Traffic Patterns

    I leaned my head out the window as I am known to do... taking in the wind, the sunset, the smell of summer and BBQ.  Feeling warm, comfortable and totally intent on enjoying the evening; sirens and awaiting trauma victim be damned. Not insensitive, just not out of the ordinary.  Pretty music sang back-up to the crackling of the scanner and the main street in the township was that awesome, late-afternoon-glowy scene, still busy, winding through the end of rush hour.  To others, we're disruptive to this setting: changing traffic patters, piercing the air with shrill sounds and reminding them that all is not well somewhere.  Kids on street corners wave and mothers sling arms protectively around them to keep them on the sidewalk.  College students scatter backwards as we come up fast and push the red-light.  Brakes and tailights show we are an intrusive blip, coming from nowhere, storming through their lives, their afternoons, like a ten-second hurricane and gone just as quickly leaving a mess behind for them to sort out.  But to us, there's a rhythm to it all.  You go right, we'll go left, switch siren frequency, cross the white line, heavy same-flow traffic means crossing the yellow line, airhorn for the pedestrian-heavy red-light intersection, watch the mirrors for reference points (too close to that truck), wave to the kids, smile, pay attention, enjoy the ride.  Every "hot" ride we take by nature risks the lives of everyone onboard, everyone on the road, and everyone waiting for us at the end of our trip.  We are supposed to weigh the risks and benefits of the initial dispatch - is this person's condition life threatening?  Enough so to put many other lives at risk?  If so, the lights and sirens are allowed.  If not, we are by law required to obey all traffic laws when responding to that patient.  But is this how things actually happen?  Well... no.

    The problem is, we can't always know for sure if the dispatch is accurate (many times it truly is not).   Sometimes the patient worsens between the time of the 911 call and our arrival.  "Dizziness" deteriorates into "unconscious."  Sometimes the caller is distressed and unable to give an accurate report.  "Finger cut" in actuality is "Amputated hand."  That in and of itself is enough to pardon the lights and sirens stretch.  Like so many other times on the job, we are required to make this decision with a lack of crucial information.  We don't really know what we are getting into.  And once you turn on the lights, you can't turn them off in the middle of the roadway.  Talk about confusion.  If you're going to do it, you gotta commit to it, and everything that comes with it.  If we don't get there fast, someone could die.  But if we use unnecessary risk, someone else could die.  So why risk it?  Well, we know there is someone waiting who needs us, who could hypothetically be in life-threatening danger, and everything else... everything else is possibility.  Everything else is, theoretically, in control.  But we all know that isn't true.  Things you think are in your control sometimes aren't.  You can't control the other driver's choice to swerve to the left instead of the right.  You can't keep someone from coming to a full stop right in front of you.  All the airhorn in the world won't stop that 5 year old from running out into traffic.  The light is GOING to turn red.   It always does.  You can't stop it from turning red.  But you can choose what you are going to do now.  Do you blow through the intersection without stopping, and just pray everyone hears/sees you coming?  Do you come to a full stop and wait for it to turn green?  How many minutes will you save?  How many will you waste, that might have saved a life?  I guess the answer might be proceed with caution.  Try your best to find a happy medium.  Slow down at the red light, blow the airhorn, look both ways and proceed if it looks safe.  There's always a risk.  Either way there's a risk.  Either way you might let someone down.  You might let yourself down.  Either way someone might get hurt.  Too much risk and you'll create destruction all around you.  Too much hesitation and you'll miss the opportunity you were given. What do you do?  What can you do?

The only thing you can control is yourself.  The only thing you can control is how you react to what everyone else is inevitably going to do.

    My frame of mind shifts as the ambulance comes to a stop.  We made it, we've made the right choices so far (presumably).  Now? Game time: no more enjoying the night.  I do a mental checklist of the things I want to take up with me (jump bag, collar, backboard, CIDs) and throw them on the stretcher, but try to keep my mind semi-blank.  If you approach a patient focused on what you think you should be seeing, you might miss what's actually there.  The apartment complex we're at is on top of a hill, and I can see the street at the bottom where we turned in moments before.  The traffic pattern is still sorting itself out.  There's a close call as a car tries to pull back into a lane from where they pulled over to let us through.  Just then, the medic's chase car throws it all into chaos again as he flies through, lights and sirens ablaze.  I sigh and lead my crew into the building, shoving the stretcher roughly into the elevator.  There's a cop already in there.  He presses the floor number.  The medic slides in at the last second.  I'm sure I scowled.

    "So what's the matter with you, Chief?"  He smiles and pokes me in the ribs.  "Lighten up... what the hell are we going to anyway?"

    Truthfully, sometimes I like not knowing what I'm getting into. Sometimes in order to take the risk, it's better to go in blind.  It may not be safe or healthy, or the right choice but... if I always knew, I might never go.  I might be too slow.  I don't want to make the choice.  I don't want that responsibility.   

    "Fuck if I know."  I watch the sunset disappear as the elevator doors slide closed.  "I didn't read the dispatch printout."

