Charles lived until he was 21.

Charles is our grandson. He had a double lung transplant at the age of 19 and died two years later of his body's rejection of the lungs. Charles has been gone for 7 yrs last April 1st, 2003.