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It was Sunday afternoon; I was quite comfortable in my reclining chair watching the Pro Bowl football game when my publisher, Susan Hodge, called me. She wanted to know if I had heard about the fires in Hollister. I told her no but I would look into it. Within a few minutes I was on the Internet and reading the WRAL-TV account of what was fast becoming a major news event.
I then called Jan Myrick, wife of Lee Myrick, fire chief of the Littleton Volunteer Fire Department. I had met her for the first time on Saturday morning at the Littleton Lions Club pancake breakfast. She was there with her husband to receive a donation check from the Lions and the Littleton Lake Gaston Festival Committee.
Jan provided me some initial information about the fires. When I asked her if there was anything I could do she said not that she knew of, but she would call back if something came up. She told me she was staying close to the emergency radio so she could keep up with everything,
After a few moments of indecision I got dressed and headed up to the Littleton fire house. As I was pulling into the parking area I noticed the television on in the lounge and one person watching it. One of the trucks was out of the garage so I thought things were pretty much under control.
After I parked and went inside I quickly learned that the truck in the garage was there in case anything happened around town. They left one firefighter and a truck in both the Littleton firehouse and the substation for local emergencies.
There were four or five people inside the lounge, a fireman and two women and a teenage boy and I think another little girl. My apologies to all of them for not getting their names. They greeted me warmly and started talking about the day’s events.
I quickly learned that they had been fighting fires since before noon. In fact, Tommy Myrick and his wife, Teresa, were at church when they got the call. I immediately thought to myself this is another one of those situations where you don’t realize what people do to help the community until you see it or get involved yourself.
For me it was a choice. I was sitting at home trying to figure out if I wanted to interrupt my day and go out to see what was going on. They, on the other hand, have a commitment to the community to be there whenever they are needed.
I say they because when it comes to volunteer firemen the entire family volunteers whether we realize it or not. In this case it was not only them but also their daughter, Ashley, that decided to also give back to their community.
Within minutes Ashley and Lauren Lesack came in with Assistant Chief Dale Bobbitt. They were returning from a fire on Medoc Mountain road. Ashley is a junior at Halifax Academy and Lauren is a senior at Warren County High School, more importantly they are Junior Firefighters.
They came in all excited because they were able to do more than just deliver the sandwiches they took out to the firefighters. They were excited because they were involved in the actual fighting of the brush fire. I learned later that as junior firefighters there are a lot more things they couldn’t do at a fire scene than there are things they can do.
Listening to the girls relate their story of what they did with all the excitement they were telling it was great. It was the same kind of excitement you would expect of young people when they are able to experience something they really wanted to do. In addition they had cell phones and were showing pictures they took at the scene.
The pictures I saw showed that they were indeed in the thick of the fires. The pictures showed firefighters standing in front of flames ten feet high or higher throughout the entire area. Assistant Chief Bobbitt assured me that they were in no danger, but were very useful. A comment was made that this was a good experience for Lauren; she plans to attend North Carolina State in the fall to study forestry.
They commented a couple of times about getting clean clothes that didn’t smell like smoke. I thought that it was typical of how I would expect a couple of young girls to be acting. I commented that they should wear the clothes to school to let their friends know what they did on Sunday. They both smiled at me and politely said no way.
I immediately thought why did you say that, they now think that you are a weird old man who is really out of touch.
I also thought that there is hope for at least some of these young people. These two junior firefighters, Littleton has three junior firefighters, really went beyond what one would expect for kids there age. To be honest it made me proud to think that I live in the same community as they do.
It wasn’t long before Teresa and Ashley headed home. I don’t know how long Teresa had been there, but she mentioned that her husband left from church to go to the fire. It really made no difference how long she was there, the fact is she, like many other wives locally, and thousand of wives or husbands nationally, give up precious time with their loved ones so they can give back to their community.
At that point I recalled what Jan Myrick told me the day before after they received the donation from the Lions. When I was trying to get information from Lee for a caption I caught him off guard. Jan stepped right in and told me that they spend hundreds of hours a year training and keeping their equipment and the firehouse ready to go.
Lee seemed a little embarrassed that he could not figure out all the hours, at that point I made the comment that for him and other volunteers they probably just did it without thinking of the hours it takes.
I, for one, would like to take this opportunity to say thank you to all the volunteer firefighters who do such a great job in Littleton and around the lake. They have to meet the same standards as paid firefighters do; yet they do this as a volunteer taking up their time outside of their regular jobs.
