When I was coming up, my family lived in a large three story with a barn-like roof. By this, I mean the roof covered the top two stories and sported second and third-story windows, which poked through the overhanging roof. We boys, all seven of us, occupied the third floor while my sole sister and my parents had bedrooms on the second floor.

We lived, at the time, in a cramped residential neighborhood where the houses crowded together cheek-to-jowl in a seemingly singular mass of structures and yards that appeared a hodgepodge to the unaccustomed eye. This close proximity served our family and neighbors well in times of strife as the following story will illustrate.

When I was in my early teens our house nearly burned to the ground if not for the efforts of some extremely courageous firefighters. This fire, later determined to be the result of faulty wiring, started in the aforementioned barn-like roof. Once ignited it swept through the top floors and as mentioned nearly destroyed the whole house. This fire ensued in the late night hours when the entire family was fast asleep.

Fortunately, one of my lighter sleeping brothers was awakened by the flames roaring in the walls and awakened us all in turn. I remember him coming into the room I shared with my brother John. As I watched in amazement, John looked up and seeing flames shooting over his head in fiery darts, rolled sideways off his bed and swiftly helped my brother Chris rouse the rest of the sleeping brood.

My oldest brother Greg, always a heavy sleeper, nearly jumped out of his skin at the first sound of “Fire!” and rumbled down the stairs and out the front door. My brother Chris and I, both guitar players, nimbly rescued our guitars and hastened into the street ourselves. The rest of our family stood in scarcely suppressed horror as we watched the flames engulf our home. Just then, the local fire department arrived and commenced to save our house.

I remember watching these heroes scramble up our front stairs and enter the now raging inferno. One firefighter in particular caught my attention. He had mounted a ladder that was extended up to the top of the roof. There, he opened a trap door that allowed access to the attic. Each time he raised the hatch, flames spurted out in a frightening display of ferocity. As I watched, he stuck the hose he was brandishing down the chute, disgorging copious amounts of water into the blazing maw

While we all stared in utter disbelief, this brave man pulled on his gasmask and descended down the hole and into the gates of hell. Some time later, this superman emerged out the front door covered in soot and coughing up smoke, which no one seemed to notice or even acknowledge. They all thought he was just doing his job, I presumed.

All the while, my dad was performing acts of bravery of his own. Repeatedly, he entered the fiery structure only to re-emerge carrying armloads of clothing and other household items in an attempt to rescue what he could from total destruction. As the father of eight, he was merely protecting his own, I reasoned after digesting all that I witnessed that long-ago night. Finally, the Fire Chief intervened and prevented any more excursions that my father might attempt.

Later, I thought about how crazy-cool the fireman’s actions were; but I also recalled my own dad’s heroics on that wild night. As I dwelt on both men’s actions, I thought how closely related courage and madness really are.

© Stephen Alexander 2008

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