The World Turns.

Yes, Christmas Eve was fun. The whole family together, laughing, eating, goofing off. A night of a dinner, and a couple early gifts: The camera that took the pictures. The new French press to make coffee with. And plans to gather Christmas morning to open gifts before my son and his sweetie headed off to the other side of the family.

In the midst of our Christmas day joviality, my pager went off, and the reality of my life as an emergency responder interrupted. The wind had been blowing here, and a tree top snapped off and fell on a traveling vehicle, injuring one of the children. I was out the door. My wife Jody knew right then and there that if this call was a bad one, how I would be affected, and told the kids. Unfortunately it was.

I am lying in bed the day after Christmas, computer on lap. The distractions I wanted, some wine last night, television, surfing the net, the drums, reading; nothing is making the tears stop or the pain go away. It's not just the image of a child getting CPR. It's going deeper than that for me. It's the cascading effect of being out of work, no solid prospects of any yet, no health insurance, my wife and our son being rear ended on the mainland, that car being partially unusable now, and then going to a call to help what turned out to be people I know. People who lost a daughter. The father with a broken neck. Their lives are altered far more than mine.

Part of it is the helpless feeling. Yes, I can treat the mother, as I did. I can help the oldest daughter retain some semblance of sanity, as I did. But it's the incredibly helpless feeling of knowing that a hurt child is not doing well, having a mother ask how her daughter is, wanting to be with her, and I have no words to speak other than to ask this woman to focus on herself for now.

Having pieced together the need for CPR and a falling tree, a responder knows there is a head injury that had immediate traumatic effects. The odds aren't good. Nobody called for air lift, or put it on standby, that I heard, because the ambulance never moved. They were still trying to get a heart rate. Really not good. All this info is on my mind while I move between mom and dad, trying to assure them, to help them in any way I can.

Finally the ambulances all leave for the hospital. The family will stay together, despite the upcoming final news. I finally put my head down on the hood of the chief's truck and begin to cry.

My day turned when the wind began to blow. Actually before that. The tree had some weakness, and when that weakness started, my day was altered. That weakness grew until Christmas, 2011, until that day, when just minutes before, my friends and their children got into their vehicle to go spend Christmas with their relatives on the mainland. They likely never saw the tree break, or heard it. Suddenly, it crashed into their lives, not out of malice, but as a necessary response of nature to the strong but not really bad wind that day. We've had worse. At that moment their day turned, and someone called 911.

Then my day turned. The lives of my family turned, and that of our community. The ripples will roll out for a while. As I sit here crying, typing these words, depressed, shut in, eating stale popcorn for breakfast because I can't motivate for anything else right now, I know this won't last. I will heal, and the community will heal. This couple and their family perhaps slower. Losing a child and sibling cannot be easy. None of us ever saw the moment that culminated in that tree breaking, and yet because of the interdependence of things, on Christmas Day, 2011, our lives were woven traumatically together.

I certainly can't blame the tree, or the victims. There isn't anywhere to put it, and realistically, no reason to blame. I just need to feel the pain and anger, cry the tears, and get on with helping this family recover from their more immediate experience. This is the stuff of life. As a responder, I get to see the ugly side of it. I think that's the lesson. When my pager goes off, I get to be intimately connected with the ugly suffering of others. I get to help, and indirectly so does my family. We are all in this together: the wind, the tree, the patients, the responders, the community, all of us. Knowing our community they way I do, I think we will successfully navigate this turn in our world.

A Brief History of Our Christmas Trees

Last night we celebrated Jody's birthday by putting up the Christmas Tree. It's an annual event, an event she cherishes. Miles, Claire, and Taylor came over. Jode and I had spent the afternoon cleaning and re-arranging so we could make room for the tree, even though this years is smaller than recent trees. Which partly meant that some of the ornaments didn't make it to display this year. Oh well. And I see this morning one of them was batted off by the cats, and another completely shredded. 

The first hiccup was the lights. Jody had some strings of the older style bulbs, meaning bigger, not the little pencil point style. And every time she plugged one in, the fuse would blow. So off to the store to score some LEDs. And then another store, while the rest of us watched Family Guy and Simpsons. Eventually she came back, the lights went on, and the decorating started, among the chuckles, a little beer, and delicious cupcakes Claire had baked that we turned into a version of Suzy Qs. Claire's cupcakes are to die for. Especially the Chocolate/Peanut Butter. 

And then it was done. At least for the most part. The four of us just hung stuff where there was an empty place on the tree. Jody however will now spend the next couple weeks tweaking this arrangement. She has favorites, so she might move them to the front of the tree from where I might have hung it. And as the tree fills more of her vision and imagination, she'll balance it so to speak. Me? I sit back at the end of the night, and marvel at this occasion. There are papers, metal, glass, ceramic, feathers, ribbons, all congregated together in various shapes and colors, and while I bask in this visionary delight, the smell of the tree wafts over me as it warms up and falls open.

Jode finally sat down to check her e-mail, and opened the computer to find a birthday card. We never did crack open the bubbly which I had bought her. I suppose maybe Christmas day. Or not. She relaxes in the glow of the tree to answer Facebook birthday blessings from her friends, while I go to bed. I like this part of year, as her birthday really melds together a time where we spend more time together as a family, as human beings celebrating the turning of the time and by honoring one another by giving gifts. In our house it starts on the 7th, when the tree goes up, a new display of colors, sounds, and fragrances fill the air at our house.