While trying to check the welfare of a one such an older man several years ago, I came across a very common problem for the Emergency Worker, a dog, a big dog,  mean big  dog. It did not start off as a big dog, but a little dog turned into a big dog. Let me explain.

As with other older persons with a medical alarm, Frank was no different, even after we explained it to him at least a dozen times he still did the same thing again and again. With his medical alarm it was always the same, Frank would leave his house and forget he had the medical alarm around his neck. When he got to the end of his range for the medical alarm it would send an emergency signal to the alarm company

   We helped him with the illness and subsequent death of his wife; in fact we were on the call when his wife died. they had been married for 57 years when she died, Frank was as nice as he could be, he had been in WWII, had some sort of medals, but never really told us much about them. His yard had a four foot chain link fence; inside that fence was a little dog. It was a little shaggy flea bag mutt named Buster. Buster would try his best to bite us every chance he got. Being as savage as his little five pound body would or could be.

Frank loved that little dog even more than he did himself, he showered Buster with love and affection, he bought him steak, Frank would eat hamburger.

Because of the little dog, we had a routine, one Firefighter would shake the fence to distract the dog and the other would go and check the house to see if Frank was home or hurt. We would get the hidden key, go inside and look around to make sure that he was not home, you just never know!

  We went to his house as always, we were about half way up the sidewalk to the door when we heard a wolf growl from up under the house. We looked at each other and stopped dead in our tracks!

We both saw a monster coming from under the house; we saw this beast frantically clawing his way out from under the house he was huge! His mouth was as wide as the Tyrannosaurus Rex…. dogs that eat fireman and their partners. We ran to the fence, and tried to open it in a panic…we did not have enough time and we vaulted over it from a standing position.

My foot caught the top of the fence, I tumbled over and I fell on my face, I jumped up and turned around just in time to see my partner make his leap, as he jumped I saw that the little dog had him by the pants leg…… his tighty whiteys now showing and also exposed was a fresh scratch about a foot long, a trickle of blood was coming from it…

Partly used can of Pepper spray that the Cops gave us last shift….. The big bad dog yelped as if hit by a speeding car, turned and never stopped yelping. He then placed his face to the ground and ran straight away, he rolled over and got up again and ran with his face on the ground, in an effort to rub the offending pepper out of his eyes…..

The big dog grabbed the Buster in a rage, biting him and shaking him like a rag doll. Both of our jaws dropped, our eyes popped open and a feeling of total helplessness swept over us.

Our act of revenge had cost Buster his life…. Buster landed in a heap near the fence where we were, he was yelping and howling so much! Our hearts felt for him as he continued to yelp. He bounced up and ran under the house,

   We did not tell anyone what happened. We reported that the man was not home and that we were out of service and returned to the station to clean up….two hours latter we made up an excuse to go by Franks house to check on him.

 The dog still had a piece of ham in his mouth. A nice small circle with blood still coming out of it was in the middle of his forehead….. he was digging a hole…. old guy said, “You boys help me enough, I will do this”,  In almost unison we said” we’ll help” and I drug the big dog nearer the hole and we took turns digging the hole deeper than it should be, I think in part to cover all of the evidence against us.

We went to Franks yesterday, he is dead…..I felt a wave of grief over take me…, I fought back tears….. He left a letter addressed to you two….

I opened the letter, it was hand written by Howard. With a quavering voice I read it out loud. In it he thanked us for all of the care we had given him over the years, he named us both, he thanked us for helping him nurse Buster back to health and thanked us for not telling on him…… He said that he loved Billy and Bobby as if they were his own Sons; it was then that I broke down and started crying….

 Phil from C shift picked up the letter and finished reading it for me! He said we should be proud and hold our chest out like men, as it takes a man to care for someone as much as we did him. How he knew what kind of men we were, how he would have died for us.

   Phil was still reading the letter when a call came in for a car wreck on the interstate with entrapment, we still had tears welling in our eyes,” You want us to take the call, Phil asked? I looked at Bobby; he wiped his eyes and shook his head no! I looked at Phil and said,

 “No thank you my Brother” gave him a nod and a handshake, and ran to get into the Rescue to help someone else who needed us!

Once a man has heard a scream that he knows means his death, he changes, well at least his underwear, Tims scream made me do that!

The call came in as an ill person, which in Emergency workers eyes can mean almost anything! It can range for an actual ill person, to a multiple shooting, and NO I AM NOT KIDDING!!!…….. …My partner Tim walked to the front door, saying “Fire dept” over and over again, in an effort to get someone’s attention. No answer, we walked to the door, Tim knocked on the front door with the flashlight,……. A guttural scream is one that comes from your feet and works its way up to your mouth, all the while gathering momentum and strength……. Tim’s scream caught me by surprise, I did not see the mans face in the window until I was on my way down from apparently trying to jump to the roof of the house to get away from the danger that Tim had obviously faced…from my point of view, I was about to be killed by a madman with an AXE! After, peeling parts of the side of the building off with my fingers and shoes, in my effort to avoid death. I came back to rest on the front porch… I looked and the disfigured man in the window…. His ears were gone, eyelids rebuilt… She was really weak and exhausted, the tables were now turned, and he now was her caretaker, …….. this Son was going to take care of his Mom, no nursing home for her. They would take care of each other until death claimed one of them!