She was sitting in front of the computer at the Ezer Mizion office. Very busy as usual. All around her were co-workers engaged in varied aspects of raising funds to facilitate bone marrow transplants. At times she even heard snatches of a co-worker’s conversation with a donor who had merited to save the life of a young mother or perhaps that of a tiny toddler. Saving lives was the order of the day. Behind the standard office banter was the seriousness of what we accomplish. She felt good. She knew that her work was important, one cog in the wheel of making sure that a cancer patient in need of a transplant received his chance to live. It was gratifying work. She couldn’t ask for more satisfaction in a job.
Until one day when an enormous bundle of satisfaction landed right in her lap. She had been too busy to pick up a call on her cell and so the caller left a message on her voice mail. Hours later she checked it. “What’s this??? It must be a mistake.” But it wasn’t a mistake. She was being called by the Ezer Mizion office in Israel, not on the office phone but on her cell phone, not for the usual request of a report on something-or-other or the phone number of somebody-or-other but for her personally. Why? Because she, a girl who processes data, line after line, so that a life-saving transplant can take place, she herself may be able to save a life. She was found to be a possible match for a 65 year old woman with AML.
The office erupted in excitement. One of us is a match! Further testing had to be done. It meant a blood draw. Our phlebotomist was called in and he also joined in the office elation. Each tube was carefully wrapped and shipped to Israel where the final testing would be done. Now we waited. Each day began with, “Have you heard anything? Any update?” And one day there was. Positive. She was a perfect genetic match. Like the people whose statistics are listed on the brochures she sends out. Like the people she has seen on the organization’s videos. She, she herself, would be traveling to Israel. She would be spending hours at Ezer Mizion’s new Harvesting Center with staff members seeing to her every need so that she can be perfectly comfortable. She would be the heroine of the day. She would save a life.
