Fire Fighting Tales from Rural Maine: "When do we do anything alone?"

During our most recent training weekend at Fire Academy, we arrived before 7 a.m. and spent a long time standing in the cold as the cars were prepared for our extrication lesson. I was sick and I kept having to take off my gloves to blow my nose, exposing them to the well-below-freezing air. I was standing with a group of my classmates, fellow firefighters, and I was actually growing concerned about the intensity of the pain in my fingers and toes. I shifted and stamped and scrunched my fingers and toes trying to get them warm.

One of the firefighters noticed, and the next thing I knew, he was taking off his gloves and telling me to put my hands inside them. They were warm with moist heat and toasty! (Like the inside of a Ton Ton?!) And then another firefighter told me to give him my gloves and he put his warm fingers inside of them, so that when I gave back the first firefighter's gloves, my newly warmed fingers could go inside warm gloves. My hands stayed warm for the rest of the day. Neither of these men are in my company.

On the day when I got most beat up, the second day of our most grueling weekend, when my knees were bruised to the bone and the rest of me was smashed to bits and I was reeling from the trauma of having gotten trapped in a confined space (wedged between wall studs and tangled up so badly my helmet and mask slipped off while people screamed at me to go faster--twice!), and it wasn't even lunch time yet, I stumbled out of the building looking for all the world like what I was--a woman in shock and about to pass out--a firefighter spotted me and immediately asked if it would be okay if he helped me. He himself has two bum knees, but with respectful kindness he slipped an arm around me and helped steady my gait. We made it to the staging area and as I focused on keeping all the black spots in my vision from swarming together and dragging me down, he went for help. While he was gone and I swayed stubbornly on my hands and knees, refusing to pass out, but unable to do more than that, another firefighter noticed me and brought me water. And two minutes later, after I had been checked out and was back on my feet again, another firefighter offered to change my bottle for me. Again, none of those men were in my company, which means that they had no necessary obligation to notice or to care how I was--and yet they did; they noticed, they cared, they took swift and effective action on my behalf.

On Thursday night, Orland Fire responded in mutual aid to a fatal motor vehicle accident. So far two firefighters from my class have checked in on me, because we have been taught that is important to ask someone if they are okay after a night like that.

I had to do the confined spaces maze two times in one day on our second weekend at Academy. When it was time for the second trip through, I was so exhausted and overwhelmed and borderline hysterical with fear just at the thought of going blindfolded back into that terrible, relentlessly small space that I (embarrassingly) started crying--and not just a little. I was crumpled faced and sobbing. I could't stop; my defenses were broken and I was leaking fear. I didn't want to go back in. But my lead instructor told me, firmly, that if I didn't get back in there (NOW) then I wouldn't graduate. And I want to graduate...so I gathered what was left of my inner resolve, I climbed back into that dark maze and my lead instructor came behind me, barking at my heels.

The second time through was harder. I was more tired. More scared. My vision and breathing were more obstructed. I was carrying a heavy axe and had to sound the floor constantly as I crawled and felt my way through the tunnels and turns. They threw more unexpected and terrifying obstacles at me--snagged my bottle and held me down--and I completely lost my shit twice. Once I even begged to be let out.

But they didn't let me out. Eventually I stopped screaming and I overcame all the obstacles and I got myself out. But it was not pretty. And I assumed that I had failed. I was devastated.

That night I barely slept. I had night terrors about the maze all night, and shame and grief about my failure. At the end of the next day, I asked my lead instructor when I would have to try the maze again. Tears sprang to my eyes and my chest constricted in panic just to think of it. But I swallowed that fear, determined to graduate.

"You don't have to do it again," he said.

"But...I didn't do it...?" I said. I was very confused.

"You did do it," he said.

"But...but I cried? And I panicked," I said.

"You overcame some big fears yesterday," he said. "You're too hard on yourself."

"But...you mean I passed? I don't have to do it again?"

"That's right," he said. "You demonstrated adequate proficiency."

I was still very confused. "But...I didn't do it alone...?"

He looked me in my eyes and he asked, "When do we ever do anything alone?"

My eyes teared up again and I swallowed a little sob. "Never," I said. "We never do anything alone."

Beyond any of the hundreds of important skills we are learning--like how to tie a life safety knot or bail out of a burning building on a charged hose line or throw a ladder--it is these other moments that will stay with me forever. As much as I love knowing how to rescue someone down a ladder or how to tie a clove hitch or how to put water on a fire, of all the things I am learning about myself and being a firefighter, these lessons about what it really means to be a firefighter are the most profound.

