Text Preview
For me, National First Responders Day is personal.
My son was supposed to spend the night at his sister’s apartment in Washington, D.C., when disaster struck. At around 1 a.m., she called me, frantic, saying that he still had not arrived. I drove into the city and started walking the blocks between her apartment and the last place she had talked to him.
In Chinatown, I came to an intersection that was blocked off, with lights, an ambulance, and people holding up their phones. There were police officers at the edge of it. I walked up to one of them and said, “Excuse me, sir. I am looking for my son.” He looked at me the way you would look at someone who interrupts an emergency to ask for directions. He asked my son’s name. His face changed when I answered, and he asked me to repeat myself. I did.
“Ma’am,” he said, “this is for him.” He held his hand out toward the intersection. “Your son was hit by a car. The paramedics are getting ready to take him to the hospital.”
I remember what I saw in the next minute better than almost anything in my life. Officers were already interviewing bystanders on the sidewalk. People were moving fast to get a gurney into the ambulance. The officer offered to drive me to the hospital. By the time we got there, the ambulance had already arrived, and they were working to save my son’s life. They would not let me see him.
Later, while I sat in the waiting room, a paramedic came by to see how I was holding up. I asked how my son was while he worked on him at the scene.
at the original publisher
Preview excerpt — approximately 287 words shown. The full piece is at the link above.
Selected for Rip's readers. Article text and links belong to the original publisher.