Almost finished basic training

I planned to submit posts to this site regularly, but life got in the way. I've forgotten about my normal neurotic fascination with dying, why I can't break through into the writer's market, how I'm getting old, and what a waste my life will all be if I can't leave something substantial behind to prove I'm here. I've forgotten these things because I'm too focused on living life. I don't even suffer anxiety attacks anymore. I'm too busy. Isn't it bizarre how being consumed with the art of survival and helping others, can remove all the fears you have surrounding those very things? You would imagine that keeping away from the things that trigger your fears would be sensible, yet it's facing them that works. This is common sense I suppose, but there is something paradoxical about it as it throws you into the very situation you fear, and the fear is not unfounded in this case at least. I may find myself in that life threatening situation one day. Suddenly everything is in clear and logical perspective, Grab life, tear a big chunk off it and chew like mad, because it's so fleeting and in the end, you really only have minimal control.

I've spent all winter shivering in turtleneck jumpers and tracksuit pants under cotton yellow turn out gear; getting wet at the ends of hoses, at the sides of hydrants, by the edges of rivers, having fun, fun, fun, (except for that bout of swine flu we all got,) knowing all the while that the day it will come when I won't be simply freezing in a mild Victorian winter, but boiling like a stuffed lobster in the next unbearable Victorian summer. The same cotton suit that barely keeps me warm now, will feel like it's suffocating me then. I've been training all winter for that day.

I've been reading my wildfire firefighting training manual, learning how to read maps, how to predict the course of a running fire over the map, how to choose safe routes to the fire, how to use two-way radio communication and memorize all the call signs, how to read army time, understand wildfire suppression theory, learn different kinds of firefighting attacks and strategies, how to protect the point of origin, chain of command, asset and property protection, pump operations, extinguishing agents, hand tools and hoses and fittings ... is that all? I think so though something tells me not quite ... working around machinery and aircraft? PPC, protecting yourself in a flashover, how to draught water from a creek or river?

On top of that I turned up to my local brigade every Sunday and when I can on Wednesday nights to practice all these things, and whatever else is going on, even when I'm not training to qualify for the other things.

We have our last prac session this coming Sunday and then have two weeks break to go back to our station and practice draughting and knot tying until our final practical assessment. Mapping assessment was my biggest challenge, although I did manage reasonably well, but I blitzed the wildfire suppression paper. My assessor said I'd done the best assessment paper he'd ever marked, "If I didn't know better I'd have thought you cheated .. textbook." Am I proud? Hell yeah! I threw everything into learning it. And I was encouraged to be proud by the assessor's big smile.
I know it might be considered sexist, but a lot of this stuff does come more naturally to the men and I felt I had to work very hard at it. The skills involved were not skills I exercised regularly, especially on the mechanical side of things.

Anyway, that's six months of training down and even now I sense just how green we are and how much more we have to learn on the field. What happens next? After we complete the course, our captain is issued with our pagers, and he decides when each of us are ready to begin turning out. We get our very own set of yellows with boots and helmets.