It has been an emotional roller coaster since the last time I have written. For some fuck known reason, I chose to make excuses about everything that had happened. There were many ups and downs at work, and it knocked me on my ass. In national news, a police officer was shot and killed. This resulted in a threat towards us EMTs. These actions caught us all off guard and we suddenly went from being the heroes, to the targets. For the first time in my ems career and working in jersey city, I felt a fear for my life.
The subsequent days became longer. It was a mad scramble by all of our team to try and secure yourself a bullet proof vest. Your news feed and phone are flooded with messages of rumors and potential threats against you. What is real? What is a hoax? What is someone just looking to get you excited? Deep down you know it's just everyone looking out for your best interest. But it gets to a point where you really don't want to hear it anymore. You become tired of seeing the warnings, yet you never let that constant worry out of the back of your mind. You keep your head on a constant swivel, and you realize one thing... That the town you loved so well, has all changed in the blink of an eye.
Your normal bullshitting around with your partner before the shift, turns into a discussion of what you heard may be going down and making sure that each other's vests are fitting correctly. Now as you get into the truck, you realize more than ever, that it's real now, and you may not come home.
You become vigilant, almost to the point of paranoia. People who you would walk by on the street, are suddenly a possible threats. You can no longer go grab the casual cup of coffee at 7-11, without having to keep your back against the wall. You no longer park your vehicle in an area where someone may approach it from an unknown area. Your fatigue level goes into overdrive. You're fighting to keep your eyes open and the act of remaining vigilant wears you out. You think it's all over with, and you realize that you are only 2 hours in. There is still 10 to go.
You struggle to sit comfortable in your truck. And you begin to realize the things that are more difficult do. For example, it is really difficult to take a shit with a vest on. It's also a real pain in the ass to bend over to pick up small objects. But this is your life now. Some people have chose to stop wearing them, and that's their right to do so. I know the partnership that I have, we both wear ours, despite them being very hot and uncomfortable.
But again, this has become the normal around town. You are faced with the moral difficulty of wearing Kevlar to work, not because you want to. It helps those who don't know what you see. The family and friends who care about you, that you know you couldn't ever tell what you have seen. And that if you ever did, it would give them nightmares. They would never be able to shake.
All night, you ponder: Why should we do this? We are the good guys! We are the ones who help people! Why are we suddenly targets? It's not supposed to work this way!
Unfortunately, there is no time to stop and think about these kinda of things. You just have to strap on your boots and go to work. There's no time to be scared, there is a job to be done. In reality, Most of us have all accepted our fate in that if we get taken out on the job, it was just in the cards that way. However, you put it on everyday for your loved ones in hopes that they will be able to sleep a little easier until you walk back in that door.
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