Tuesday, June 17, 2008

Write What You Know

I've mentioned before that as a rule I don't really write about work, as this is not a work blog. Sometimes, I think, life intrudes upon my best intentions. This blog started out life purely as a training blog focusing on one corner of my life. That is about to change, if only because there isn't much training to talk about right now. My walking is... mobile, my flowfit is... flowy, my ass still hurts. That makes for boring posting day in and day out. That makes for no posting day in and day out. Mostly the people that still read this leave comments like "gee, sorry your butt hurts" along with pointing me in the direction of some relief (thanks, ABW).

So. *deep breath* I work for 911. Today, following a pattern that I have established lately-- I took a call that ended up needing a coroner instead of an ambulance. Well to be fair, the ambulance got there and determined their services weren't needed and then called for the coroner, and I wasn't the only one handling the call, multiple people were calling and multiple people were dispatching help. But still... I see dead people.

My particularly macabre sense of humor about all of this is part of the job defense mechanism I suppose. I recognize that the patient was someones mother, (and probably grandmother in this case) who's life was cut short in the middle of what was a probably a very routine day. She was probably running an errand when she was t-boned, but I'll never know. I take some comfort in the fact that it was not a suicide, I've had a few of those lately. My fellow workers tell me "the death thing" wears off in about a year.

It's not all bad. I had a caller dial and hang up, and when I called back she was screaming for an ambulance. After I got her calmed down and things in order she asked me how I knew to call.

"911 clairvoyant service ma'am, we're a beta testing center, it'll be nationwide soon."