Because I Can… the random thoughts of Marc Scott

I bought a new truck this week.  I needed one.  Well, that’s what I tell myself, and anybody else that asks as well.  My old truck was, well, old.  It was a great truck.  A faithful truck.  But it was ready for retirement.  It had definitely earned it.  I didn’t mean to buy a new truck so fast, but I tend to be a little spontaneous about my vehicle purchases.  It’s a bit of a disorder.  Nowhere near as bad as it used to be, but a disorder nevertheless.

I love my new truck.  I love it so much that I’m going to pay for it for the next 5 years.  That’s a pretty serious commitment.  Not to make light, but truth be told, that commitment will last longer than my marriage.  I suppose I shouldn’t joke about things like that, but, what else am I going to do?  I didn’t take to kindly to the idea of being divorced with little to no say in the matter.  So I suppose I use humor as my defense mechanism.  This is, however, not the point of the blog.

As I drove my new truck home I felt blessed.  I was reminded how, despite all the trials I have lived through, and trust me, there have been trials, overall, I am exceedingly blessed.  Am I wealthy?  In the financial sense, certainly not.  Does God meet my needs daily?  Indeed he does!  I am blessed.

I’ve got this competition going on with one of the girls at work.  It’s silly really.  But it’s fun.  And if you can’t have fun at work, then maybe you need to find a new job!  We’re competing for Twitter followers.  Like I said, silly.  The deal she put on the table was that if she could surpass me in the number of followers by next Wednesday, July 15, then I would go to her house and clean her bathrooms in my firefighter gear.  She would then take pictures and post them on the radio station web site.  Personally, I don’t get it.  Who wants to see pictures of me in my firefighter gear, cleaning?  As I am slowly coming to learn, however, there are many things I apparently do not understand about women!

I wanted to win this little “Twar” (that’s what you get when you take Twitter and start a war).  Yesterday afternoon I started thinking about ways I could win.  Then I thought about ways somebody else could win.  Then I had a brainstorm.  There was no rain.  No thunder.  No lightning.  But it was a storm nevertheless.  In the end, I came up with, what I thought, was a brilliant plan.  I was beyond blessed this week when I brought my new truck home.  I decided I needed to pay it forward.

On my show today I made an annoucement.  I hyped my “BIG PLAN” all night last night, and all morning today on Twitter.  At 3:09p I revealed it live on the air.  With a representative from the Brantford Food Bank on the air with me, I pledged to donate $1 for every new follower I added on Twitter, up to a total of 1000 followers, or, $1000.  The deadline for the bet between Melissa and I is Wednesday afternoon.  Follow me!

It’s so easy for us to get caught up in our stuff.  Our cars and trucks and boats and motorcycles.  Our full fridges and our overloaded pantries.  Our flatscreen TV’s and surround sound systems and our computers and cell phones.  We busy ourselves so much with all our stuff that we can forget about the real, honest need that is out there.  The need doesn’t exist only in Africa!  It exists in our own backyards!  Times are tough all over the place.

The Brantford Food Bank has seen an overwhelming increase in use in the past couple of months.  Just in June alone 1200 families came to them looking for a helping hand.  Appeals have been put out for help.  They need it.  It’s so easy to do to.  What’s a couple cans of tuna, some soup, a couple of boxes of Kraft Dinner and a loaf of bread going to cost you?  $10?  Do you know how much something so little can mean to a family with unemployed parents due to the recession?

Jesus said whatever you did for the least of these, you did for me.  He doesn’t suggest we help.  He commands we help.  We need to be reminded how blessed we are.  Sometimes, we need a little perspective brought into our lives.  I got it when I bought my new truck.  How can I enjoy something like that, knowing full well that a family in my town won’t eat dinner tonight?

I sound like a World Vision commercial, and you know what.  That’s fine.  I don’t care.  Truth is truth, and that’s all there is to it.  Do with it what you will.  I just hope you’ll help.  And if you don’t live in Brantford, find your own local food bank.  All it takes is one or two extra items the next time you’re in the grocery store.  Every little bit adds up!  Maybe you can’t do $1000 over a silly little bet.  But everybody can do something!

A Facebook friend posted this on her status on Thursday,

(name removed) is pondering life… 6 years ago tomorrow at noonish (name removed) and I were in an major car accident and shockingly lived through it. It all happened because some young gals were excited about the first day of summer break and hurrying to get to the beach and missed a stop sign. It always makes me see how easy it all could be gone! Life is short.

