I’m 63 now and I started giving blood when I was 17. For many years Red Cross called me every 56 days to come on in and give. When I was in my mid-20s, I worked at a hospital where they very quickly learned I was the “perfect” donor. I’m an O negative with all the crossmatch that says I can give to anybody. While I worked there they brought in a fireman with unusual blood who had been hurt badly. We had blood of his type so they came for me. The doctors gave him my blood, still warm from me. They told me later that I saved his life. By they time the could have gotten his type from the nearest large city, he would have been dead. What a wonderful feeling.