It’s Not the Flames That Kill You

Fire. Flames. Destruction. Death. In a structure fire, it’s not direct contact with the fire that generally kills people. What ends life is inhaling the hot gases, breathing in the products of combustion. A scorched airway, carbon monoxide, cyanide, or other toxic gases: these are the killers. For firefighters, add structural collapse, heart attack, getting disoriented and separated from your crew, and running out of air to the list. Secondary effects kill many more than the flames themselves. So what’s this got to do with life, writing, and soul work?

Quite a lot, I’m learning. For nearly two years, a metaphorical fire has been destroying “my life as I’ve known it.” And, as fire always does, it is transforming one thing into another, into something I don’t yet recognize. The surgeries, the lingering complications that ended my firefighting and EMT days, the divorce, getting laid off from my web design job – those are just the flames. The “products of combustion” and the secondary effects are much more difficult to face. Fear, anger, doubt, depression, these are the soul-killers. These are what can leave me feeling like I am heart-stoppingly alone in a burning building with my low-air alarm shrilling, sure that I am about to pay the price for having misjudged both my strength and my supply, and wishing the whole thing would just fall in on me and get it over with.

I keep writing anyway, using words like the line of rope I used to trail behind me when doing a primary search, or the act of checking the hose couplings to determine which way to exit when the evacuation order sounds. Doggedly pursuing words has brought me through the fire and out the other side.

And now, the smoke is clearing. It is still night and the moon slides through the clouds like a glowing dolphin coursing through a black sea. I pull off the sooty mask, the thick gloves; I ditch the heavy SCBA. Next to go are the red helmet and the protective hood. I peel off my turnouts. Nearly 50 pounds of gear shed, laying like a snake’s cast off skin, in pale, moonlit contrast to the scorched ground. The night breeze plays through my hair and kisses my darkened, sweaty face.

I laugh. I have to admit it. As I look over the apparent disaster and pick through the charred rubble of my life, I feel a sense of freedom that I haven’t experienced in a long, long time. The whole thing starts to look a lot like arson.

I can’t really blame the destruction on the faulty wiring in my house of cards. No, on some level, I lit the match myself the day the Universe asked, “Ready for your life to change?” and I said ,”Yes.” Fiat. The Universe and I just had to clear out some debris first. And, as unrepentant as most firebugs, I keep returning to the scene of the crime to inspect our handiwork. Not half bad.