Quiet Time
County Highway CS west of the Hardees at the I90 Loves truck stop may seem an odd place to ponder late-stage capitalism. But I have some alone time and who knows how these ponderings begin. Maybe because the Hardees shoe-horned into the corner of Loves never registered with me before. The student union at WIU had a Hardees in it, and I’ve since had a soft spot for the third tier fast-food operation, given my fifth (ok, sixth) tier college roots.
Maybe because the memory of helping the medical examiner earlier this year at Loves has crept back out of the box I put it in as we pass the truck stop. The ME and a couple deputies could not get the deceased truck driver out of his sleeper / coffin and into her van so, who you gonna call? Fire. The big red fix-it truck will arrive and … fix it. As the big red truck departs, we’ll stuff another memory into another box. Over there in the basement corner, in the pile of boxes.
Seriously, I’m fine. To be sure, a little more sensory cognizant of the randomness of mortality than before but, on the upside, ever more appreciative of being on the upside of terra firma. You only get one, so live your best life.
No, the late-stage capitalism ruminating is more numbers related, as economic stuff tends to be. Since my last biscuit breakfast at the Hardees in the student union, the U.S. population has increased by 40% (mark me down for three of those). At the same time, the number of volunteer firefighters has decreased by 30%, from 900,000 to 625,000. Many more people needing help, with far fewer helpers. Mark me down for, um, one. One with legitimate questions about the whole "invisible hand" nonsense.
The second day in a row of being late to work because of fire calls. Yesterday, hauling ass down CS to get to the landing zone before the Medflight chopper arrives. Probie Sam (Samantha) in back, me hanging on to the Jesus! Bar up front and mashing the siren button with my right boot to clear the way for Lt. Alan doing a rather impressive Kimi Raikkonen impression while at the wheel.
Make it there in time, add some cones to the beacon lights Chief 3 Brian has set and cross our fingers the Medflight doc and nurse will exit the ambulance with a patient who gets to fly. Because victims do not get a flight, only patients do.
Non-emergent today on CS. Third call of the morning is a lift assist / medical call for a man who fell off a ladder in his garage. Doesn’t need a helicopter. Our ambulance will do. But our EMTs will not be able to get the man off the floor and into the ambulance on their own. Lift with your firefighters, not your back, as EMTs are inclined to (smartly) adher.
Chief 3 Brian will leave the scene of call 2, where he is alone, to meet us at call 3. Brian left call 1 to get to call 2, alone. So, the late-stage capitalism cogitation occurs with Mitch at the wheel, Lt. Alan in the officer’s seat and me in the back, alone.
I suppose the bright side of being in back alone is you can choose any seat and sprawl out a bit. But, alone is alone no matter how many toys you can distract yourself with. Fire rigs are loud so conversations tend to either be between the driver and officer up front and the firefighters in back, but rarely between the front and back. Hence the back of a fire rig in transit alone is a very alone place to be.
And then you start to think about the four of us being such outliers to even be able to respond. Brian and Alan able to be on the call because of being able to work outside an office and Mitch and me being able because we work for the Village. Those are very slim margins to operate a first-responder service under. Take one or two of us out of the equation for any reason and you are left with very difficult choices at fires or accidents of any magnitude. There’s mutual aid, but they have the same day-time staffing challenges, and are ten to fifteen minutes further down the road.
Having been responsible for paid, career fire departments in my previous life, there is no way I would have let any of them operate with a sixty-three year old first due interior attack firefighter. That’s insane.
But that is what we have. If they are lucky, that is what many rural volunteer fire departments have. Firefighters in their sixties and beyond. Volunteering in the fire service has become so technical, so burdensome and so all-consuming that dual-income families find it extraordinarily difficult to play a part, even when they want to. And the Venn diagram of AARPers who may have some extra time and are also fit enough for the rigors of a young person’s game are a rather narrow slice of the population. Packin up ain’t pickleball.
A Superman costume and cool toys only goes so far. When it butts up against training classes, maintaining certifications, selling raffle tickets, bodily wear and tear and boxes stuffed into corners of your mind, there is no objectively good reason to do it. To risk it. It is an entirely unreasonable ask.
But then you’ll be knocked backward by the rotor blast as a patient leaves the scene under a Medflight doctor’s care rather than in a medical examiner’s van. And Troy, having relieved Alan so he can tend to a child home from school, will spring for some takeout Hardees on the way back to the station and the muster room will host the best breakfast of the workweek. And you’ll scrub the road grime and rotor wash off 33 together before heading into the office, so she looks great the next time she rolls.
And you’ll hope you’re in back when she does, gearing up with a teammate.
