Brigade Life

Something about fire brigades. Volunteer ones, I guess I'm writing about. Warning: this could get sentimental.
I've been in one for over eight and a half years. I guess if I didn't love it I wouldn't be there anymore. Sometimes it's a challenge and sometimes I start to believe the little voices that tell me it's too hard to have two little kids, be studying and be a firefighter at the same time. Then I tell those voices to shut the hell up and that I can make it work with a bit of creativity, and buckets of flexibility in attitude from my fellow firefighters.
Anyway, days like today I especially appreciate being in my volunteer fire brigade. Not because sometimes you lose people, but because when you do lose someone you realise what you've got in who's left, and it's the departed member who has left that gift, among other mementos of their time with us on earth.
Some say a funeral is an unfortunate time to reconnect with old mates and I tend to disagree. I tend to think it's a great thing to come away from a funeral and feel glad that, at least, of all that's happened, you were able to press 'pause' in normal activity and get together to celebrate someone's life. Life does just get in the way of catching up with people. And sometimes death has to intervene to trip the circuit. (I don't think I'll mind, when my time comes, if people get together for a great chinwag and reconnect. That would mean that at least two people would have been there to see me off - woo hoo!). Today it was great to catch up with people that, without brigade, I would never have made a connection with and that, because of brigade, my life is richer for having known.
The thing with the vol brigade is that you get who you get and you just have to deal with that menagerie of personalities, skills, talents and experiences. You don't get selected the way you do for paid jobs - if you're healthy, of a clean police record, and willing then there's a place for you if you want it. After that, you see how you fit in. And most people do, in my experience. I've met vols from all over the state and none of them are of the same mould. All we have in common is that we want to put back into our communities.
As a vol, you see the same people, at least once a week, week in and week out for years. You see this side of them that they bring from home or from work whilst leaving a lot of themselves at home or at work. You get to know a few people so well that you become part of their private lives. Sometimes you might even stop being part of their private lives, for various reasons, and find that you can still work and joke together just knowing that there is that connection you have from the jobs you've attended together, the training you've done together, the skills and knowledge that's been shared. That can't be changed by a partner who doesn't get along with you, because that partner isn't a vol and doesn't know what you two know; how the other person would withstand physical pressure beyond their own expectations just to make sure you both exit a smoking building safely, how the other person has taught you to tie knots, how the other person has taken time to show you how a pump works or how to thread those damn laces on turnout boots. I would hope that most vols feel the way I do, in that no matter what the interaction of our private lives, that they seek to bring out the best in their fellow brigade members. Yeah, it's optimistic, and that's what I tend towards.
Often, I'll find myself telling someone about a friend, only to realise that I don't know that much about the person beyond brigade life, and wonder to what extent I can actually use the term 'friend'. And then I'll use it, anyway, because whilst I may not know children's names very well (something I intend to work on), or what music they like, because when you spend at least a couple of hours with someone every week, then see them at all sorts of hours in an emergency environment and debrief with that person, or spend extra hours on fundraising with your brigade peeps, then that counts, too, and is yet another way to know someone and have them be important in your life.
Today we attended a funeral of a fellow vol, and as well as being really sad that he left us so suddenly, I was glad for the opportunity he gave us to bring together former members we hadn't seen for a while, and to be together to appreciate the massive contribution of his life he did make to our brigade in his time served. I didn't know him as well as many of the others did, and I liked him a lot. He was non-confrontational even when he was having a confrontation and he offered whatever he could to the brigade, even when work kept him away from training and callouts. I knew he really wanted to get back into brigade life, like old times, so when I was told of his sudden illness it felt like a sideswipe. I think a lot of us were still processing it today, to make sure it was real. I guess it was, because we watched the casket being lowered into the earth after forming a guard of honour for him.
I wasn't sure, when I first joined, what that action would lead to, in terms of all these new people I had to get to know and work with. I had heard of firefighters refer to one another as family, brothers and the like. Somehow, these people enter your consciousness, then your subconscious and strangers form a very odd 'family' indeed, and a very welcome one. My mum used to complain that I had more time for strangers than I did for my own family, when I'd go to training on Wednesdays and Sundays, then fundraising, and callouts. When I first joined they were strangers. In a very short space of time the term 'stranger' couldn't be further from the truth, even if I didn't know what music they'd like played at their funerals. Those same people didn't know my mum, my sister, my favourite colour, and they accepted me for what I was willing to give and what I could dig deep to find in order to give.
In the foreseeable future we'll be moving to a new area and joining a new brigade and the process will begin again, perhaps with some more theorising and musing on my part. I dread to think that I'll feel about people I don't yet know the way I do about our current bunch of fiends (oops, did I forget the 'r'?), because it doesn't seem possible. Yet I hope that does happen, because I don't want to lose that sense of belonging to something way bigger than myself in the process of moving town. I'm ambivalent about my own situation where my childbearing has meant I have spent more time away from brigade than I thought I would have to, but babysitting for two young children on a Wednesday night is hard to come by when you're asking favours of loved ones, and also trying to maximise study opportunities when uni work is due. I'm told that everyone understands, so it's probably time I ease up on beating myself up over that. And the move doesn't mean we can't retain bonds with our current brigade, it just means we're adding to our brigade experiences.
I think I'm in a lucky situation where I was a vol and then introduced Tom to vol life. He knows what I mean, so I don't live with someone who doesn't understand why I would drop everything for 'strangers', or who struggles with that committment. I'm also lucky that I have friends in a few of the partners, so even if they don't always 'get' it, we still get along, and can be part of one another's lives.
No answers, no great revelations, I just needed to get it out.
So, thank you Steve A, for helping me thresh out these thoughts and bringing to my attention how important you have been, and how important all our members are to our lives, both private and 'just brigade'. You gave what you could until there was nothing left to give.