Return to the Dream

I slipped into the budget hair stylist with less than 10 minutes to spare before they locked the doors for their 8 p.m. closing. I can only guess that such behavior makes me one of the customers they hate. Fortunate for me, if the woman with the scissors had such feelings tonight, she didn't take them out on my hair.

As I waited alongside another late-comer for the two filled chairs to empty, I picked up a US News & World Report. I absolutely hate to get involved in an article in a magazine that I don't subscribe to with the knowledge that I might not finish it. I'm not sure where that comes from -- just one of my many quirks. So, I skimmed.

Somewhere along the way, I read part of an article about how baby boomers are redefining retirement. The woman used as an example in the first few paragraphs quit her job in the corporate world to bake cookies for a living. So far, the cookie business hasn't made her rich. However, her perspective was this... The corporate work she was doing wasn't want she wanted to be doing when she died. Baking cookies, it seems, was. You've gotta admire a person for not only approaching life like that, but for actually taking action.

Skimming the article got me thinking.

I consider myself absolutely blessed to have the job I have today. Being a firefighter was once my dream job -- one of those things that I expected to always want to do, but never get the chance. Not only did I get the chance, I've been a firefighter for six years now and paying the bills by doing it for four. Who could possibly ask for more? Well, as it turns out, me.

I've been bogged down lately in a job that I love to do. I never imagined how much politics could be involved in a small suburban fire department. I never imagined that there could be people who do my job that want others to fail or that want to hinder the job and not help it along. I was wrong. And for a stretch of time lately, it seems that I've only been able to focus on the negative. That focus was so strong that I can remember one day where I just didn't want to go to work at my dream job. Talk about a sign that something is wrong.

In lieu of any real or meaningful New Year's resolutions, I've decided to make a few April resolutions. Most important of these is that I must worry about the things I can change and do my best to forget everything else. There are folks that will do their best to jump in my path and I've gotta do a better job of jumping over them instead of trying to kick them out of the way (that method was not working). And, finally, I must remember that the firehouse is only 1/3 of my life. The right thing might not be good enough for others, but if it's truly the right thing -- that's all that matters.

If I can put these resolutions in action, perhaps I'll still be riding a fire engine when others of my generation are quitting their job to bake cookies.