Daily Inspiration

Monday, Monday turns into Tuesday, Tuesday

I did write some miscellaneous thoughts yesterday, but I didn’t place them here. Instead I wrote them in the margin of a notebook that holds more chapters of Jennifer’s Story. Hopefully, I'll be able to understand my own scribbling.

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My mind is overflowing with thoughts this morning. Slow down mind!

On Sunday night around 8:30 or 9 p.m., sirens screamed in the distance, then came closer. I’ve learned to distinguish the sound of sirens stopping at my apartment complex or the stores across the street. It sounded as if they turned down a side street near me. I offered a quick prayer for whatever emergency existed, then went on with what I was doing. Soon I realized that multiple emergency vehicles were somewhere nearby. The sirens kept screaming and wailing. The sounds just weren’t stopping.

I walked out onto my porch, then joined my neighbors who had gathered on the sidewalk. We realized there must be a fire, and close by. The pungent odor of smoke filled the air, and we knew that smell well. Just last year, the hardware store and lumber yard a block away burned to the ground. This smell wasn’t as strong, nor were there paint cans exploding. Still we realized the fire had to be nearby and we were all concerned and curious.

A bunch of us followed the wails of the fire engines. Sure enough, on a street nearby there were at least six fire trucks, an ambulance, and other emergency vehicles. A house was the target of their attention.

The street was full of water, but the house was not ablaze. At first, we figured the fire had already been doused. We were wrong.

A neighbor explained that the woman who owned that house was 90 years old. She was already asleep in her bedroom when something exploded in the house and blew out the windows. As she rose from bed, grabbed her walker and tried to make her way to the telephone, she realized her house was on fire. Fortunately, relatives lived next door, and one of our volunteer firemen lived right across the street. They rescued the woman from her bedroom window.

When more fire fighters arrived, they started fighting the fire in the usual way, with water. But they soon realized they had a different kind of problem. The heater had exploded in this elderly lady’s home. And the fire was in the walls, an electrical fire throughout the entire house.

They took turns suiting up completely, with heavy protection and gas masks and entered the house with fire extinguishers made for electrical fires. Two by two, they entered and fought the blaze within for just minutes before coming back out and collapsing on the lawn outside, blackened by the soot and gasping for breath.

A four-year-old child stood nearby watching, concerned for the fire fighters. One special fire fighter saw that fear in the child’s eyes and made a point of talking with her about fire safety.

We learned that the elderly woman’s husband died just two weeks before. We also learned that she was sitting up in the back of the ambulance, watching the fire fighters. She refused to go to the hospital, saying that she was just fine. She wasn’t concerned about her home or the contents. She just wanted assurance that none of the fire fighters would be hurt. And she wanted to be there so she would know for sure.

As I stood watching the people around me, I distanced myself from them, at least in my mind. My writer’s mind thought about the different kinds of people living in walking distance to my apartment.

The elderly lady, who had recently lost her husband and was in the process of losing everything she owned, was concerned only for those who fought the fire.

Our fire department consists entirely of volunteers. Many of them probably live close by. One lived right across the street from the fire. What special individuals they all were, willing to risk their lives for others. (I forgot to mention that they risked their lives to rescue the woman’s dog, then administered oxygen and first aid to make sure he survived.) A special fire fighter took a few minutes to talk with a small child.

Most of the neighbors in my apartment complex were more concerned than curious. A few of us joined hands and prayed for our fire fighters and for the homeowner, now without a spouse and a home. One neighbor ran to the corner store and bought a case of bottled water for the emergency crews.

Also nearby were other kinds of people. One man emerged from his home just long enough to yell at a volunteer fire fighter whose personal vehicle blocked his driveway.

Back at our apartment buildings were residents who, when asked if they’d heard the sirens, answered, "Who cares. They didn’t come here."

Those same neighbors, who cared not about the fire, the woman whose house burned, nor about the fire fighters, are probably the same ones who haven’t watched one minute of the war happenings. They’re worse than those who thought war was the only answer and worse than those who insisted we must have peace at any cost.

I realized, then, that those neighbors, the ones who can say, "Who cares?" about serious tragedies, are the ones who can ruin a nation.

Apathy spreads like a virus. The children of these "who cares?" people have children who care not as well. They’re being raised without any passion for life, for living. They’re being raised without any joy or hope.

Many of the kids who live near me go to school because they have to, not because they have any passion for learning. If they get excited about anything, it’s about things close to them, things that years from now will not matter. Their worlds don’t extend beyond their own school, their own friends.

In talking with them, I’ve discovered that their ambitions are localized too. The only future they can imagine includes college if necessary for the career they’ve considered, working at something they’ll hate, acquiring a mate, and having children who will be raised to be indifferent too. They don’t envision having families because they love children. It’s just the thing to do.

I wondered what happened to make the fires go out in so many of my neighbors’ hearts and souls. And I wondered what it would take to rekindle them in our future generations.