Reading that one simple post brought back a rush of emotion for me.  In that moment, I relived every detail of Thursday June 26, 2003.  That day remains my toughest day as a firefighter.  A day that I suspect I will never remove from my memory.

It started with a call for a 24 year old male possible VSA (vital signs absent).  I was 24.  When we arrived on scene we found a young man, lifeless, the result of a freak accident.  While placing a ladder to the side of his barn, a strong gust of wind caught it and carried it into high voltage lines.  We began CPR immediately, though we knew there was nothing we could do to bring this young man back.  “He’s too young.  This could be me!”  As I switched off between compressions and respiration’s, those were the only two thoughts in my mind.  I tried to distract myself by counting off my motions out loud.  It wasn’t working.

I was doing OK until his parents showed up.  That is when my heart broke, not once, but twice.  Once at the mothers realization that her son was gone, and again when when the father looked head on into the same tragic reality.

As we turned the scene over to Police and EMS something happened that almost never happened at my old station.  We got a second call.  Without time to process what just unfolded.  Without a moment to catch my breath from experience I just had, we were racing back into action.

This time the call was a 2 vehicle MVC just up the road from where we were.  We arrived on scene to find one car on it’s roof in the field, against a large steel culvert that ran under the road.  The second vehicle was a good distance away in the field and it was mangled quite severely.  It was evident that extrication was going to be required.

I was assigned to medical on the vehicle in the field.  It was filled with girls who were on their way to the beach.  Certainly this is not how they expected to spend their day.  I didn’t know it at the time, but the other vehicle was driven by a girl I had gone all through school with.

I remember every detail.  From the moment we arrived on scene until the moment I assisted with loading one of the girls into the air ambulance, and we cleared the scene when both vehicles had been removed and the hydro pole that had snapped like a toothpick had been replaced.

The next night I was scheduled to speak at a youth event at my church.  I was a Youth Pastor at the time.  The idea of standing up in front of a hundred plus people was agonizing enough, withouth having to do it while still processing everything I had done the day before.  One of the things I always did was write a handout that I would give to all my kids.  I was a teen once… I know teens are easily distracted and have short attention spans.  I also know they never have a good answer when their parents ask them what the message was on.  So I figured a handout was something tangible.  They could take it, read it, or just toss it on the kitchen table when they got home.  This is the handout I wrote 6 years ago.  Thanks to my grandma and my mom, I was able to get a copy of it.

Thursday June 26th was a tough day for me and for many others.

My day started by responding to a medical call for a 24 year old unconscious male.

When I arrived on scene I found a young man, the same age as me, laying on the ground dead as a result of electrocution.  We started CPR immediately, and I managed to keep myself composed through the entire ordeal.  God has blessed me with the ability to be calm in intense situations like that.

After the paramedics arrived I had an opportunity to step back and what I saw next broke my heart.  I saw the young man’s mothers standing in the yard staring at her son whom she’d never have the opportunity to talk to again.  I kept my composure though.

Then something else happened.  The unsuspecting Father pulled into the driveway.  As the mother, his wife ran across the driveway towards his vehicle my heart broke again.  This mother was running to her husband to tell him that he too would never have the opportunity to talk to his son again.

I’ve been on the Fire Department for nearly 3 years, and death is something that I’ve had to deal with many times.  But on this particular day, it hit a little closer to home for me because this man I was doing CPR on was the same age as me.

So why am I telling you?  I’m telling you this because when that young man’s parents got out of bed in the morning, I’m confident that the thought of losing their son was nowhere in their mind.  But just a few short hours later it was a reality they were being forced to deal with.

We have no idea when God is going to call us home.  For some it could be 5, 10, 20 or 50 years.  For others, it could be a matter of days, weeks or months.

All I know for sure is that, that young man’s parents will never have a chance to tell their son they love him again.  You have a gift that they no longer do.  As soon was you’re done reading this, go hug your teen(s) and tell them you love them!

Ever since I was a little kid, I can remember wanting to grow up and be a fireman.  Then again, is there any little boy that hasn’t dreamed the same dream at least once?  Probably not.  Big, bright red trucks, hoses spraying water, a cool costume, shiny toys, lots of noise.  It seems to consist of all the necessary elements for a boys ideal situation.