As a volunteer firefighter in a very small, rural town, I will most likely never use most of what I am learning. I will probably never rescue an unconscious firefighter from a burning basement or be the one to deploy the roof ladder. And I expect after my end test I will promptly forget the names of all the different sprinkler heads.

On its face, of course, firefighting is about putting out fires. But at its heart, firefighting is about so much more than that. Our biggest promise is not that we will put out a fire, it is that Everyone Goes Home. And the only way we can accomplish that is to understand that we are, in each and every moment, from fatal car crashes to training exercises to explosive conflagrations...never doing anything alone.

Fire Fighting Tales from Rural Maine: Why

April 18, 2016

I've had some demons to face at Fire Academy, not the least of which were my own low opinion of my self and my overwhelming fear of confined spaces.

We returned to our Class A burn site on Saturday for what was one of the most physically grueling experiences of my entire life. I spent a lot of the day wondering why (why-in-God's-name, why?!) was I doing this. I didn't think I could possibly climb or carry one more ladder, swing one more axe, do one more evolution. I just couldn't. And it wasn't even lunch time yet.

But in each moment when I felt like I couldn't, this girl showed up--this girl who is me!--and she waited until I'd finished thinking, "I can't..." and then she stepped into the quiet, tired space inside me and she said, "Yes. Yes, you can. I *know* you can."

And so I did.

I swung a sledgehammer at a concrete wall in full gear wearing a pack in 65 degree direct sun; I used a chainsaw; I climbed and hammered and swung and carried and crawled and I *worked*. And when it came time for my exhausted body to smash through walls with urgency and climb through spaces that were too small for me, I took off my pack (the right way, left side so you can keep breathing) and I passed it through, and I took off my helmet and I passed it through, and I smooshed my firefighter body through each and every hole. They held us down. They set off alarms. They hollered and threw debris and bodies on top of us.

And I got through. My whole company got through.

When my panic swept up like a tsunami, I took a deep breath and dove under it. I got through and I did not cry.

I got through!

And at the end of that day, stinking, bedraggled, bruised, and exhausted, you could not have wiped the shit-eating grin (as my Chief calls it) off my face.

And this is why I do Fire Academy. :-)

In a feat of mighty, mighty fortitude the cadets (and some instructors) of Hancock County Fire Academy spent alllllll day taking turns smashing a concrete wall (10" thick? reinforced with rebar). And you know what? We did it! By the end of the day, that hole was big enough for Marcus Tweedie and a whole company of fire fighters to climb through. This is me during my turn.

I posted this (above) on Facebook, and here's what my Chief said, in response: "I've been having a little difficulty putting this into words, but here goes. Many times speaking with women in particular about volunteering for the fire department, most have some of the same doubts that Naomi did. Few take the first step to see what it's about and what they might have to offer. We don't use force, shame or push them into becoming more than they are capable of. We may offer some encouragement to do more than they think they are capable of. We try to find a job they are comfortable with and give them the support to do it well. All of our jobs are important, some may seem a little more glamorous than others. Sometimes a member will get an interest to do just a little more or want to learn new skills outside of their comfort zone for too many reasons to list. You just never know how much more you want to be involved until you are part of a volunteer department. You watch and learn, and find that "I think I would like to do that". Here is a firefighter who started her journey as a somewhat shy, timid and tentative new member who had many reservations but wanted to drive a fire truck. She found herself in situations beyond her comfort zone and didn't back away. Now she's on the tail end of a mentally and physically exhausting training academy to face the very thing she said she was frightened of, fire. Three years ago I wouldn't have imagined this is where she'd be. Quite the opposite actually. Now we look forward to having yet another qualified interior firefighter in our ranks. Take a chance, see what you can be capable of finding inside yourself by volunteering with your local fire department. Your story might not be as glamorous but your community will benefit none the less."

Fire Fighting Tales from Rural Maine: Why

April 18, 2016

I've had some demons to face at Fire Academy, not the least of which were my own low opinion of my self and my overwhelming fear of confined spaces.

We returned to our Class A burn site on Saturday for what was one of the most physically grueling experiences of my entire life. I spent a lot of the day wondering why (why-in-God's-name, why?!) was I doing this. I didn't think I could possibly climb or carry one more ladder, swing one more axe, do one more evolution. I just couldn't. And it wasn't even lunch time yet.

But in each moment when I felt like I couldn't, this girl showed up--this girl who is me!--and she waited until I'd finished thinking, "I can't..." and then she stepped into the quiet, tired space inside me and she said, "Yes. Yes, you can. I *know* you can."

And so I did.

