Driving through Bay Ridge, we pass the site of the old Kleinfeld bridal shop. “Too bad it’s now in Manhattan,” I say.

Bronson shrugs. “It’s progress,” he says. “Who’d come this far into Brooklyn?”

I’m glad Manhattanites haven’t discovered Bay Ridge and its quiet sidestreets, church bells, and glorious homes. “It’s elegant without being snooty,” I say.

“Because it’s not gentrified,” he says. Outside a popular Italian restaurant with great calamari, a middle-aged woman flags us down. Beside her a slightly older man sits in a beach chair drinking a cold bottle of water. He’s wearing a baseball cap with the name of the restaurant written on it. He looks good: bright eyes, healthy skin, excellent physique. “What happened to your husband?” Bronson asks, as I take the patient’s vitals.

“My father,” the woman says. “I was walking with him when his legs buckled.”

“Did he feel dizzy beforehand?” Bronson asks.

The woman translates into Italian, and the patient answers, “No.”

A middle-aged man comes out of the restaurant. “My brother,” the woman says.

They speak for a while in Italian. Then the man says, “He lives with me and my wife. I’ll take him home.”

“I think he should go to a hospital,” Bronson says. “To get checked out.”

“No hospital,” the patient says, in thickly accented English.

“How old is he?” Bronson asks.

“Ninety-five,” the woman answers. My eyes pop open. His vitals are terrific: BP 110/80, pulse 80. This man has obviously bathed in the fountain of youth. “I’ll be damned,” I say, putting away my stethoscope. “Any medical problems?”

“No problems, no medications, no allergies. He’s fit as a fiddle.”

Despite his obvious good health, no telemetry doctor or EMS lieutenant who cares about his or her credentials is going to risk allowing a 95-year-old to refuse medical aid. I explain this to the woman, who encourages her father to go to the hospital. He finally agrees, and I help them both into the ambulance while Bronson gets the information he needs from the son. I hear him ask, “How does he stay so healthy?”

“Worms,” the son says. “My father always told me that when he was a kid, in Italy, he used to eat worms from the field. And that everyone did in the old country, and that none of the children ever got sick. When he opened his restaurant, I used to joke that he should put worms on the menu.”

“Gross!” I shout, from inside the ambulance.

“Yeah,” the son says. “But look at him.”

I can’t argue with that. He’s radiating good health.

The patient strapped in, I say, “Who’s coming with us?” The daughter says she will, and the son says he’ll meet us there.

En route, I tell the old man, “Your son told us about the worms.” The woman laughs and translates this to her father. He laughs, and says something back.

“What did he say?” I ask.

“He just wanted you to know that the worm story is something he made up, to make my brother laugh when he was little.” She chuckles. “My brother still thinks it’s real.”

I stick my head up front and whisper to Bronson, “I want to live here. How much is real estate?”

“Astronomical.”

Ms. Klopsis is an emergency medical technician on an ambulance in Brooklyn. This column details her observations and experiences. Some names and identifying details have been changed to protect the privacy of patients.