I was lucky growing up because dad was on the fire department.  That meant I got to hang out there lots.  It meant rides in the truck, it meant playing in his old gear, it meant hanging out at the hall sometimes.  I remember getting so excited before our town parade every year.  That was a guaranteed trip to the fall hall.  I knew I’d go once to wash the trucks, and then I knew on parade day I’d get it ride in one.

It was inevitable, I suppose, that I’d end up on the fire department.  Actually, I don’t think not ending up on the fire department was ever an option for me.  I remember riding the trucks, but I knew one day I’d want to drive them.  I remember watching the hoses spray water, but I knew one day I’d want to be the one holding it.  All shiny toys carefully stored in the compartments of the fire trucks that were “lookie no touchie” were crying out for me to be old enough to finally play with them!

I’ve been doing it going on 10 years now.  I’ve seen a lot, I’ve done a lot.  Every time I climb into that truck, I still feel those butterflies of excitement like I did when I was a kid.  That feeling of jumping into your gear, sitting down in the jump seat, and pulling out of the hall with lights flashing and sirens wailing, I don’t think will ever grow old for me.  Actually, since I transferred to my new station a year and a half ago, it’s only got better for me because they do three to four times the amount of calls as my old station did.

Today I did a fire prevention event for a group of small children.  They are something I’ve always enjoyed, because it takes me back to my childhood.  I’m a little afraid of kids.  They’re pretty small, you know.  I’m always afraid of breaking one.  Especially around the fire trucks and all that equipment.  At the same time though, nothing melts my heart like seeing the joy in a little kids eyes while they’re bouncing around inside the truck or waiting for their turn to hold the hose.

Twenty five years ago, I was that kid.  I was fascinated beyond the capacity of my vocabulary.  What I couldn’t express in words, I communicated through pure joy.  All I could do was stand there with my eyes as big as saucers, and my smile as wide as my mouth would let me.  I ran, and bounced and skipped and crawled and explored everything with wonder.  I wanted to sit in the drivers seat and put my hands on a wheel that was bigger around than I was tall.  I wanted to wear the coat that swallowed me whole, leaving my head to pop out like a turtle.  I wanted to pull the handle back and watch the water shoot from the hose like a cannon.  I wanted to splash in the puddles that came after.

I smiled for 2 hours today.  It made my face hurt.  I’m sure a lack of sleep, and the hot sun may have been a factor, but mostly, it was the kids.  All of them.  The boys and the girls and watching them take in the wonder of it all.  Each time I lifted one of them into the truck, my heart melted a little bit.  Each time one of them reached out for me to bring them back down, my heart melted a little.  Each time they touched my hand and pulled the lever on the nozzle with me, my heart melted a little.

The only thing better than doing what I did today, will be the day when I am “Firefighter Marc” and the parent too.  That is the day it will have come full circle.  The day it’s my little boy, or my little girl.  Just thinking about that day makes me smile.  And maybe my little boy or little girl will grow up and become a firefighter just like me, and maybe they won’t.  Either way, I can’t wait for the chance to share it all with them like my dad did with me.

I was asked an interesting question the other day.  “If you could have 3 wishes what would they be?”  It’s not an uncommon question I suppose.  No doubt it’s something we’ve all pondered a time or two.  I mean, Aladdin is one of my favorite Disney movies.  It just seemed an odd question at the time.  Far more reaching than an impersonal discussion about the weather or the Blue Jays or the Stanley Cup Finals.

I couldn’t offer an immediate answer.  I decided such a question was too important to simply respond to off the cuff.  Although such an occurrence is unlikely to ever happen, truth be told, I own no lamp for a genie to even inhabit, I wanted to make sure I was prepared with a solid answer.  You know.  Just in case.

After a great deal of thought, and there may or may not have been a list written on paper – I’ll never tell – I decided I had come up with my 3 wishes and 1 solid alternate.  I give them to you now.

I was so excited about getting married.  A wife.  A house.  A dog.  Eventually some kids.  I wanted it all.  I was ready for it all.  I nearly got there.  Then one day a delivery came, and inside the envelope was a notice of divorce.  The dream died that day.  In that moment.  It took a long time before I ever even questioned if it could be possible again.  Some days, I still question it.