I swung a sledgehammer at a concrete wall in full gear wearing a pack in 65 degree direct sun; I used a chainsaw; I climbed and hammered and swung and carried and crawled and I *worked*. And when it came time for my exhausted body to smash through walls with urgency and climb through spaces that were too small for me, I took off my pack (the right way, left side so you can keep breathing) and I passed it through, and I took off my helmet and I passed it through, and I smooshed my firefighter body through each and every hole. They held us down. They set off alarms. They hollered and threw debris and bodies on top of us.

And I got through. My whole company got through.

When my panic swept up like a tsunami, I took a deep breath and dove under it. I got through and I did not cry.

I got through!

And at the end of that day, stinking, bedraggled, bruised, and exhausted, you could not have wiped the shit-eating grin (as my Chief calls it) off my face.

And this is why I do Fire Academy. :-)

I posted this (above) on Facebook, and here's what my Chief said, in response: "I've been having a little difficulty putting this into words, but here goes. Many times speaking with women in particular about volunteering for the fire department, most have some of the same doubts that Naomi did. Few take the first step to see what it's about and what they might have to offer. We don't use force, shame or push them into becoming more than they are capable of. We may offer some encouragement to do more than they think they are capable of. We try to find a job they are comfortable with and give them the support to do it well. All of our jobs are important, some may seem a little more glamorous than others. Sometimes a member will get an interest to do just a little more or want to learn new skills outside of their comfort zone for too many reasons to list. You just never know how much more you want to be involved until you are part of a volunteer department. You watch and learn, and find that "I think I would like to do that". Here is a firefighter who started her journey as a somewhat shy, timid and tentative new member who had many reservations but wanted to drive a fire truck. She found herself in situations beyond her comfort zone and didn't back away. Now she's on the tail end of a mentally and physically exhausting training academy to face the very thing she said she was frightened of, fire. Three years ago I wouldn't have imagined this is where she'd be. Quite the opposite actually. Now we look forward to having yet another qualified interior firefighter in our ranks. Take a chance, see what you can be capable of finding inside yourself by volunteering with your local fire department. Your story might not be as glamorous but your community will benefit none the less."

Tales from Rural Maine: Time capsule

April 21, 2016

Are you ready for this? One of my yoga students handed me a copy of the Bucksport Free Press...from 1990! It's the graduation special edition featuring, that's right, the Bucksport High School Class of 1990. (Also a story I wrote in my debut as a sports reporter...) She didn't have a child or even a relative in our class, and yet somehow, like some sort of yoga-rific time capsule, she got that issue, held onto it for 26 years (!) and then handed it back to me before yoga class. If that isn't Throwback Thursday-worthy, I don't know what is! #TBT Rock on, Golden Bucks, rock on! "You Can't Touch This!" June 1990. :-) (I still have that watch.)

Fire Fighting Tales from Rural Maine: Never alone

May 24, 2016

Last night, my Hancock County Fire Academy classmates and I sat for the state written exam. If we pass it, we'll be half-way to our Fire Fighter I and II certifications. The second half is a skills test in June. (This does not affect our status as graduates of the Academy; we are all graduating, regardless of the results of the state exams.)

The test is hard. And long. 200 questions in three hours. It can cover anything from our 1100-page textbook, like for instance how much steel expands at certain temperatures or which NFPA standard covers fire fighter training regulations or what you would find in an MC-305 tanker truck or what you should do with the doors on a car while you are displacing the dashboard so you can free an entrapped passenger. (I didn't know the answers to any of those, by the way except that the standard covering training regulations is NFPA 1001. I'm sure that will be incredibly useful in my career as a firefighter :-)).

There were 19 of us sitting for the exam and as each one finished, he or she left the room. When the first people handed in their tests and left, I still wasn't even half-way through the first exam. By the end, there was just me and one other fire fighter slogging through the last part of our Fire Fighter II and watching the clock.

It was nearly 9pm when I finished. I'd had a long day and a long week and a long six months. And it was a little bit of a lonely feeling to know that I was going to walk out of that exam that we'd been working toward for six months, and there would be no one waiting for me, to say "How did it go!" or "We did it! Let's get a drink!"

I hung around in the exam room, darkening the circles in my bubble answer sheet for a while, so that my classmate wouldn't be all alone in there as he worked on finishing. But eventually, after going over and over all those bubbles, I started to get very anxious. Like I wanted to take the whole test out and start over, but there were only fifteen minutes left! So I decided to call it...and leave. My classmate and I gave each other a big smile and a thumbs up and I decided I'd go down to the fire bay and wait in the quiet darkness for him to finish, so at least he wouldn't be alone when he came out.

