Julie Sylvester and Christine Gerdes reunited with genuine warmth, counteracting the gloomy winter weather.
A few weeks earlier, Julie was driving her bus when she saw Christine slip on ice and fall. She pulled over to help and her kindness left a lasting impression. Upon seeing each other again, the first thing Julie wanted to know was “How did you fare?”
“I came out okay,” Christine assured her. “I was worried something was broken, but I was just bruised and dizzy and had a headache.”
Driving the Commuter North route, Julie was about to turn right from Kipke Dr onto Greene St when she saw Christine fall hard. “Our grounds crews are amazing,” Christine said, “So it must have been one of those flash-freeze situations. It just looked wet, but it was pure ice.”
After struggling “like a turtle” to get up, Christine walked very slowly toward the intersection and waved to Julie to go ahead. Instead, Julie turned the corner, pulled over and stopped to ask if Christine was okay. “I was upset, and in tears, and said yes, I was ok…but I am guessing it wasn’t very convincing,” Christine recalls. “It was just so nice that someone was stopping to make sure I was okay. Her kindness really came through.”
Julie gave Christine her name and phone number in case she needed anything. Christine notes, “In retrospect, I was dazed. But I had her little piece of paper and that was reassuring. I felt very alone when I fell and having her right there made me feel so much better.”
After the incident, Christine passed along her compliments to F&O leadership. From her work as special counsel to the provost, she knows that “people are quick to complain but compliments are much harder to come by.” It was then that it occurred to her that by stopping to help, Julie might have been risking being late on her route.
However, Julie knows the F&O values through and through. She says, “Safety is first priority, always. We have to look out for each other.”
Written by Katrina Folsom