My first wish would be for a second chance at love.  I’d wish for a woman that I’d be crazy about today, tomorrow, and everyday we had together until all our days were behind and no more lied ahead.  Together we’d have a house and I’d fix it.  I’d probably yell at it from time to time, and I may even throw things at it on occasion, though when nobody was watching, but it would be our house.  Our home.  We’d fill it with a dog and children, and possibly some fish.  I dare not say how many children though.  God has a funny way about these things.  Tell Him you want 1 and the next thing you know you’re expecting triplets.  I just want kids.  I’ll take however many He’s willing to give.

A wish, or one day a reality?  Either way, I hold onto this one with great hope.

Since I was about 10 years old, or at least, somewhere in the general vicinity of that age, I’ve dreamed about being on the radio.  The soft glow of the digital display on my Sanyo stereo was a constant companion to me.  It sat on a shelf hung right at the head of my bed.  The speakers were tucked away neatly inside the headboard, and played all my favorite songs right into the back of my pillow as I lay dreaming.

I remember making my own “radio station” with an old tape recorder.  I’d mix the songs together, and record intros and weather forecasts for them in between.  Even at that young age I seemingly understood that half my future career in radio would be giving weather reports!  I bet if I looked hard enough, one or two of those tapes may still exist somewhere.

Since those days of my childhood, creating my own radio stations, I’ve had a dream that one day I’d do it for real.  I had visions of programming a great Christian radio station.  I still have those same visions, although they’ve morphed over the years as my skill and knowledge has developed.  My dream now involves creating a station like no other, and using it as a model to build a network of stations right across the country.  That, however, is another blog for another day.

My second wish, would be for this dream to come true.  It would be that somehow, God would bring me the resources I needed to make this dream a reality.  That would be an incredible wish!

Firefighters only save people in the movies.  OK, so that’s not really true.  It seems it though.  I’ve watched Backdraft and Ladder 49 hundreds of times probably.  I’ve just never done anything like they do in those movies.  10 years on the fire department.  No saves.  Sure I’ve gone into burning buildings, and I’ve extricated people from the wreckage of an M.V.C. but I’ve never had a save.

Truth be told, I’ve mostly experienced loss.  I don’t know a worse or more helpless feeling than watching the final grains of sand trickle through the hourglass of life while your hands are doing compressions on a persons chest.  It’s an awful feeling.

I keep answering the call though.  No matter the loss.  No matter the emotional stress.  I will keep answering the call.  The next one might be the one, I tell myself.  Not because I have a hero complex.  You just do it because you know you might be able to help someone.  That is motivation enough.  That is why I joined the fire department in the first place.

My third wish would be to make a save.  One save.  To race through a house, flames licking at my heels, heat wrapping around my body and squeezing the life out it, seeing the safe exit, a whole different world just on the other side of that door.  When I rush through it, into a different kind of light, the inviting light of sun versus the threatening light of flame, I emerge with a child pulled tighly to my body, protected by my arms, safe in my hands.

I wish for the chance to replace all the memories of the ones I couldn’t save, with just one that I did.

Finally, an alternate.  In the event that any of my 3 above wishes should come true before I am extended the chance to make 3 wishes, I thought it prudent to have a contingency wish.  The proverbial back-up plan.  This one, I shall spare detail as it will only cause embarrasment and ridicule.  Not that I’m ashamed of it mind you.  Just that I know others will find it amusing.  Simply put… I’d wish for the chance to be a bass singer in a Southern Gospel Quartet and share the stage with the likes of Ernie Haase and Signature Sound or the Gaither Vocal Band.  An unusual desire perhaps, but one that is shared with sincerity equal to the rest!

There are a lot of things about being a Firefighter that are tough.  Without much thought or imagination I’m sure you could come up with a list as long as your arm.  You don’t need to do the job to understand the pressure, the danger, the challenges.

Physical, mental, emotional.  They are all there.  Walk around with an SCBA on for an hour or two, and your shoulders start to tense up and your back begins to ache, I don’t care how fit you are.  Stand in front of a roaring fire for 20 minutes and you feel like your body is burning inside a swimming pool.  It’s an odd sensation.  You’re soaked to the bone inside your gear from sweat, but at the same time you feel like you’re on fire yourself.

From time to time on the Fire Department, you’re going to see things that nobody should ever have to see.  It will often come in the form a motor vehicle collision, but not always.  Images that burn into your head like a photograph taken with the camera of your mind.  They never really go away.  One night you close your eyes, and the images will just appear, like they’ve been recorded on the backs of your eyelids.