I walked down over the stairs and I had this little pang of sadness, to be second to last and all alone...and then, I caught a glimpse of my lead instructor standing between the trucks, in front of the open fire bay doors. Of course, he would still be there, I realized. He wouldn't leave us alone. But I wished that everyone else was there, too. So we could celebrate and share and mark the moment. But I also understood why people wouldn't want to hang around after they'd finished. Some of them had finished almost two hours before me.

When I rounded the corner, I saw that I was wrong to imagine I was alone. Almost every single member of my 19-person class was standing there, smiling, waiting for me and Jeff to finish our exams. My face lit up when I caught sight of them. I was not alone. I was never alone. I only imagined that I was. If there is one true thing that Fire Academy has taught us, it is this: we never do anything alone.

Tales from Rural Maine: The Auntie Brigade

There are some things in life that bring me joy. (Lots and lots of things!) Teaching yoga. Practicing yoga with a kind and illuminated teacher. Serving as a fire fighter. Training as a fire fighter. These things top the list. But among the other, most extraordinarily powerful things that bring me joy, is the opportunity to give unconditional love to children.

I am lucky enough to have people in my life who are willing to share their children with me. To allow me, sometimes professionally and sometimes simply as a friend, to love the socks off their children. They let me play and listen and comfort; they allow me to share in meal times and bed times and holidays. We play at the fire department. We play at home. We enjoy one another and take good care. We are enthusiastic in our warmth and appreciation.

It has often seemed such a cruel twist of this particular life's fate that someone with such a virtually limitless capacity for love and loving kindness and nurturing and patience and joy has no surviving children of her own.

But, there is also this beautiful side to that. I am part of what Liz Gilbert calls "The Auntie Brigade."

"Even within my own community, I can see where I have been vital sometimes as a member of the Auntie Brigade," she writes. "My job is not merely to spoil and indulge my niece and nephew (though I do take that assignment to heart) but also to be a roving auntie to the world – an ambassador auntie –who is on hand wherever help is needed, in anybody’s family whatsoever. There are people I’ve been able to help, sometimes fully supporting them for years, because I am not obliged, as a mother would be obliged, to put all my energies and resources into the full-time rearing of a child."

Last night, when my friend Kathleen handed her fussy toddler to me near bedtime, he felt upset. There was also a nearly five-year-old bouncing around, avoiding sleep. As his mother left the room to go make up my bed for me, nearly five-year-old daughter tagging along behind, Graeme and I were left alone. I held his warm little self, fresh from the bath, wearing only a diaper, and he reached out his arms after his mother, disappearing down the hallway. "Ma-ma!," he said. Distress building in his face, in his voice, in his body. "Ma-ma!"

I softened into his upset, holding him gently, and I murmured, "Graeme...let's go find the moon..." As soon as I said the words, his body relaxed into mine. He got quiet and rested his sweet little head on my chest. I walked to the window and looked out into the night. I rocked gently, tenderly, and his breathing slowed and softened. His eyelids got heavy. Softly, steadily, he fell asleep.

I stood there for a long time--an Auntie, tired, back aching, but available completely--happily rocking, holding that beloved little boy...and looking for the moon.

Yoga Tales from Rural Maine: Bedtime

On Thursday night, I taught my first Yoga with Naomi bedtime yoga class to the inpatient kids at Acadia Hospital in Bangor. Acadia Hospital serves children and adults with mental health needs, and these children all live in the hospital. One of them had been there for three months.

None of the children were forced to come. They each chose on their own. There were six children, four girls and two boys. The youngest was four years old; the oldest were sixteen. Two of them were dressed in scrubs. One had an arm striped with cuts from wrist to elbow. One of them, the littlest, didn't want to take off his Batman flip-flops. I said that was okay. I said everything was okay.

For 45 minutes, these children had peace and kindness. They were brave and curious. Some were silent and big-eyed. Others tested the boundaries. Everything they did or said or asked for or felt during our time together was okay with me. Everything.

There was no other staff in the room. Just me and these kids. I met each challenge with softness, with sincerity. "I am here to help you keep yourself safe on your mat," I said. "You don't have to do anything you don't want to do. And I will do my best to notice if something doesn't seem right for you, but you are the only one who can really know if a movement or a moment is okay. Notice how you feel. And stop or change or ask for help if something doesn't feel right. That's your practice."

The most oppositional child, a nine-year-old girl, tall for her age, pushed back a lot. She complained about the brand of crayons; she expressed resistance, vocally and with her body throughout the first half of the class. And everything she did was okay. Everything. I met all of her resistance with warmth and kindness.

About half-way through, she began to soften. She interrupted my instruction to ask, "Do you know pretzel pose?"

