hi ho, hi ho, it's off to work I go

Well, my shiny new bunker gear ain't so shiny any more. :) My first day back at Training was fun... got to put on all my gear and breathing apparatus and go through a confined space maze on all fours or crawling on my belly. One great thing about being smaller than the average fireman is that squeezing through an 18 inch hole fully decked out in gear is much easier when you're 140 lbs vs. 200 lbs. The big guys have to take their airpacks off while still keeping their facepieces on and push the pack in front of them as they go through the pipe and put it back on once they get through it. I must say it is disconcerting being detached from your air supply... dropping it could rip your facepiece right off which would mean bye bye air. Which is why we train in pitch black so we rely on feel as opposed to sight because usually in a fire we can see squat anyway. In the afternoon I went over medical protocol and breathed life back into a rubber dummy.

I still have a bit more to go before I work out all the cobwebs. But it is like riding a bike and it's all coming back to me now that I'm in the groove. Funny how once I get out of my mommy sweatpants and put on my navy blue station wear that I start engaging that work-mode part of my brain. It's not that I don't love my children but during those glorious hours when I lose track of time because I am so focused on work, I feel totally free. It's that happy exhaustion that leaves me breathless and would send me running home during my rookie days bursting at the seams to recount the shift's tales to my husband. It's funny how I see Jacob doing the same thing, running into my arms when I pick him up from daycare... his constant babbling of his adventures of the day which still amazes me how he has grown into his own big little person. And this is one of the reasons why I work. I have my world, and my children have theirs and we all get to meet somewhere in between, melding and sharing everything together. It enriches my life and makes me a happier person. I don't think I would be as happy if I were home full time. And nor would the children. It's hectic and takes supreme organizational skills balancing my mommy world and my fire world but it's working out and the children are none worse for the wear. And the cute thing is that Jacob thinks everyone's mommy is a 'fireman'. Oh how fun it would be if that were true! xo ;)