Cold Comfort

Another tale from the glamorous life of a small town reporter.It is 5:30 in the morning and I am, naturally, in my nice, warm bed with a pair of nice, warm cats keeping me, well, nice and warm. This is important, given it was four degrees outside and a windchill of minus seven. I didn't know this at the time, because I was sleeping, like people with normal jobs.But not for long.When I lived in big cities, like San Francisco or Seattle, there were sirens blaring past my apartment at all hours of the day and night. It happened so often that, soon, I barely noticed. I even got to the point where I could sleep right through the piercing electronic shrieks as they approached my bedroom window, getting higher pitched and then lower pitched as they receded, thanks to a thing called the Doppler effect. (Thanks to my high school science teacher for explaining the Doppler effect to me.)Well, I got over that pretty fast after I moved to small town Nebraska. Fairbury may not be the most silent place on the planet but it's sure as heck a lot quieter than San Francisco or Seattle.My point is, when I heard the sirens my eyes instantly popped open and I could see the flashing red and blue lights through the window shades and curtains.When I first started this job, I instantly rushed to every report of every wisp of smoke and every little fender bender and every other reason a deputy or firefighter might have for turning on a siren. I was always full of enthusiasm (or something like that), but that was a long time ago.Okay, it wasn't all that long ago, but it was still long enough for me to get tired of chasing after fires with my camera, only to find it out long before I arrived or even that it was a false alarm.On the other hand, it is my job to cover these things. So now, when I hear a report of a fire, the first thing I do is ask myself, do I really want to do this? The answer is always, “No.” Then I ask myself, do I really NEED to do this? The answer is usually, “Yes.”I've rushed out to fires in the middle of the night still in my pajamas. There is no experience quite like standing in the street, in the dark, in a freezing puddle, in your bedroom slippers, clicking away with your camera. Hey, sometimes you gotta skip the niceties if you wanna get that shot.Like I said before, it was four degrees outside and windy. I decided to risk missing the shot and took the time to put on pants. Unfortunately, I couldn't find my hat, a stripey bobble hat that was a gift from a family member. I'm probably going to catch heck for losing it.I'm also expected to wear one of those reflective neon yellow vests that is supposed to help keep me from getting hit by a truck when I'm standing in the middle of the street in the dark. Only, I put on my heaviest winter coat and discovered the vest won't go over it. Again, four degrees, so I wasn't changing into a lighter coat. I just tied it around my neck like a cape. The lamest superhero ever.All this before I even got outside, let alone got to the scene of the fire.The moment I stepped outside, that wind hit my bare forehead and, wham, instant headache.At the scene of the fire, I was snapping pics while firefighters were running around in the dark, making sure everyone was safe, hooking up hoses, climbing up ladders, carrying all that heavy equipment and doing it all in the same frigid weather I'm now whining about. Watching these guys and gals go through all this makes it hard to feel sorry for myself.I said hard, not impossible. I had to clamp my mouth shut because every time I opened it, even a little bit, the wind made my teeth ache. Despite my gloves, my fingers hurt. My head throbbed. My dry skin crackled like old wax paper.When it was all over, I headed to the office to write up the story and then I had to come up with a column for today's paper. I couldn't think of anything else, which is why you are reading this.

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