    I leaned my head out the window as I am known to do... taking in the wind, the sunset, the smell of summer and BBQ.  Feeling warm, comfortable and totally intent on enjoying the evening; sirens and awaiting trauma victim be damned. Not insensitive, just not out of the ordinary.  Pretty music sang back-up to the crackling of the scanner and the main street in the township was that awesome, late-afternoon-glowy scene, still busy, winding through the end of rush hour.  To others, we're disruptive to this setting: changing traffic patters, piercing the air with shrill sounds and reminding them that all is not well somewhere.  Kids on street corners wave and mothers sling arms protectively around them to keep them on the sidewalk.  College students scatter backwards as we come up fast and push the red-light.  Brakes and tailights show we are an intrusive blip, coming from nowhere, storming through their lives, their afternoons, like a ten-second hurricane and gone just as quickly leaving a mess behind for them to sort out.  But to us, there's a rhythm to it all.  You go right, we'll go left, switch siren frequency, cross the white line, heavy same-flow traffic means crossing the yellow line, airhorn for the pedestrian-heavy red-light intersection, watch the mirrors for reference points (too close to that truck), wave to the kids, smile, pay attention, enjoy the ride.  Every "hot" ride we take by nature risks the lives of everyone onboard, everyone on the road, and everyone waiting for us at the end of our trip.  We are supposed to weigh the risks and benefits of the initial dispatch - is this person's condition life threatening?  Enough so to put many other lives at risk?  If so, the lights and sirens are allowed.  If not, we are by law required to obey all traffic laws when responding to that patient.  But is this how things actually happen?  Well... no.

    The problem is, we can't always know for sure if the dispatch is accurate (many times it truly is not).   Sometimes the patient worsens between the time of the 911 call and our arrival.  "Dizziness" deteriorates into "unconscious."  Sometimes the caller is distressed and unable to give an accurate report.  "Finger cut" in actuality is "Amputated hand."  That in and of itself is enough to pardon the lights and sirens stretch.  Like so many other times on the job, we are required to make this decision with a lack of crucial information.  We don't really know what we are getting into.  And once you turn on the lights, you can't turn them off in the middle of the roadway.  Talk about confusion.  If you're going to do it, you gotta commit to it, and everything that comes with it.  If we don't get there fast, someone could die.  But if we use unnecessary risk, someone else could die.  So why risk it?  Well, we know there is someone waiting who needs us, who could hypothetically be in life-threatening danger, and everything else... everything else is possibility.  Everything else is, theoretically, in control.  But we all know that isn't true.  Things you think are in your control sometimes aren't.  You can't control the other driver's choice to swerve to the left instead of the right.  You can't keep someone from coming to a full stop right in front of you.  All the airhorn in the world won't stop that 5 year old from running out into traffic.  The light is GOING to turn red.   It always does.  You can't stop it from turning red.  But you can choose what you are going to do now.  Do you blow through the intersection without stopping, and just pray everyone hears/sees you coming?  Do you come to a full stop and wait for it to turn green?  How many minutes will you save?  How many will you waste, that might have saved a life?  I guess the answer might be proceed with caution.  Try your best to find a happy medium.  Slow down at the red light, blow the airhorn, look both ways and proceed if it looks safe.  There's always a risk.  Either way there's a risk.  Either way you might let someone down.  You might let yourself down.  Either way someone might get hurt.  Too much risk and you'll create destruction all around you.  Too much hesitation and you'll miss the opportunity you were given. What do you do?  What can you do?

The only thing you can control is yourself.  The only thing you can control is how you react to what everyone else is inevitably going to do.

    My frame of mind shifts as the ambulance comes to a stop.  We made it, we've made the right choices so far (presumably).  Now? Game time: no more enjoying the night.  I do a mental checklist of the things I want to take up with me (jump bag, collar, backboard, CIDs) and throw them on the stretcher, but try to keep my mind semi-blank.  If you approach a patient focused on what you think you should be seeing, you might miss what's actually there.  The apartment complex we're at is on top of a hill, and I can see the street at the bottom where we turned in moments before.  The traffic pattern is still sorting itself out.  There's a close call as a car tries to pull back into a lane from where they pulled over to let us through.  Just then, the medic's chase car throws it all into chaos again as he flies through, lights and sirens ablaze.  I sigh and lead my crew into the building, shoving the stretcher roughly into the elevator.  There's a cop already in there.  He presses the floor number.  The medic slides in at the last second.  I'm sure I scowled.

    "So what's the matter with you, Chief?"  He smiles and pokes me in the ribs.  "Lighten up... what the hell are we going to anyway?"

    Truthfully, sometimes I like not knowing what I'm getting into. Sometimes in order to take the risk, it's better to go in blind.  It may not be safe or healthy, or the right choice but... if I always knew, I might never go.  I might be too slow.  I don't want to make the choice.  I don't want that responsibility.   

    "Fuck if I know."  I watch the sunset disappear as the elevator doors slide closed.  "I didn't read the dispatch printout."