It's 2:30 in the morning and I'm driven out of a deep sleep. I listen to the tones, to the dispatch: "dwelling" and my pulse rockets. The next thing I'm consciously aware of is being in my car on the way to the station. Fast-forward, and I’m shaking off the last remnants of sleep as I’m getting my gear on and jumping on the truck as it flies out of the bay. A few hours later we're back. Dirty, smelly, exhausted, and absolutely stoked. I stagger home, it's now 7:00am and if I hurry home I have time get catch a shower before going to work.
I'm a volunteer firefighter. It's dirty. It's dangerous. It is absolutely the best thing I've ever done.
I don’t think there is anything else like it. There is action, and excitement. There’s drama. There is the sense of Community, of helping your neighbors. There is knowing that I am really making a difference, and sacrificing myself to do it: my sweat and my blood. There’s also the loyalty, the “Brotherhood” as I’ve heard it called, knowing that my life is in the hands of the guy next to me, and his in mine. It is a lot of things that say a great deal about a man, a community, a country.
In many ways, joining the Fire Department filled many holes in my life. I work as a Systems Engineer for a large company. I sit in front of a computer most days and use my head to solve problems. It is an interesting job, but hardly exciting. My “night job” provides the excitement and gives an otherwise hum-drum life some flavor. There is nothing like flying down the road, lights and siren blaring, with a smoke column visible, knowing that we’re got “work”. There is also a striking similarity between my two jobs. Firefighting is all about problem solving. Figuring out what the situation is, and deciding what must get done to fix it. What I’ve learned on the fire ground I’ve carried over to my career, and vice versa. They build on each other and make me a better person.
The department has given me more then just an outlet for my adrenaline fix. I have met some of my best friends in the department. They are guys from all over the place, and all walks of life. They are construction workers, farmers, car salesmen, engineers and students. I know that I could call any one of them with a problem and they would drop everything to help me out. I would do the same for any one of them. They really are my brothers.
Henry David Thoreau once said “The hero is commonly the simplest and obscurest of men”. I think this statement should really read “The simplest and obscurest of men are commonly called upon to be heros”. We are group of every-day people who, when the call comes, drop everything to give all that we can to somehow make things better.
