A note about the holidays
I've struggled with what to say about the holiday, not only because holidays are complex. But because for first responders, that complexity is layered with working through the holidays and…
The days after Thanksgiving
It can be so easy to go from planning a celebration of gratitude (be it thanksgiving or another celebration or tradition) to completely forgetting the things we hold dear and…
To All Veterans
A few years ago I couldn’t find a poem that expressed how I felt, so I wrote one. Dedicated to one particular veteran, who will always live in my heart,…
Sometimes We Can Forget
We can forget that what we are doing is helping people, other human beings: not entering calls, not creating call types, or dispatching units. Yes, all these things play a part in helping others,…
In thinking about reliability
The first time I called 911, I was a child. Someone had broken the window to our duplex, possibly trying to break in while my family settled down for the…
Standards. It’s about what matters most.
A standard that many dispatchers have heard of and certainly most dispatchers think about all the time (consciously or subconsciously) is the standard of answering 90 percent of all 911…
Are your days off a blur?
Sometimes my days off were a blur; sometimes, it was all a blur. And it got old & exhausting really quick. Something that helped me get out of the blur…
Our Knowledge Matters
Compound= make (something bad) worse; intensify the negative aspects of. (1) Stigma= shame associated with a particular circumstance, quality, or person (2) Anyone that knows me knows that I LOVE…
Tired+Tired=More Complaints
Callers are tired from the pandemic and so are those providing service during the pandemic. Tired+Tired=More Complaints. That does not mean that we should lower quality standards or throw our hands…
Good News, Bad News
Good news and bad news is a game I play with my kids when we are running late to school. Good news, I say, is that we are almost there.…