coming off the high

I wouldn't call myself an adrenaline junkie but I do have to admit that after a particularly busy shift full of exciting calls it's sometimes hard to come off the 'high' and go back to 'regular' life. The intensity sometimes leaves me in a funk as my body and my mind are still processing the previous 24 hours. It's not to say that baby's first steps and first words aren't exciting milestones... it's just different. I know my husband and my children need me but at work the feeling that I get from feeling needed is in such a way that I can't exactly describe it. It's a look of 'thank you' from a distressed person's eyes, the clutch of a hand guiding someone who is afraid to safety, or singing a funny song to a child to calm him as he is being carried to the ambulance. It's about being there for the public and the community and helping out not because I have to but because it's in me.

But I have to remember too that the work that I do at home chasing away the monsters from under my son's bed... wiping away the tears from my daughter's eyes when she falters learning how to walk.... and stepping in when my husband with all his good intentions is burning dinner, that what I do here is no less 'heroic' than what I accomplish on the trucks.