← Harold's Old Time Radio
Loading summary
Transcript2 lines
- [00:00]
A
With the American Express Platinum card, you can unlock over $1,500 in value annually with statement credits on select purchases and other benefits. That means getting access to even more of your favorite things, more jet setting, more trend setting, and more resetting. And downward dog. The stage is set for you to do even more with the American Express Platinum part. Learn more@americanexpress.com US Explore Platinum Terms Apply.
- [00:30]
B
Rest of the Story Tammy could have sworn that she heard her boyfriend called her name, even though she knew he was up in the bathroom taking a bubble bath and the door was shut anyway. Her name had been spoken as she thought she had heard it, in a soft voice, not as though it were being shouted from a distance, much less through a closed door. And still Tammy went on up and knocking on the door, asked, did you call me? And when there was no answer this time, she opened the door and peeked inside to discover her boyfriend was gone. Startled, Tammy rushed inside, plunged her arms into the bubbly, soapy water. No, this was not a joke. Her boyfriend had apparently lost consciousness, had slipped down into the bathtub, out of sight. With his body slippery from the suds, his hundred and ninety pound frame would be difficult for Tammy to lift, but she had to try. Fully clothed, she climbed into the tub with him and pulled with all of her might. Momentarily, she wrestled his head above water, watched him gasp. And yet, even as her boyfriend seemed to be regaining consciousness, he suddenly blacked out and the dead weight of his limp body pulled him back into the water once more. Tammy struggled interminably, failing and succeeding and failing again in her attempt to get him up in breathable air. And then, somehow the slender woman managed to roll her boyfriend's torso over the side of the tub, his arms dangling at first, then then began moving voluntarily. He was coming to give me your doctor's name, Tammy shouted in his ear. He did, and then he mumbled, there's an oxygen tank in my trunk. Get it. She did. Minutes later, Tammy was pressing the oxygen mask over her boyfriend's face. He took two deep breaths and collapsed. The tank was empty. Tammy grabbed for the phone on the wall. It had just been installed the day before, but not well enough. The line was dead. Tammy fled to another phone and called the doctor. She explained what had happened. The doctor said, keep checking him and call me back. And then he hung up. There was no time for disbelief. Tammy called the town police chief, who was a friend. He listened and he was there within five minutes. When he arrived, Tammy's boyfriend was still semi conscious and breathing irregularly but they got him to the hospital. They ran all of the tests, which yielded a diagnosis. Hypoglycemia, that is perilously low blood sugar. A rich dessert had precipitated it. The warm bath water had lowered his blood pressure even further. All of the wrong things at once. But Tammy's boyfriend lived to tell and even to laugh about the incident in years to come. For all the while Tammy was trying to haul 190 pounds of flesh out of a slippery, bubbly bathtub. She had failed to realize in her panic that all she really had to do was open the bathtub drain. Today marks your first acquaintance with Tammy the heroine. The valiant 110 pound woman who defied physics and got her clothing all wet to rescue her boyfriend from the bubbles of death. But you've known for years who else she is. Country music superstar Tammy Wynette. And by the way, the boyfriend she saved from drowning in a bathtub in the autumn of 1976 was Burt Reynolds. And now you know the rest of the story.