Death is part of the job.  You don’t really realize how much until you’ve done it for a while.  That brings with it a whole different dynamic of stress.  You’ll be questioning if there is more you could have done, or something you could have done differently.  At the same time, you can find yourself trying to comfort a family member who is now in an emotional spiral set into motion by their loss.

I can’t stand sleeping with my socks on.  If my feet are too warm, I simply don’t sleep.  I like to sleep with my socks off, and my feet outside the covers to stay cool.  If my feet are cool, my sleep is sound.  If my feet are warm, there is either no sleep or restless sleep.

When I get woke up in the middle of the night to the pager, I’m completely incoherent for at least a minute or so.  I sometimes don’t know who I am, where I am, and what that infernal beeping is that’s waking me up.  Yet, instinctively, I always find myself getting dressed.  Usually about the time I’m pulling my t-shirt over my head, I have figured out what’s going on.

No matter how hard I try, there is one thing I struggle with more than anything during middle of the night fire calls.  My socks!  I can never seem to put my socks on when I’m woke from a deep sleep.  Pants are easy.  The holes are bigger.  Shirts, same deal, though I’ve stuck my head through a sleeve a time or two.  Socks though, I just can’t get.

Believe it or not, there was an incident once that involved a rather painful tumble down the stairs because of my socks.  I don’t know exactly what I was doing, but apparently I was trying to put my socks on while heading down the stairs.  It didn’t work out so well for me.  I told you… it takes me a bit to wake up!

One of the toughest things for me since then, is adapting to a life that involves sleeping with my socks on.  It just seems to be a safer alternative.  It also makes me appreciate nights out of town that much more because they are the only nights I can sleep sock free!

I don’t have children, though, I’ve had limited experience with them.  Mostly, it’s been through the fire department.  At my old station, I used to love doing fire prevention events with the kids.  It reminded me of what I was like when I was a kid, always wanting to be on the fire truck or wearing the equipment.

During these various functions I learned that for kids, there are no answers, there are only questions.  “What’s this?” “It’s a fire hose.”  “What does it do?”  “It sprays the water.”  “Where does the water come from?”  “It comes from the fire truck.”  “How does it come from the fire truck?”

No matter the number of answers you would give, a child always seems to have an uncanny ability to find, yet another question!  They just don’t seem to be content with an answer.  They always need, and want, to know more.

I find myself at an interesting point in my life.  At 30, I have acheived both personal and professional dreams, and, sadly, I’ve seen them both fade away.  Often, I have to stop and remind myself that I am only 30 and it’s OK.  I sometimes forget that I started my career at 17.  Having not achieved everything by 30 doesn’t mean I’m a failure, as many people are only getting started at 30.  It comes as little consolation to me at times, but I remind myself of it nevertheless.

I haven’t blogged much this week, perhaps you’ve noticed.  I hadn’t hardly missed a day since I started this back in January, but this week I’ve definitely been slacking.  The reason for that is because I’ve been spending a lot of time looking for answers.

I don’t mean to sound like I’m at some major crossroads, though, I’m not ruling that out.  I would like to believe that I am still too young to be experiencing a mid-life crisis, though, I’d certainly see a sports car as a solution to at least one or two of my problems.  But I’ve definitely been taking some time to look for answers.

The harder I looked for answers this week, the more I kept remembering those fire prevention experiences.  I’d get an image in my mind of a child, standing tip-toed to cross the three foot mark.  He was standing in my bunker pants, my boots nearly as long as his legs.  The bright red suspenders are pulled up over his shoulders, though even they can’t keep the pants hiked up on his tiny little frame.  He throws my coat on and can’t even get his hands to come out the ends of the sleeves.  When he places my helmet on his head, it swallows him.  Somewhere, inside the yellow dome is the face of a child.  He attempts to walk, but with each step the weight of the gear nearly sends him toppling to the ground.  He pays it no mind.  He’s a firefighter, if only in make believe.  As he tries to wade around the sea of grass and snaking lines of fire hose, he asks questions.  With each answer comes a new question.  There is no end until time dictates that we pack the trucks and head for home.

This week one question has come into my head more than any other.  Are there answers?  That’s what I’ve been reflecting on, tossing it back and forth in my mind over and over.  Is life about answers, or is it just about a journey filled with questions?  Are we on a quest to a destination of absolute?  Or are we moving through a sea of questions, the complexity of which are like the waves.  Some bigger.  Some stronger.  Some smaller.  Some easier.

