poor, poor trees

Well, there you have it:

...the stuff that beckons me from my kitchen counter. And what my head has been wrapped around for the past few weeks and will continue to do so for the next five months. Apart from knowing the material cold and practically verbatim, I think the toughest part of the process has been trying to gather all the material. You see, they only provide you initially with a reading list. They'll give us a disc in a month with a lot of the info we need to learn but I need the head start... besides, I'm not one of those people who learns well off a computer screen. I like my highlighters! So I bought textbooks and photocopied a kajillion policies on a whole lotta paper. Poor poor trees. Now that I have gathered my little library of study material I feel a lot better... kind of like having a security blanket. So now when I wake up in the middle of the night with a nagging question about flammable liquids and containment, I can look it up right away in the Fire Code and go back to bed in sweet slumber. Yup... I'm sounding lime a total nerd but believe it or not, I am actually really enjoying the material and learning. My biggest challenge is finding the time. I'm doing as much as I can on shift between calls because when the kids are home of course they want my undivided attention. Speaking of which, here are my tired babes last night:

It was pretty cute how Jacob was stroking his sister's hair. I was actually surprised how patient he is with her.... she tends to really push his buttons always trying to get her way and grabbing his toys from him. I'd love to claim that he got his patience from me but nope.... I think he was just born an old, old, soul. xo

animals

In general, I like pets... I've had 3 labrador retrievers of my own. But at work, the only 'animal' I like is my colleague who can rip a door off its hinges when he's making light work of forcible entry into a building. Tough, strong guys like that are worth their weight in gold as a crewmate. Other than that, animal, and work, and me, don't mix.

Yesterday's shift we had an alarm. There was smoke coming out of the townhouse when we pulled up. So we took a hydrant, charged the line and made a forcible entry since the owners weren't home. Because I was the first one to cross the threshold, you can imagine my surprise when there was a dog baring its teeth at me. Now I don't blame the dog really, because I was entering his home looking like the Michelin man and sounding like Darth Vader with my breathing apparatus on. But his growling did freak me out and I just prayed he wasn't going to bite me. I was convinced that even with my bunker gear on, the dog's fangs were going to pierce through to my skin.... or worse, go straight for my jugular. All I knew was that I had to get past this darn dog to get to the real safety issue at hand... the fire of course. So with bated breath, I dove in, grabbed the dog and handed him to the firefighter behind me who brought the dog out to safety. Now before you sign me up for firefighter of the year, said dog looked like this:
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I guess I'm not as tough as I thought. But at least I was braver this time than when I once came across an aquarium full of snakes! In that moment there was no shame in screaming like a girl. ;)

busy!

After my kids and my job, studying for this exam has taken up every spare moment of my time. So blogging unfortunately has been suffering a bit. So when I can't think of anything interesting to post about, a picture always comes in handy:


Jacob is ready to take the training wheels off but because we live downtown it's a bit too much of a hazard right now with all those crazy drivers. Maiya is starting to get the hang of riding her tricycle. Bear in mind she's not two yet and doesn't quite understand the rules of the road. It's always a bit of an adventure navigating with her.

On the work front, we're welcoming a new crew member tomorrow. He's not new, new but he's been off with a back injury for awhile so I am sure he is excited to be back. It'll be neat to see how the dynamic changes going from 9 people in the station to 10!

ok..... breakfast then gotta hit the books for an hour or two.

xo

el stinko

It was biological warfare at the firehouse yesterday.

I don't know what the rookie put in our lunch. Although tasty and delicious... it left all of us with some seriously dangerous gas emissions to the point where we couldn't be in the same room with each other. Heaven forbid if anyone was stupid enough to light a match because the place would have rocked off its foundation. I wanted to don our Level A fully encapsulated hazmat suit because I literally couldn't breathe. One guy dutch ovened himself. That was pretty funny.

I never realized how loud people can toot. And in so many different octaves. Yep.... we're so mature.