"I don't think I know that one," I said. "Would you like to teach me?"

And she and another girl jumped up and taught me and the rest of the class "pretzel pose," which is a kids' version of Eagle Pose.

"Wonderful!" I said. "I love that one. Do you know any more?"

And they taught us two different kinds of pranayama (breathwork), which they know by other names.

"That's so good!," I said. "You know some beautiful yoga. Do you have another yoga teacher?"

"No," she said. "We learned in Coping Skills."

Yoga is being woven into the lives of these children at the hospital, not just by me, but by other practitioners; even when it is not called "yoga," yoga skills help kids (and all of us) to cope, to heal, to be.

Outside the room, other children were suffering. There was screeching, screaming, an interminable cry of anguish that went on and on and on and on.

But inside our room, it was more quiet and safe. It was peaceful and creative and fun.

"I'm here to help you feel peaceful at bedtime," I said.

"Bedtime is hard," said a nine-year-old boy. "Because that's when the bad things happened..."

My heart clenched. Bedtime is when the bad things happened. To this sweet, brave, bright, outgoing child. With painted fingernails and an endearing smile. The bad things happened at bedtime. And now he is here.

I took a deep breath. Breathing helps. But I never let my gaze leave his eyes. There are no words for a moment like that. So I made an instinctive, warm noise, a sort of compassionate hum. And I nodded. "I am here," I said. "I am here with you...would you like to make a bedtime wish?"

And he said, yes, he would. Everyone said yes, they would like to make a bedtime wish. I gave everyone a stuffed animal, a Beanie Baby, to hold--this little boy chose a ram because he enjoyed it's articulated legs. Each child also had two butterfly scarves to use during practice, and he wrapped his ram safely in one scarf, swaddling and snuggling it.

The kids got comfortable and safe on their mats. Gentle music played. I talked to them. And I moved around the room, inviting each child to close their eyes, to breath, and to focus on their wish. Then I spritzed "magic bedtime spray," (lavender water) around them (first asking permission each time) and then they opened their eyes and blew "pixie dust" out of my palm, to seal the wish, and then I sprinkled pixie dust on their resting bodies.

Every single child made a wish. Even the teenagers.

Before she left, the little girl who had been so oppositional in the beginning asked me, "Did I disrupt this group?"

"No, darling," I said, with full sincerity. "You were just right."

She smiled a big smile and glittering slightly from the pixie dust, she took away all the gifts I had given her: a picture to color, a brand new box of crayons, even the name tag she made for herself out of construction paper...and, I hope, the gift of a little more peace and safety at bedtime.

Fire Fighting Tales from Rural Maine: Weight

When I started at Fire Academy, I weighed the same as this guy...so, yeah. This was me. You would not believe the crap I can do or how long I can do it with 276 pounds on my frame! And you can now possibly understand why I got excited when I lost 17 pounds early on in my Academy journey! You can't shrink the size of your gear, but if you can take 17 pounds of excess weight off your body...you can carry more handtools more easily. ;-)

Photo courtesy of Professional Fire Fighters of Concord, NH.

Yoga Tales from Rural Maine: Old School

I had an iPod snafu today--for some reason it didn't charge overnight and I had *three* yoga classes in three different towns to teach today, and my students and I really like the yoga music to play during class. So, I used the iPod for the first class, but then it died so I brought my rockin' boom box and a CD to the last two classes.

"We're rolling old school tonight, my friends!" I told my last class of the day. "This here's my boom box, which I bought in San Francisco in 1996!"

"That's the year I was born!" said one of my students.

(!!!)

Luckily, my young student is holding up a little better than my boom box, which decided during Savasana that it, too, needed a rest. So my students had the gift of silence, and my voice, and the crickets outside the open window.

If that was the last hurrah for my boom box, I guess it was a good one.

Although...now what will I use to play all my mix tapes???

Yoga and Fire Fighting Tales from Rural Maine: I did it!!!

On the first Wednesday in May of 2013, I was voted in as the newest member of the all-volunteer Orland Fire Department. I was lonely, frightened, sick, sad and suffering from PTSD. I was so frightened all the time that I struggled to leave my house. 

The notion that I could ever ascend to the ranks of interior firefighter seemed about as likely as my landing on Mars. For the first two years, I had to serve side-by-side with the woman responsible for my trauma. But I never quit. And then she left. And in the year that followed, I blossomed. Removed from the stress of that trauma trigger, I completed my EVOC training (which means I can drive fire trucks) and then I went on to tackle the vigorous, intense interior fire fighter training at the Hancock County Fire Academy. That training has beaten the crap out of me. And I still have three training weekends to go before I graduate from the Academy, but last night (almost three years to the day that I began this journey) my Chief told me that Marcus and I have now completed the minimum requirements for our department. 