A child is seldom content to rest when an aswer has been offered.  They keep pressing, searching, wondering.  Could this be what Jesus was referring to when he spoke of child-like faith?  Perhaps the point is not to find or know the answers.  Maybe I’m supposed to just have faith in the journey, with each question being another dot on my map.

I am white.  Stark raving white.  I don’t mean Caucasian, though I am that as well.  I’m talking complexion.  I share the same colouring as that of the Abominable Snowman or a shiny new white porcelain toilet sitting on the display rack a Home Depot.  It’s pure.  In the right light, it’s blinding.  It the wrong light, basically, my body is about as pale as that of a corpse.

I’ve always been this way.  I think it might have something to do with my refusal to wear shorts or go to the beach and take my shirt off.  Long pants, short sleeves… farmers tan.  This is as good as it gets for me.  I am mostly OK with this.  I mean really, who the heck needs to see my hairy white chicken legs?  And nobody should be subjected to the abdomen that once enjoyed the glory of firmness and now mourns a fate that has left it with more rolls than a bakery.  It’s just not necessary to do that to people.

I went to the church camp I attended in my youth this weekend.  A night out of town.  No TV.  No internet.  No 3am dumpster fire calls.  Just rolling hills (that actually bear striking resemblance to my gut), big fields of green grass, wide open, clear, star filled skies, and air that is fresh and unused – like you’re the only thing that’s ever come into contact with it.  It’s a beautiful place to retreat to.

The deal is a trade.  I enjoy a little solitude in nature, and in return, I assist the camp with some maintenance.  Translation… I get a place to sleep for the night and they get somebody to mow those big fields of green grass.  Truth is, it’s an excuse for me to drive a tractor.  As a child I would beg grandpa to let me drive the tractor.  I spent countless hours on his farm pleading with him.  One time he let me do it.  I cut a turn to short and took out the corner overhang of a roof on one of the sheds.  It’s OK for me to drive a tractor at the camp now.  In the mostly wide open spaces, there is little for me to hit and damage.  All I have to do is keep the tractor out of the pond and I’m good.

Saturday afternoon I was at the camp alone.  50 acres of God’s handy-work all to myself.  I jumped on the old blue Ford, which actually looks similar to the one I drove on my grandpa’s farm, and away I went.  Cutting the grass.  Out there in the sunshine, in my 50 acres of seclusion I got this idea in my head.  I thought to myself, if you were ever going to try and tan your pasty white self, what better time and place to do it than right here, right now!

When you’re surrounded by trees and hills, it’s like you’re on an island, even though your not.  I was sheltered from the passing highway, and I knew the airplanes overhead were out of viewing distance.  I believed I could take my shirt off and do no harm.  When the sun bounces off my whiteness, somebody could catch those reflections and, broken by my shadow as I moved, they could mistake it for some kind of morse code signal or something.  However, since I was safe inside the confines of nature, I decided to do it.  I took my shirt off!

I got back from the camp Sunday afternoon.  I don’t think I was home for more than half an hour when the pager went off.  Grass fire.  I got up off the couch and made my way to the hall. I jumped into my boots and bunker pants and pulled them up, suspenders looped over my shoulders.  Before I got my bunker coat on though, a brother firefighter commented on my new complexion.  Standing next to the bright red pumper, you would have thought I was a part of it had it not been for the brown of my hair and the white of my teeth.

I raised my arms very slowly to put my coat on.  I winced a little from the pain that was beginning to setting in.  Then, as if I had done it to myself entirely on purpose, I smiled and said, “I’m just trying to blend in.”

It’s not normal what we do.  Firefighting I mean.  Well, it’s not normal to most.  It’s normal to me.  Maybe not at first, but after a while it became normal, or, at least as normal as such a thing can be.  You train.  You experience.  You do.  Eventually, you don’t really think about certain parts of the job.  It’s easier not to think about them.  Your training becomes as natural as tying your shoelaces.  You don’t need to think about it.  You just do it.

When people find out I’m a firefighter that’s usually what they want to talk about.  They expect that I will tell them brave and heroic tales of all the lives I’ve saved, all the dangers I’ve survived, all the glory I bask in daily.  I wish I could tell stories like that.  It sure would make what I do easier some days.  I don’t have very many tales like those though.  Mostly, I just have stories of tragedy, pain and loss.

