By Carla Slavey

Rick Girdler spent many years in the insurance business, which means he knows a thing our two about cars.

It’ s no wonder, then, that when trying to come up with a metaphor for one of his life experiences – in this case, a medical procedure – Girdler falls back to a car concept.

“ If you buy a car, and it’ s a certain color, and you hadn’ t seen one like that before, after you buy that car, you see that car all over the place,” he said.

Likewise, after he had to have a stent placed to fix a blocked artery in his heart, Girdler said he’ s talked to many folks who have undergone the same procedure.

“ I’ ve talked to people who have had them done 10 years ago,” he said, who have told him they are not having any more problems now.

“ Or maybe they have to go back every now and then and put another stent in,( and talk) as if it’ s just a routine normal thing,” he said.

As common as having to get a stent may be, the circumstances which led to Girdler finding out he needed that stent were far

from routine. Girdler, a Somerset resident who serves as a senator in Frankfort, found himself having a heart attack on the morning of May 9, 2022.

Girdler also spent 43

years in insurance, so he said he was used to waking up in the early hours, around 5:30 or 6 a. m.

“ I woke up early that morning and had quite

a bit of pressure( in his chest), but I thought,‘ Well, It will pass.’”

So he drank his morning coffee and took a shower. But the pressure in his chest continued.

He finally understood

Photo by Steve Cornelius

that it wasn’ t going to go away on its own.

“ So I woke up my wife, and said,‘ Well, we might ought to go to the hospital, because I might

be having a heart attack.’” Girdler’ s laid-back, countryfied demeanor belies the sense of urgency one may normally have under those circumstances. Girdler said that his wife“ got all excited” at the information and hurried him to the emergency room of Lake Cumberland Regional Hospital. But Girdler himself, even in retelling the story more than three years later, doesn’ t tell it with any sense of drama or frenzy. He recalls it in perfect detail, but he gives it the concern one might hear from someone remembering what they had for lunch yesterday.

And the truth is, he said, he wasn’ t scared at the time.

“ I was just my old self, joking and carrying on,” Girdler said in describing how he spoke to the hospital staff.“ I’ m one of those that if it’ s my turn to go, it’ s my turn to go. And I’ ve been a believer in Jesus Christ since I was 14 years old. I know I’ m going to a better place if something happens to me.”

He stressed, though, he’ s not eager to make that journey.“ I want to go to heaven, but I don’ t want to go up on the load now, as the joke goes.”