No matter what happens from here on out, I am an interior certified fire fighter with the Orland Fire Department!! So put that in your pipe and smoke it! (But then dispose of your smoking materials safely.) :-)

I totally DID it!!! Namaste. (And thank you for believing in me.)

Photo courtesy of the Ellsworth American.

Yoga and Fire Fighting Tales from Rural Maine: Believe

Three years ago today (May 13, 2016), I apparently donned my turnout gear for the first time, went for a ride in our tanker, felt what it's like to send water out of a hose...and apparently, I liked it. (A lot!) Here's what I posted on Facebook that day: :-)I suspect this was one of the first appearances of the "shit-eating grin" my chief has come to know me for.

Best. Training. EVER!!!! Sadly, no photos this time, but: first time in structure fire turnout gear, first time running pump truck (yay, physics--thank you Mr. Bradford!), first time riding in tanker truck, first time at pump house, and the crowning glory...first time at the end of a hose!! Screw bungie jumping. You want a thrill? Latch onto the end of a fire hose and lean into a friend. My arms feel like jelly, but I am happy as a clam--a clam that fights fires!

I keep thinking that becoming an interior firefighter came out of left field, but apparently I've been loving it since the very first second.

My first time on the nozzle.

I keep thinking that that girl--the three-years-ago-living-in-trauma girl--who joined the Orland Fire Department would never believe that I am actually standing here today, a bona fide interior fire fighter with Orland, about to complete Fire Academy and potentially about to become a state certified Fire Fighter I and II.

But...I also know that you don't get what you hope for, you get what you *believe.*

So, at some level, there *must* have been a part of me, even when I was broken and afraid (of everything!), that *believed* this was possible. Isn't that amazing? That underneath all of that life-or-death fear of the daily basics, underneath all of my physical illness, injury, and weakness; underneath all of the trauma; there was a part of me who believed she could rise up and accomplish something that at that moment seemed (to everyone, I'm sure) impossible. (I bet that's the same part of me that got into and through Smith College, when going to college was among the most deeply unlikely things for a girl born into my circumstances to do.)

I was also lucky enough to have a few friendly fire fighters around me, who believed it even better than me. Lt. Dave Sukeforth, chief among them. He was the first to suggest that I should go to the Academy this winter, and the fiercest advocate for getting me in. I have never understood why Dave (or anyone else) thought I could do the Academy...but if Dave hadn't insisted, I'm not sure I ever would have tried. When my own belief was thin on the ground, the belief of others filled in the gaps. If you have a dream my friends, finding and trusting as many pairs of believing eyes as you can manifest is essential. **It's the belief that makes wishes powerful.**

With four of my staunchest OFD supporters after we made a convertible. :-)

Marcus joined the OFD and sixty days later, he was at the Academy. It took me 2 1/2 years to get to that same starting point, but we did it together. And I think if he hadn't joined the department when he did, I might never have gone. Knowing he would be there made it possible to begin. The timing of his decision to join was a tremendous gift to me. (And when I felt like I might have to quit the Academy because I just couldn't take the abuse any more, he told me that if I had to quit, he would sign up and do the whole thing over again with me, because he knew I could get through.)

With Marcus and the original Company One.

But, I didn't quit. I did the opposite of quitting. When faced with a choice between quitting and standing up for myself, I made the radical (for me) choice to stand up for myself and ask for change. Fear + courage = progress.

And now...it's almost over. Tomorrow, the roller coaster reaches its peak and we start zooming down toward the end of fire academy. Two classroom days of haz mat. Followed by two days of OFD obligations (and studying). Then two more days to study as much as possible. Then Friday, another live interior burn, Saturday forestry work (lots of digging in the sun), and Sunday, our grand finale...our Open Day, when we'll run through the practical end test (where we try to remember every single thing we've learned to do)...and then my classmates and teachers will roast some meat for eating...and the next day, Monday, I'll teach at Acadia and then sit for my State FF I & II exam...

...three years and ten days after I (very enthusiastically) first donned my turnout gear. :-)

If you have a dream, listen not to the constant radio chatter of voices broadcasting reasons you can't; especially don't listen to the ones inside your own head. Listen instead to that one faithful voice inside you that says, "Yes. I believe you can."