When I was a kid I wanted to be a firefighter because all little boys want to be firefighters.  Having my dad on the fire department made it seem only more inevitable that I would join.  I remember going to the fire hall with dad.  Riding in the trucks whenever I could was always a highlight.  I used to put on old bunker gear that he had at the house and run around it.  When you’re a kid, that is all there is to it really.  It’s about cool gear and big red fire trucks with flashing lights and sirens.

They don’t really tell you too much about what firefighting can do to you when you first join.  I mean, they asked me questions like “How will you react to blood?”, “Would you be able to go into a burning building?”, “Can you handle what you might see at a car wreck?”  I answered the questions as honestly as I could.  “I don’t know.”  Truth was, I didn’t.  Dad had been a firefighter my whole life.  So that gave me insight into things I’d see and do too.  But even that can only prepare you to a certain extent.

Something else they don’t tell you is that, contrary to popular belief, you don’t very often save people.  In 10 years, I don’t know that I’ve ever saved anybody.  I had no idea that on the majority of the calls I’d be fighting a battle that was lost before I even made it through the door.  There is no worse a feeling, that I can imagine anyway, than walking into a situation where people are looking to you to help, and you know that you’re too late.  Do that enough, and no matter how tough you are, it will wear on you.

I’ve watched a police officer tell parents their son is dead while I was still doing CPR on him in the distance.  As I counted off chest compressions, knowing my efforts were in vain, I did not feel heroic.  I’ve held a charged attack line on a house burning out of control, well aware that I can’t stop the fire fast enough.  The family members watched their memories go up in a ball of fire.  While the flames licked out the window at my helmet, I did not feel brave.  I’ve held the jaws of life in my hands, using them to cut out a someone whom life had left.  I couldn’t save that one.

Firefighters don’t talk much about the dark side of the job.  Nobody would really want to hear it anyway.  I’m sure it’s a defense mechanism, keeping the stories amongst ourselves.  I’m not sure who we are trying to protect more.  Is it ourselves, from becoming vulnerable, out of fear that we’ll lose the tough layer that permits us to do the job day in and day out?  Or is it our family and friends we are trying to protect, from the pain and suffering that we have become all to familiar with?

On my journey as a firefighter, I have plotted points on a map.  I cannot tell you the house number.  I may not even be able to tell you the street name.  As I drive past certain places, I remember.  Sights, smells, sounds.  Each mark on the map inside my head comes with memories I’d prefer to forget, but can’t.  There is the barn where the electrocution took place.  There is the house where I almost got caught in my first flashover.  There is the corner where the woman was ejected from her vehicle and, almost as if controlled by the flick of a switch, her life stopped.  There is the field where the Air Ambulance landed the first time I ever loaded somebody into it.  There is the garage that was the first structure fire I ever entered, and after seeing what was inside when the fire was out, I am thankful I exited with my life!

I don’t regret what I do.  Not for a minute.  I’m 10 years in, and if I can stretch it out another 30, I’d be grateful for every moment.  And not all the stories are bad.  In fact, as I was writing this very blog I got called away to a fire.  A couple, enjoying a quiet evening on the banks of the river.  Lines in the water, hoping to catch some fish, they had started a small little campfire to cook some hot dogs on.  A passerby saw it, and called 911.  Those are the funny stories.  Those are the stories that bring, if only for a moment, the balance back inside my head between the good and bad.  When the dark memories creep into my dreams, the funny stories are the ones I recall to try and push them back.  Those are the stories I tell people about when they ask what it’s like to be a firefighter.

When I am called to duty, God,
wherever flames may rage.
Give me  strength to save some life
whatever be it’s age.
Help me to embrace a child
before it is too late,
or save an older person
from  the horror of that fate.
Enable me to be alert and hear the weakest shout
And quickly and efficiently to
put the fire out.
I want to fill my calling and
to give the best in me.
To guard my every neighbor and
protect his property.
And if according to my fate,
I am to lose my life,
Please bless with your protecting hand
my children and wife.

A. W. ‘Smokey’ Linn

He was a brute of a man.  He towered above any that stood next to him.  His broad shoulders looked as though they could, and maybe even had, carried the weight of the world.  His square jaw, and chiseled features were exactly what you’d expect to find on this “man’s man.”

To look upon him, was to stare at the reflection of intimidation.  To speak to him, was to understand the term “gentle giant.”  His frame was built, his voiced boomed, it was as if the ground would shake beneath him with each step.  Yet, larger than his strapping outward appearance was his heart.

