On April 26, 2016 I went to work at Engine 3, Lynn Fire Department, Lynn, Massachusetts.  After more than a decade of working as a professional firefighter EMT, I hung up my bunker gear and started my new life as a farmer.

Sort of.  It’s not quite that simple, really, but that’s the Snapchat version.

There are many reasons why I have decided to change careers at age 45, with 5 years to go until I collect a pension.  Some of these reasons will make sense to you and some of these reasons will make you cock your head to the side like a schnauzer who was just asked if he’d like to go for a ride.  In due time, I’m sure I’ll cover all the reasons but for now, I want to share a story with you that illustrates what I had known for some time:  It was time for me to go.

My papers to leave the department were already turned in and I was spending a lot of time feeling apprehensive that I was making a bad choice.  Was I committing financial suicide? Would my life have meaning once I left the job that was so much a part of my psyche?  Would houses in Lynn ever get put out without my expertise or would fire consume the entire city?  Valid questions, all.

I was working my last night shift – a Saturday night.  Always a pleasure in Sin City.  I had already responded to a call for a gunshot victim who turned out not to be shot, but to have two severely broken ankles as a result of jumping through a second story window to avoid being shot.  For those of you unfamiliar with Lynn, MA, that’s the kind of city it can be.

A little later in the evening we received a call for an elderly man who had been a victim of assault on the commons (the commons being the beautiful park in the middle of the city where you can buy drugs or get stabbed after dark).  When we arrive on scene, we discover an aging miscreant named, let’s say John, who has been beaten up and is moaning loudly while sitting on a bench.  He is also wildly drunk.  I had dealt with John numerous times, usually after he’d been beaten up by random people.  I’m going to assume John’s personality plays some part in these interactions.

Anyway, there are also three gentlemen sitting on another nearby bench being questioned by police regarding the assault.  These three men in their early 20s are adamantly denying any involvement in the assault and claim that when the police showed up they were merely helping them man to his feet because he’d clearly been beaten.  Now, this isn’t my first time on a scene like this, so I’m not convinced by their story, per se, but they are telling it well enough that I’m not dismissing it, either.

It takes a little doing and more conversation than I’d prefer to have with John, but he finalizes his decision that he doesn’t want to go to the hospital.  Among other things he explains he is from Revere.  Or Lynn.  Or Chelsea.  Or Revere.  His father was a state police captain.  He isn’t sure who beat him up, but they weren’t Irish, if you know what he means (I did know what he meant, unfortunately). He used to be an alcoholic and he currently lives in Revere.  Spoiler alert:  I already know where he lives and it isn’t Revere – it’s a boarding house about 50 meters away.

Before we escort John back to his room at the Kensington (which is his boarding house – all the boarding houses in Lynn have fancy names like the Kensington, The Ruth, The Floridon, etc.   Anyone thinking they’re going to get a nice room at a place with a fancy name like The Mayflower is in for a rude awakening), the police ask him to ID the potential suspects in his assault.  This takes some time to explain and sink in.  Then the police lead him over and ask the suspects to stand, one at a time.

Here’s the thing about the city of Lynn.  We have a wonderfully diverse criminal element.  Roving bands of robbers, drug dealers and general riff-raff are likely to have people from multiple ethnic backgrounds and national origins.  Honestly, if you’ve ever seen a terrible 1980s movie with a gang in it, they have the same diverse make-up that you’ll find in Lynn criminals.  And Lynn, perhaps not coincidentally, is where Hollywood has started to come and film when they want a city that looks like it stopped progressing in 1982.
Which is why the first suspect to stand up is a white guy (read: Irish) whom John looks at and says, “Nah, not him.”

Suspect number two is a Hispanic guy and John says, “Maybe.”

Suspect number three is a very dark skinned black man from either Africa or Haiti (I couldn’t quite hear him well enough to determine the accent).  John takes a look at him and says, “Definitely that one.”

For those of you keeping track, that’s the white guy didn’t do it, the darker skinned guy might have and the really dark skinned guy definitely did it.  Brilliant bit of assistance provided by one super drunk, racist derelict.

Then the cops arrest all three of them.  Turns out that the gang unit officer in plain clothes actually showed up on scene and watched all three of them kicking this dude and was the first officer to intervene.

 

Now, the point of the story.  Which comes in two parts.

First, I was getting fed up with people in general.  Dealing with people who stab and shoot each other, overdose multiple times, lie to you about what drugs their friend has done rather than tell the truth so you can help him – it was starting to take a toll on me.  Some people can do it forever, but I was starting to hate people.  Like, really losing my compassion for helping anyone.  And I didn’t really want to lose that completely.

But second, this incident gave me a glimmer of hope.  Why?  Because I was still willing to give the benefit of the doubt to these three idiots who had just beaten an alcoholic old man for no reason.  Yes, I was still skeptical about their story, but I was willing to listen to what they had to say and take it into account.  There was still some hope for humanity in my eyes.

 

It was definitely time to go.  The decision had already been made and I was glad to have confirmation that it was the right one.