The Accident | Part 3 of 4
My husband was speechless. I had a few hours of shock under my belt before he heard this news. By this point, I was already trying to figure out how to regroup and recover from backing out of all out planned commitments for the Philippines. We already let our apartment lease go to month to month paying higher rent because we planned to leave. I already signed up for the program at work but I’m sure they have heard the news and cancelled the program indefinitely.
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Stacy wasn’t at the coffee shop that morning. He told me that they were traveling for a week for their anniversary. So I headed into work without our normal morning talks to shake off morning anxiety.
At work, as soon as I put my things down at my desk, the girl in the cube in front of me said the trainer wanted to see me in the training room. I wasn’t surprised. The typhoon was a big international story.
When I walked into the training room, the trainer looked up from reading his newspaper at his desk and said, “Did you hear the news?” I shook my head and said, “Yes, that typhoon hit them hard. Those poor people. I’m assuming the training program is cancelled indefinitely, right?” He stood up and said, “Oh you didn’t hear then.
Stacy’s sister passed away in that storm. He called me yesterday. She was such a sweetheart. We are sending flowers to their family. I’ll be out for a few days to travel to New York for the funeral. She was so young. Stacy is devastated.” In shock and at a loss for words I said, “Oh my God! No I didn’t know. Please give Stacy my love. Unbelievable!”
As I walked out of the training room, I walked towards the front window of the building and just stared at the bare trees full of snow. Trying to just sort my thoughts. If the timing had been slightly different that could have been us in that typhoon and who knows how we would have made it out. We only missed it by a couple of months.
When I got back to my desk, there was an email from the corporate office saying that all programs scheduled for the Philippines have been cancelled due to the typhoon. They posted a list of ways to donate to impacted areas and a support hotline.
The work day flew by. Before I knew it, people were starting to get their coats on and leave out for the day. On my way out, I peeked into my manager’s office saying, “Looks like you’re stuck with me for a while.”
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