Slightly Off the Mark: Happy National Public Safety Telecommunicators Week!

It's Photo Wednesday! Which I just made up. Only it's not--in this case it's mostly Meme Wednesday, which I also just made up, although I'd imagine I'm not the first. Somebody should make a meme about that.

So instead of my photos, I'm posting images about what I like to call Dispatchers Week, because National Public Safety Telecommunicators Week really doesn't roll off the tongue.

I spent over three decades as a full time dispatcher, and now I'm a part time dispatcher until our books start pulling in, oh, five figures. Should happen any minute now.

When I came back, one of the first things I noticed is that we now have a dispatch goose, who tends to change clothes a lot and goes by the name Gertrude. No, I don't know why.

I think most of my coworkers are glad to have me back, so I can teach the newbies about puns and inappropriate humor. Or, it could be because we're shorthanded at the moment. It turns out we're supposed to do this job 24 hours a day--who knew?

How do I keep going? Ibuprofen and Mountain Dew.

When I first started in the emergency services, some 45 years ago, I was told I'd never make it in the business if I didn't drink coffee. In the time since, I've had exactly one cup of coffee, at a winter mobile home fire when the temperature was below zero. I'd have drunk antifreeze, if it was hot enough. These days, most of the other dispatchers don't drink coffee either. I have no explanation for this, although when you pick up a 911 call and someone immediately screams in your ear, that tends to keep you awake for awhile.

Anyone in this business can tell you there are, indeed, stupid questions. But here's the interesting thing: Often the person who calls in and apologizes for wasting our time, then spends five minutes trying to convince us it's nothing, has a legitimate complaint. People who ask stupid questions usually have no idea we're pretending to shoot the phone while listening to them.

This is exactly why our moods, like our shifts, can veer in any direction in an instant. Except when we have visitors. When people are watching, nothing happens.

It's one of the most important jobs there is, because we're the first first responders. If we don't take the call, none of the other first responders know to respond. Unless there's a fireball on the horizon, or something.

So thank you for your dedicated work, dispatchers! With you in mind, there's a minor character in my Storm Chaser series who is, indeed, a night shift dispatcher. You can tell by how grouchy he is.

Fires and other emergencies tend to pop up a lot in our books, both fiction and nonfiction. Check us out!

· Amazon: https://www.amazon.com/-/e/B0058CL6OO

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