Thank you for all you do, and thank you to Ashley and Lauren for showing me that there are kids who really care about their community.
Maurice Emery is the Editor of The Littleton Observer.
Visit the site at: www.littletonobserver.com
Read and share his past columns with your friend at www.athoughtortwo.com
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| Come join me as I continue my journey through life. Let’s talk about life and what’s happening today and what we would like to see happen tomorrow. |
| April 26, 2008 |
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What started out as a once a week blog, has really turned into once a month. Hopefully I’ll get back to once a week some day.
I’ve failed at loosing weight once again. I lost about 90 lbs and put back on 40 all in one year. My swimming has slowed to once or twice a month. All this just so I can be the editor of a weekly newspaper.
My sleep problems continue to depress me. After such good results from my latest sleep test there seems to be a minimum upside to it all. That is that my foot no longer feels cold or stays in pain while I sleep.
The doctor put me on a regimen of pills one to keep me awake all day the other to put me to sleep each. He hopes that after 3- 6 months my body will reverse a life time of lousy sleep.
I tried the free samples without much success. I decided to get the prescription anyway. Shocked and changed my mind when I found out one will cost $328.00 a month with no insurance coverage for this med.
This is the one that is supposed to keep me awake all day to force me to sleep only at night. The lady at the pharmacy told my wife, he really shouldn’t need this pill, just tell him to stay up. My wife laughed away. Like if it was that easy I would have it years ago.
The sad part for me is that I find it even more difficult to remember things. I spend more time making sure of definitions of words when I write and verifying fact that I have known for years.
Stay tuned for more adventures.
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| March 22, 2008 |
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Easter Saturday has come quickly this leap year. It is beautiful here in NC unlike many other parts f the country. Even thought the weather is beautiful, I suffer from a head cold.
My battle to get better sleep continues. I have had to try a full face bipap mask, but was not successful. Now I have rigged up a chin harness to try to keep my mouth shut, my family always said that was a problem I have. The new homemade harness seems to work the best, but it is still a struggle to get good sleep.
The political issue of the week is basically does sitting in a pew in a church for twenty-years and becoming a close friend with your minister impact on how you think.
It is easy to say birds of a feather, but that as everyone knows is not always the case. Some people hang onto certain relationships in spite of what the person is like. They do this because there are other areas of the relationship that they can benefit from in a positive way. I have no problem understanding this.
What I have problems with is hypocrisy. When Obama felt that Geraldine Ferraro should be cut from the Clinton campaign, then he should also cut his minister. When Obama felt that Clinton was not being entirely truthful, then he should come out and say he misspoke when he said he was never in a pew when his minister made disparaging remarks, instead of hiding the comment in such a great speech.
He is such a good orator that he often reminds me of a good illusionist. By expressing one point he hopes to make you forget about another. It is disheartening that both Obama wife and his minister have made public statements about their dislike of America or some Americans.
I am forced to go back to what I said during the Democratic convention when I first heard Obama speak. I turned to my wife and said he will be president some day. When he announced his run for the presidency I once again turned to my wife and said this is too quick. He needs more experience.
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| March 7, 2007 |
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Talk about a rough week and half. The sleep clinic called me on Monday (Feb 25) and scheduled a test for Wednesday night. After it was all over on Thursday Morning I found out that although I had lost the weight, unlike most people, my positive air pressure (the PAP part of CPAP) went up.
The partial results showed that in my approximately three and half hours of sleeping (actually 216 minutes) I had 340 sleep disruptions. That is one disruption for every 2/3 of a minute sleeping. I had 278 episodes where I stopped breathing. Thirty seven of those were over 10 seconds. I had no REM sleep periods.
The nurse and I were both surprised. For most people the more weight they lose the lower the pressure goes. In some cases they have lost enough weight to go off the machine.
Not me, mine almost doubled. It went from 12cm to 21cm. This also required that I change machine from a CPAP to BIPAP, Bi pressure. The long and the short of it is that the machine is set to 21cm pressure breathing in and only 17cm of pressure to breathe out. The outward pressure is lower to allow me to breathe out.
Even after the pressures were set for the new machine the report shows that I slept Just a little over three hours (186 minutes). I was able to get one half hour of REM sleep. I still had 130 sleep disruptions. But I only had 36 episodes where I stopped breathing.
Friday afternoon I was sitting in the offices of Eagle Home Medical with their nurse Kay to be instructed on how to use the new BiPAP machine. This was by far the most informative instructions I have ever had on sleep apnea and the use of a PAP machine. It was the first time that I knew that sleep apnea is hereditary from the male side of the family.
