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Posts published in “Day: November 29, 2016

In A Heartbeat

Picture of Mike Tully, Webmaster and Publisher
Mike Tully’s Column Runs Each Monday In the Southern Arizona News Examiner Site.

Certain life events focus the mind extraordinarily. Famous examples are the prospect of being hanged or the experience of being shot at. Other life events resonate with irony. I just had a life event that falls squarely in both categories.

First the irony: I just retired from my most recent job, with Pima County. After seven and a half years with the County my effective retirement date was November 13th. I was looking forward to a new stage in my life in which I could still do interesting things, but at my pace. Then, on the first day of my retirement, I suffered a massive heart attack. There it was: the hot breath of the irony dragon.

The focusing came the next day, after I was rushed into the catheter lab to have a stent implanted that restored normal blood flow and eliminated the pain. Neither the pain nor my concern that I might spend retirement in an urn on the mantle focused my mind. It was this: the realization that I was lucky.

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