One thing leads to another...yeah yeah yeah

Thank God this week is over!
Yesterday was the AHA Health Fair at the Tsongas Arena and it was fun...but probably won't lead to many new customers. (Thanks to T and J for coming by to help me!)
When we first book these health fairs, we do hope for some newbies. After all, we're exposing folks to our program and, well, that's part of good marketing!
So, I was sitting there at the booth (While K was teaching for me-thanks!), I was thinking "Oh brother, this is going to be a long day with no possible newbies..." (Frankly, I was thinking it was almost a waste of time. Though we did meet a few folks who work at the Arena and someone who works for the L Devils who might actually come to class!)
Then, a gentleman came up to the desk and seemed to want to talk. I asked him if he was having a good day (He was probably in his 60's or 70's) and he told me he was at the Health Fair because he'd just had a heart attack. He said he was there to learn and was starting cardiac rehab this week. He almost started crying talking about it, as he told me how he had chest pain, thought it was indigestion and waited awhile to call the ambulance. Luckily, he *did* call and he was ok-though he did have a heart attack. He said it felt so weird to say "I had a heart attack." I can totally relate-it was weird for me to say my Dad had one.
I told him about my Dad and he got even more emotional (he was probably about my Dad's age-at least the age he would be now). He said he had to walk on a treadmill for the first time and almost collapsed-he'd never worked out before. This man was scared about rehab, but I reminded him (multiple times) he was STILL HERE and that was surely something!
I told him that he could do it, to just take one day at a time and that he would get stronger every day and that, with all the advances in Heart research, he was here, alive and able to hug his family and THAT is an accomplishment.
I tried to allay his fears about exercise, tell him it could be fun and remind him that, maybe he only walked on the treadmill that first time for 1 minute but tomorrow, it'll be 2 minutes and so on and so on...
He seemed to feel better and thanked me, gave me a quick hug and walked away.
I guess I'm still thinking about him because, well, as I said, he was about the age my Dad would be now if he'd lived through his heart attack 28 years ago. And then I realized that I might have gone there for a health fair, to promote our business and try and gain new customers, but I guess that's not really why I was there yesterday. Maybe I was there for a totally different reason. Maybe I was there to talk to this man and help him through his fears a little bit.
I hope I did because you know what? That totally made my day. After that, I could have cared less (really) if anyone would really come to class. It reminded me that, sometimes, one thing does lead to another!