Kelly, Hallie and I packed things up this morning for a daylong trip to the zoo. We were on our way down the road when I remembered we didn’t grab a large umbrella we meant to take. We went back to the house and a few minutes later, we were on way again.
Our trip hit a major snag when traffic ground to a halt on U.S. 1 near Cary Parkway. Mere minutes before, a van collided with a parked car in a fiery crash. Had I not turned the car around for the missing umbrella, we may have been in the exact spot where the crash occured.
The crash has been on my mind throughout the day: what could’ve happened differently had we been there. Could we have been involved? Could it have happened at all? Or, the most tantalizing of all, could I have helped save somebody’s life?
My fellow traveler on my business trip is a coworker who is also a volunteer firefighter. Much of the time spent traveling during the trip was spent talking about EMS and firefighting stories. I told my colleague how I was interested in actually doing some of this stuff.
And its true. I’ve long wanted to learn more first aid, and I learned some basic firefighting skills in the Navy. I’ve happened upon accidents where I assisted victims, but had I had more training, I could have done so much more. I cannot stand the thought of being at the scene of an accident and not knowing what to do to help. The very idea of not knowing is the scariest part.
I don’t exactly have copius amounts of spare time now, but I intend to find out what it takes to become trained, either as a volunteer EMT or maybe even a volunteer firefighter. The training is free, the work is immensely more satisfying than sitting in front of a computer, and I may be in the right place at the right time to help someone in need.