A New Year…again…(and again)
I originally drafted this almost 2 years ago. A lot has happened since then….so bear with the quirky dates as you read. I started to delete and start over, but realized it offered a lot of context to leave what I was thinking about at the time, so here we go.
Happy New Year 2022! Well it was anyway…I started this post on Jan 2, 2022. I guess things have been so busy and chaotic the past 18 months or so that I never looked at this blog post since I started it. As they say, “Its not too late”.
Another year is here. Another “new years resolution” of bettering ourselves. We all do it. We make the cliché fitness resolutions. Many of us may fall short of the promises we made to ourselves and our loved ones. We fall sort for a plethora of reasons…but as firefighters, we need to keep those fitness resolutions. Speaking of cliché… it is something I make every attempt to not fall victim to, but I’ll make an exception here.
Fitness, both physical and mental, is something we signed on for when we made the decision to become a firefighter. It is something that takes work. Physical fitness takes work in the gym. Mental fitness takes work in the firehouse and training field. Both need to take place before we can be successful when the alarm bells go off.
As for physical fitness, pretty much every firefighter knows what they need to do. 30-60 minutes in the gym a few days a week. Eat better. We all know it, but some of us put off fitness until the annual evals, then cram in a few weeks of the rower, maybe some treadmill action. But why? Why not just maintain all year long? That answer is probably different for everyone. Some of us are at a busy firehouse and can’t seem to find the time. Some are at slow houses and may not see the need. Some work hard off-duty and may feel like that is enough physical activity. Finally, we may just simply be burned out.
Burned out on the job.
Burned out at home.
Plain burned out.
I will do a better job. A better job on the job. A better job at home. A better job being a husband and father. I know I can do better. But CAN I? Can I find the energy or motivation. I want to, but CAN I?
I really planned in January to make this post about physical fitness, but as with a lot these days some things evolve with time. Something more important than physical fitness is mental fitness. Nearly every firefighter who has been on this job for a decade or more understands this: we used to shrug off the politics of municipal government because it didn’t typically affect the line firefighters. We did our jobs no matter what. We see bad shit. We didn’t bother with the political BS because it was just another thing on the plate. Now local politics plays a much bigger role in the lives of the line firefighters. There is no way it DOESN’T affect us.
That last paragraph was where I left it in 2022. Some things have changed, and some are the same.
Continued from 2022…our local political atmosphere is much, much better. We now have very pro-firefighter city council and mayor. They love us, but they definitely don’t necessarily understand exactly what we do. The trauma we see and will inevitably continue to see over a long career. I don’t think they have planned for how that trauma will affect us long after we hang up our helmets and boots. Next week we will bury our 2nd retiree to suicide in a little over a month. Guys I worked with. Tough firefighters seemingly hardened from a long career as firefighters. Tough on the outside, but just like any of us on the inside.
I recently saw a clip on social media from a man named Travis Howse, referring to what we do as firefighters as the “trauma factory”. He couldn’t be more spot-on. We bounce from trauma to trauma, eventually numbing us to what we see. Stuff that most people won’t see in a lifetime once or twice, much less every shift, or 1/3 of their lives, for 20-30 years.
Long career…retirement…then nothing.
Brothers and sisters sacrifice their mental well being and physical health for the job. A lot of us amass a collection of certifications and licenses over a career, only to retire and all of it means shit in the real world. That’s the real reason Firefighters stay on the job 30-40 years. Most will recite the buzz-phrase “for the love of the job”….but truly it’s the fear of “what do I do after this”, coupled with missing the best part of the job-the brotherhood around the firehouse. Yea, we love the job…but the kitchen table talks, some that can last hours after the last bites were taken, are what firefighters miss the most when they retire.
All that being said-reach out to the retirees. Make sure they are doing ok. Meet them for lunch or a couple of beers. That will mean way more to them than a chrome plated axe ever will.
Stay safe and healthy, Randy