Life at the firehouse at its best.

humbled

I woke up this morning and I was humbled by my body. I'd love to say I was in awe of what looked back at me in the mirror and that I had my 20 year old body attached to my 40 year old head but nope... no such luck.

You see, there isn't a day that I wake up where I don't feel any pain:

There's the pain of having to pry my eyelids open to wake up when I just want an extra hour of sleep. Being a mother doesn't help and being a firefighter compounds the problem of sleep deprivation. Is it worse to say I'd rather be woken up by a fire call than my kids jumping on me in the morning begging to eat sugary cereal in front of the tv?

There's also the physical pain. This is the first year where I really feel the weight of my gear. I think part of the problem is that we have new airpacks and they don't fit me properly. I'm going to have to investigate further into this when I'm back on shift to see if it can be adjusted to fit my torso. There's not a day where my back, neck, hips, or knee doesn't hurt... I even have a bunion that is beginning to throb.. and on bad days everything hurts at the same time. Ibuprofen has become my good friend. I see the older guys on the job and I understand and feel for them because I am becoming one of them. I also see the look of the smug rookies as they bound up the stairs. Ha ha I say to myself... just give it ten years and you'll be feeling the same way I do. But I can return the smug look when I beat them to the top of the stairs carrying twice the amount of gear . :) And in that glorious moment.... every moment of pain shooting through my body and lungs is worth it.

fire

Like a Phoenix rising, there is a part of me that is reborn every time I fight a fire. I am not sure why, but the smell of fire gives me energy, as does the roar of the flames and the sound of my blood as it pounds with that heartbeat staccato in my ears. And the look of a fire... to stand up close to something so powerful is what all firefighters dream of. When facing fire, I feel exhilarated. Rejuvenated. Alive. Yet with each fire I fight, I also know a part of me dies. Whatever toxic smoke I've inhaled is sure to have destroyed cells in my lungs perhaps taking minutes or years off my life, muscle fibres have deteriorated from the strain of exertion, and those really bad calls involving violence chips away at my belief in humanity. But this force of nature called fire is the siren song that keeps me coming back for more.

on being a woman

On the job, I've had my share of ups and downs. Because as a woman, even though I passed each and every test same as the next guy, I still had to prove myself... ten times over. I remember as a rookie feeling humiliated because my Captain made me don full bunker gear and breathing apparatus and then made me drag his 250 pound arse around the station to prove that I could get him out of a fire if necessary. Instead of protesting, I did it while the rest of the crew watched. He didn't make anyone else do it... but whatever... I did it even though I had already just passed my physical to get on the job. I am pretty sure he broke some labour laws in asking me to do that but unfortunately stuff like this happens. And you don't want to be the one to lodge a complaint because then you get labeled the trouble maker. Same Captain used to ask me to make him tea and bring it to him wherever he happened to be in station. It can be tough being female in the fire service because you're an anomaly, a curiosity, because you have breasts. And many will test you simply because you're not a dude until you've proved yourself and then just become one of the guys. It may happen at a big call where you've done something superhuman or heroic.... or it may happen over the course of time. For me, it happened when I stopped giving a crap what the guys thought of me. And if someone pushed, I shoved back. Now that the years have gone by, I have to say I really like being different and I don't mind standing out in the sea of blue. It's a privilege and not a curse being a woman in the fire service. Looking back, if I had to prove myself again, I would do it in a heart beat, because those guys who treated me unfairly just made me an emotionally stronger, and more determined person and a better firefighter. The irony is that in them trying to break me down, they actually built me up. They gave me a big gift in disguise and I think without them I wouldn't have the appreciation of where I came from and who I've become...

week deux

I'm on week two of my vacay. It is so hard not being on shift today. I know I'm an addict because soon as I am away from the firehall I start to get the jitters and start jonesing for the smell of cinders and ashes and the wail of the sirens. I miss my brotherhood. And I'll be darned if they go and have a three alarm without me today!