Fire Fighting Tales from Rural Maine: Ommmmm

Just when I think I'm getting close to being prepared enough for my Maine Fire Service Institute Pro-Board accreditation exam (which is on Monday, following three tough training days and a day teaching the kids at Acadia hospital, oof!), I realize I don't know nearly enough about sprinkler systems. Sigh. Maybe If 501 meditates with me, I'll absorb all of his knowledge telepathically...?

With my Chief at a training burn.

Fire Fighting Tales from Rural Maine: The Fire Swamp

I had a hard day today. It was the last day of Fire Academy, and in some ways, it was the worst one, which is really saying something. It was the fifth of the last six weekends in a row that we had training, and the third of an unprecedented three-day training weekend. To say I was running on empty is to say that the Titanic hit an ice cube.

What is the word to describe indescribable fatigue of body and mind? Also? My blisters have blisters. Oh, wait. Not any more. They all ripped off today. But my bruises definitely have bruises. And my exhausted self was taken by surprise by a confined spaces challenge first thing this morning, which did not go well for me, and I never really recovered. As a result, my day involved several rather severe crying jags, which always leaves me feeling raw, embarrassed, and pathetic. But several very kind and generous firefighters said and did some things that lifted my tired spirit enough that I was able to arrive at a moment just now where I realized that I can think of today--and perhaps Fire Academy, in general--as being like a journey through the Fire Swamp. As in, after falling into the Lightning Sand and almost dying, Princess Buttercup says to Westley, "We'll never succeed, we may as well die here!"

But Westley says to Princess Buttercup, "No, no! We have already succeeded. I mean, what are the Three Terrors of the Fire Swamp? One? The Flame Spurt. No problem. There's a popping sound preceding each, we can avoid that. Two, the Lightning Sand, and you were clever enough to discover that, so in the future, we can avoid that too..."

See, after this weekend, I know that a career in wildland fires is not for me. That's handy knowledge. (Hanging around with forestry guys/gals is like going to the zoo, by the way--they are a totally different breed from us structural guys/gals! It's fascinating to watch them, with their lean bodies and their beards and their green pants. Well, not a zoo, more like...a forest. A mythic forest full of animals who genuinely like to dig fire lines for ten hours at a stretch for days at a time in the middle of nowhere in intense heat, and often deadly conditions. Weirdly, they think it's odd that *we* want to go into burning buildings.)

Second, I think it's clear that I don't have a future in search and rescue...and rather than feel bad about that, I can be pleased that I was clever enough to discover it, so that I can avoid that in the future.

That really just leaves Rodents of Unusual Size. And I'm pretty sure they don't exist.

You can watch this film clip on YouTube here.

Tales from Rural Maine: Success

On May 22nd, 1994, my Smith College classmates and I stood in the hot sun in our black robes and we graduated. Then our lives diverged. We forged ahead. We gained, we lost, we suffered, we prevailed, we learned, we grew. We got older.

On May 22nd, 2016, (barring unforeseen disasters) I will complete my training as a (potentially) state-certified interior firefighter. Nothing in the whole wide world could have seemed more improbable to me on May 22nd, 1994. Nothing. I know for certain that the young "me" who stood in the sun that day twenty-two years ago, never, ever dreamed of moving back to her tiny home town in Maine and becoming a volunteer firefighter (or a yoga teacher, for that matter). If time travel were possible, I would put on my turnout gear, hop in my DeLorean and step out under the Emerson Arch in front of her just to see her face.

I have imagined doing this--traveling back to see her. And at first, I thought she (the young me) would *never* believe it. She would never in a million years be able to comprehend that she could or would ever do such a thing. I imagined that she would look at this 43-year-old fire fighting-yoga teaching me and just feel bewildered and frightened.

But then...I remembered. That girl? That young woman? As frightened and alone and overwhelmed as she was? As certain as she was that her path lay somewhere along the lines of motherhood and writing or something academic...despite all that, what I see in my mind's eye when I imagine traveling back in time to show her this fire-fighting-yoga-me...? I see her taking it in, processing it, and then...I see her smile! I see a look of shock and then a radiant smile that spreads across her face, dawning, as she realizes the awesomeness of the potential inside her. That girl I was, she didn't really know how big she was *inside*--and I love to imagine that if I could go back and show her, that she would *believe* it. And she would smile.

That girl--that young woman--I was, she is 43 years old now. And a PTSD sufferer. I have a genetic disorder that leaves me bruised, exhausted, and heavy. It makes my joints ache terribly. The doctors told me it was untreatable and incurable. And yet here I am. I'm teaching yoga. And I'm training to be a firefighter alongside young men who could bench press me if they wanted to. Half of them are young enough to be my children. And I go toe-to-toe. I hold my own. (I cry sometimes when I'm stuck in confined spaces, but I hold my own!)