Tried the new unit on Friday night and continued to use it the rest of the weekend. This was a lot more difficult machine to get used to than the CPAP was. The major problem for me is that I use only a nose mask, and my mouth got so dry that it woke me up. Plus the nose mask kept digging into the bottom of my nose. I solved the nose mask problem by readjusting it several times. I am still trying to solve the dry mouth problem.
To overcome this we bought a room humidifier, this was recommended by the literature. After the humidifier was setup the dryness decreased but not enough to prevent the dry mouth from waking me up, it just was not as severe.
This is now four days later and the problem has not gone away. I will be going back in for a new full face mask next week. To be fair she wanted to use a full face to begin with, but I resisted. For now my sleep is much like it has always been, disruptive. The nurse told me it could take up to three to four weeks for me to feel the effects of the new pressures.
My waking periods are better. They allow me to focus longer than I could, but are still talking about only a couple of hours not all day. We’ll see what happens next.
Just so you don’t think I have forgotten, Hillary did win three this week. Obama still reminds me of a lot of sales people I have hired over the years. They knew the right things to say to get the job, but could never do the job. They had the instant comebacks no matter what the questions were.
I guess I am slanted about sales person being president with virtually no time on the national scene. Change is almost always good; change with virtually no experience always leads to longer learning curve at the very least.
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| February 23, 2008 |
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Time moves on. My sleeping is such a disaster that I had a new sleep test run.
Not only is sleeping a problem, when I am awake my memory is shot. It is more than just old age, it is like my mind is never on one track.
You would think being able to go into a hospital and sleep all night would be a breeze. You have a private room that is always away from the usual hospital activity. Problem is they have twenty or more wires hooked up to you.
I prepared for the test by getting up earlier than usual and not taking a nap all day. I also restricted my cokes after lunch. I was extremely tired when arrived at the hospital for the test.
The nurse was great; she had the same sense of humor as I do. The wires go all over your body. They have sensors on your legs, chest and all over your head. They even hook up a microphone to your throat to listen for snoring.
It took another hour to get ready for me to go to sleep. I knew I would have no trouble sleeping. Within minutes of hitting the pillow, I brought my own from home, I was asleep. Then just like at home within minutes I was wide awake.
With all those wires you couldn’t get up or move off the bed. So I kept trying to go back to sleep. I had a couple of brief periods of sleep. Just like I was at home it was hours before I had any good sleep. The last time I checked the time it was 2:30 a.m. then at 5 a.m. they woke me up to get ready to leave.
The first thing the nurse said was I would be back to get fitted for another CPAP (sleeping) machine. Don’t know when this will happen, but I look forward to being able to sleep better than I have and not have so much trouble thinking.
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| Feb 7, 2008 |
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And the battle goes on. I have taken on a little more responsibility, but I look forward to it. My weight is in limbo, my swimming is down to a mile or so a week, but still there.
The real pressure is in following the presidential primaries. Hillary is still in the race, but it is getting tougher. Obama seems to be a good man but he is still a man at a time when a woman should be taking over the reigns.
I am reminded of when I used to hire sales people or managers with only a couple of years experience. They had enthusiasm. They had confidence. They could present a great case as to why I should hire the. But in the end they also had a learning curve that was far greater than what even they thought it would be.
Obama talks about wanting to be right before he makes decisions. If you have ever been in a position to make decision that impacts on others, you know that you can’t always insure you will be right. Sometimes you just gather all the facts and do the best you can. I know of many business people who always wanted to be right and in the end did nothing.
I love to say successful people make things happen. Successful people also adapt as they go forward, because they know that few decisions into new territory are completely right from the onset of the decision.
There is nothing wrong with change, but we should have change with experience. Hillary has the best experience between her and Obama, she also has the best council anyone could have.
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January 10, 2008
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| Okay, so like a lot of people I have gained some weight back (Twelve pounds to be exact). What do you expect from a holiday that had many ups and downs?Today I started back at the swimming pool and swam a half mile, it felt like two miles. So now I hope to continue to work on building up my strength and moving forward. My goal is to swim at least two miles at one time once a month. With sleep apnea and sleep onset insomnia combined with the pressure of the holidays I have only been getting about one to two hours of sleep at a time. From the emails I receive it appears that many of us are up during the night or in my case not even in bed yet.Then there is the election, we’ll talk a lot about that this year, but it has kept me up and concerned. That’s it for now. |
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