Though his physical stature may have put him a head above the rest, in the fire hall, on the truck, at a scene, he was their equal.  Their brother.

It was a routine call.  A residential structure fire.  Nothing unlike the dozens they’d responded to in the past.  Fire was reported to have started in the garage.  Burning hot, and consuming all in it’s path, it was working it’s way through the home.  It was never a “house” to him.  A house is merely material.  A few boards, a little drywall, a roof and some paint.  A home, however, was something entirely different.  Filled with life, with memories, with the people we loved. 

His heart beat a little faster on these ones.  He was always focused.  He was always driven.  But his drive was always a notch or two higher when responding to a call of this nature.

On the scene, his crew made quick work of laying a supply line and running an initial attack line.  Two Firefighters stood at the ready as he used every ounce of his hulking strength to lift the garage door.

As the first attack crew worked their way into the structure, the next arriving crew began gathering information from all the bystanders drawn to the chaos unfolding on their quiet street.  Who lived here?  Were they home on this particular day?  How many of them?  All were questions that needed answers, and the answers needed to come quickly.

It was determined that two were possibly still in the house.  A girl, 12, maybe 13, and her little brother, likely 5 or 6.  Their mother had made a quick trip to the store.  She wasn’t to be gone for more than 15 minutes.  It shouldn’t be possible for your world to be turned on it’s head in just 15 minutes!

He grabbed the hose line from his attack crew, and told them to get in the house and find the kids.  He would continue to fight the fire, and provide protection to them while they did their search.

An eternity passed in 3 minutes.  As he continued to battle the blaze, waiting for a sign of his crew, he looked through the dense black smoke and was sure he saw the silhouette of a man coming towards him. 

A voice yelling down the hall confirmed his suspicion.  He did see a figure in the shadows.  Soon, another emerged.  His crew was coming and they were each carrying a child.  Fire chased them as they ran down the hallway.  The temperature was rising.  That’s never a good sign.

Flashover was all he could think to himself.  His crew was coming as fast as they could, but could they beat the flashover?  In moments, everything in the structure would ignite and the building would be engulfed in a ball of fire.  His crew would be unlikely to survive.  The children they carried most certainly would not.

The garage door was braced open, and freedom was on the other side.  Away from the flame, and out of the smoke, the crew would be safe, the children would be safe.  All they had to do was make it there.

The two brave Firefighters emerged from the doorway that joined the garage to the rest of the home, with the children held tightly in their arms.  He continued to pour water to the blaze, desperately trying to cool the space down.  It was unlikely at this point he could prevent the flashover, but he could certainly try and buy a little more time.

As the 5 of them were about to retreat from the garage an explosion rocked building. Bursts of flame filled the area and the bracing that held open there only exit, and there only chance at escape, began to shake loose.

Without hesitation, without so much as a second thought, he dropped the hose and threw himself at garage door.  It was large, solid, and more weight than even a man of his size could hold.  But so help him he was going to try!

Every muscle in his body quaked.  Sweat ran from his brow as if flowing from a river.  The weight of the door was causing his knees to collapse beneath him.  If only he could hold it open long enough to get his crew and the children out.  Just a few more seconds he thought to himself.

As the last body slid under the falling door, he finally lost his grip and might.  The door dropped like an iron curtain sealing off two worlds.  On one side, a world of life and light.  On the other side, a world of death and dark.

He was a hero.  He made the ultimate sacrifice.  He died, so that others may live.

It would be hard to hear such a story and not be moved.  Not be emotional.  Not be changed.  Could you do it?  Would you do it?  I hope you never find yourself faced with such an impossible decision to make.

Two thousand years ago, a man made a similar decision.  He chose to lay down his life to save us from the fire.  He died so that others may live. 

There is something I forgot to mention about this story though.  The courageous Firefighter, he doesn’t exist.  I made him up.  I made the story up in just a few minutes.  It’s entirely a work of fiction.  The second story though, it’s entirely true!  A story written in blood and lived in love.

So let me ask this question.  Why is it so easy to believe in the first story, a work of a creative imagination?  It’s the story we put on the front page of the paper.  It’s the story that leads the nightly news.  Yet, so many reject the second story.  A story of truth.  A work of a loving Father, allowing his Son to die so that others may live?  Why do so many refuse to believe the second story?

I pray you discover the truth this Easter.