(I think I may qualify for a spot on Marissa Walsh's next panel on "Not Quite What I Was Expecting.") smile emoticon

We're talking a lot--our alumnae community--these days about the definition of success. I think that mine comes down to this: Success is, more than anything, about creativity. If you have created solutions, opportunities, healing, growth, art, relationships, families, solitude, peace, progress, forgiveness, gratitude, laughter, or conversations--if you have *created* something, anything that matters to you (or to others), then I think you have succeeded. And you are succeeding if you are seeking and savoring joy. And perhaps, more than anything, you have succeeded if the "you" that is living now would make the "you" from May 22, 1994 smile as she realizes how very, very powerful, how very, very *big* you really and truly are.

Namaste, my fellow Smithies! (And remember to check your smoke detectors.) 

smile emoticon

Fire Fighting Tales from Rural Maine: Never alone

Last night, my Hancock County Fire Academy classmates and I sat for the state written exam. If we pass it, we'll be half-way to our Fire Fighter I and II certifications. The second half is a skills test in June. (This does not affect our status as graduates of the Academy; we are all graduating, regardless of the results of the state exams.)

The test is hard. And long. 200 questions in three hours. It can cover anything from our 1100-page textbook, like for instance how much steel expands at certain temperatures or which NFPA standard covers fire fighter training regulations or what you would find in an MC-305 tanker truck or what you should do with the doors on a car while you are displacing the dashboard so you can free an entrapped passenger. (I didn't know the answers to any of those, by the way except that the standard covering training regulations is NFPA 1001. I'm sure that will be incredibly useful in my career as a firefighter :-)).

There were 19 of us sitting for the exam and as each one finished, he or she left the room. When the first people handed in their tests and left, I still wasn't even half-way through the first exam. By the end, there was just me and one other fire fighter slogging through the last part of our Fire Fighter II and watching the clock.

It was nearly 9pm when I finished. I'd had a long day and a long week and a long six months. And it was a little bit of a lonely feeling to know that I was going to walk out of that exam that we'd been working toward for six months, and there would be no one waiting for me, to say "How did it go!" or "We did it! Let's get a drink!"

I hung around in the exam room, darkening the circles in my bubble answer sheet for a while, so that my classmate wouldn't be all alone in there as he worked on finishing. But eventually, after going over and over all those bubbles, I started to get very anxious. Like I wanted to take the whole test out and start over, but there were only fifteen minutes left! So I decided to call it...and leave. My classmate and I gave each other a big smile and a thumbs up and I decided I'd go down to the fire bay and wait in the quiet darkness for him to finish, so at least he wouldn't be alone when he came out.

I walked down over the stairs and I had this little pang of sadness, to be second to last and all alone...and then, I caught a glimpse of my lead instructor standing between the trucks, in front of the open fire bay doors. Of course, he would still be there, I realized. He wouldn't leave us alone. But I wished that everyone else was there, too. So we could celebrate and share and mark the moment. But I also understood why people wouldn't want to hang around after they'd finished. Some of them had finished almost two hours before me.

When I rounded the corner, I saw that I was wrong to imagine I was alone. Almost every single member of my 19-person class was standing there, smiling, waiting for me and Jeff to finish our exams. My face lit up when I caught sight of them. I was not alone. I was never alone. I only imagined that I was. If there is one true thing that Fire Academy has taught us, it is this: we never do anything alone.

Yoga and Fire Fighting Tales from Rural Maine: Freedom

For the last seven months, I have not gone anywhere without my Fire Fighter Skills textbook and workbook and my practice rope. And then more recently, I also brought along 200+ flash cards. I've studied in doctor's offices, my car, waiting rooms, guest rooms, other people's kitchens, at three separate fire departments...And almost every morning, I set my kitchen timer for an hour and studied before I did anything else in my day.

We took our pro-board exams on Monday night, so until I learn whether I passed them, I no longer need to carry these things around and bend my days around the need to learn more about fire suppression systems or hazardous materials or forestry or chemistry or ventilation or any other fire-service-related thing.

It feels incredible--but also really, really weird--to be walking and driving and being in the world without my red backpack full of fire fighter study materials. It's like getting a cast off. Or losing 20 pounds. I feel lighter...but it's also funny-feeling, disorienting. Like, I know things are alright, but at the same time, I keep feeling like something's missing.

I'm so excited to have that elusive creature called "free time" return to my life! At least temporarily...I still need to prep for the practical skills test, but first? I'm mowing my gosh-darned lawn!

My big friend, the Jones & Bartlett Fire Fighter Skills workbook, third edition.