Prom
Prom is one of the most anticipated nights of a high school student’s life. The boys plan sweet and creative ways to ask the girls to the prom. After that, there are tickets and dresses to buy, tuxedos, or suits to rent, limos need to be booked, and the girl gets ready for the prom for hours. A boy named Olen Howden is one of the millions of kids who were looking forward to his prom in 2019.
Olen Howden
Olen lives in Lancaster, England, and he attends Ripley St. Thomas C.E. Academy, and his prom was during the summer. Olen grew up with his mother, Katerina, his father, Simon, and his two sisters, Bela and Amalka. Sadly, his perfect family was destroyed in 2008 when the family was involved in a car accident. His father died the day of the crash. His younger sister, Amalka, died from her injuries the next day. And his mother lived for a few days but died in the hospital. It was the most challenging thing he had ever been through. As if this weren’t enough, the hardships didn’t stop there.
Olen and Bella
Olen was just 4-years-old at the time of the crash. He had a broken foot and a broken collar bone. When he was released from the Royal Lancaster Infirmary, he went to live with relatives. His older sister Bela also had problems. Her injuries were very severe, and she remained in the intensive care unit at the hospital. It took a while, but Bela got better, and the two went to live with their Czech grandmother, Satava Hrazdilova. She was an older woman and didn’t have much money, and they received help from a charity called the Architects Benevolent Society.
A Letter
The kids grew up hearing about the kindness of the charity, so when she was almost 14-years-old, she wrote a letter to the charity to thank them for their generosity after her parents died. She wrote in her letter about her father being an architect before he died, and how now she was living with her brother and her grandmother. Bela wrote about all the work that the organization did for the family after the crash. When they got out of the hospital, their house was a mess because they had just moved in. The charity helped them fix up the house, and Bela was grateful. They helped the broken family buy carpets, windows, they decorated the house, purchased a washing machine for them, and even planted trees outside.
Expectations
Olen was looking forward to the prom, but it brought up sad feelings as well. This was supposed to be a time in his life that he should have been sharing with his parents and his sister, but they were gone. Wanting it to be a great night still, he wanted to go in style. Unfortunately, he didn’t have the money to go in the style that he had hoped. When he was walking to school one day, he saw a blue F-type Jaguar. As he looked at the car, he wished that he had something like that to take to the prom.
The Car
The car was parked at the Royal Lancaster Infirmary, which was the area’s local hospital. The car belonged to a physician, Dr. Marwan Bukhari, whose specialty is rheumatology. He did a lot of work for the hospital and published plenty of papers in medical journals. He is a very dedicated doctor, and his primary focus has always been his patients’ quality of life. Olen stood, staring at the car, wishing that he could take it to the prom. It was then that he decided to make a bold move. He knew that it was a shot in the dark, but if he didn’t try, he would regret it. He decided to give it a chance, so he put a note on his jaguar under the windshield wiper of the car, and went about his day.
Finding the Note On His Jaguar
When Dr. Bukhari saw the note on his jaguar, under his windshield, he didn’t know what to think. He didn’t know the boy who wrote the note, and it felt it was strange that a high school student was asking him to use his car for prom night. A doctor found a note on his jaguar from a teen, and his reaction floored the young man.
Yes!
Olen was shocked when Dr. Bukhari agreed to his request ahead of the dance. He went to Olen’s home to pick him up. Bela and their grandmother watched the two drive away, trying to hold back their tears of joy.
Thankful
Olen was very thankful that the doctor was willing to take him to the prom in his fantastic car. The family decided to give something back, so they donated money to an arthritis charity, which was the doctor’s field of medicine. What made it more perfect was that the prom was scheduled during Rheumatoid Arthritis Awareness Week.
