The Great Engine 6 Christmas Dance Party

The quick lowdown on being a firefighter and working Christmas.

Emergencies can give a crap as to what day it is. Even though most of the country takes a break on Christmas day, emergencies don’t. So there are no holidays for first responders and this particular one I was no exception. Aside from my alarm wailing at 5:00 a.m. instead of the usual 6:00 a.m., getting ready for work this Christmas morning was like any other normal workday morning. It was the drive to work where everything changed.

In my car, I sat at a red light at a major intersection utterly alone. All the roads were void of any signs of civilization. Every business was dark inside and not an occupied parking spot in sight. I wondered if this would be what it looked like if the world had come to an end and I was the only person left. The freeway— empty. And I’m talking about a major San Francisco Bay Area Freeway. When I did happen to see another car on the road, they almost always had a firefighter sticker on their back window. Even the dense city of Berkeley, where I worked—empty.

Once I pulled into the driveway of fire station number six, I no longer felt like I was the last person on Earth. Our parking lot was full of cars and lights were on inside and out. I walked into the station to thankfully find staffing for the day had been completed. (If the department still had any holes to fill, no one was allowed to leave until staffing was complete.) The captain I relieved could go home to his family and maybe, just maybe, get home before his kids woke up. Or at least his wife wouldn’t have to spend the morning telling their kids that yes, “Daddy will be home soon! Be patient!” over and over. This day, none of us working at station 6 today normally worked here. The driver worked a shift trade for a mom who had little kids at home. The firefighter, who didn’t have kids, volunteered to work so he could avoid his family drama. Sometimes having to work Christmas or Thanksgiving, can be a Godsend. Normally I worked at a bigger house with eight people but I was sent here to balance out staffing. More often than not, when we have staffing issues, people get mandatoried to work that day. I will never forget hearing a dad call home and tell his five, seven, and nine year old and that he wasn’t coming home for Christmas. There was no crying at the firehouse, except on those occasions. And yes, I know “mandatoried” is not a real word, but in the fire service, it’s rather common. This means we were supposed to get off duty but instead are made to work to fill a staffing hole. It doesn’t matter if you have small kids at home waiting for you to open presents or are about to get on a plane, you have to work.

My brother and his family always put on an incredible Christmas day which tugged at me to be missing that year. I didn’t have kids but my two nieces, six and eight years old were bummed I was absent from Christmas day, but nothing like missing mom or dad.

The off-going crew left and my crew got ready for whatever would be thrown at us during the day. We did our usual morning equipment checks and put our turnouts and personal equipment just so. We did our usual cleaning of the station and then “took the day off.” No training or fire inspections or paperwork, just keeping ourselves occupied while we waited for the alarm to go off.

I always liked working at the bigger firehouses on Christmas where there were eight firefighters on duty. There were more people, more food and we’d always put on a huge spread that many of our families would come to Christmas dinner. The atmosphere had a better Christmas magic feel to it. As a side note, I have worked so many major holidays at our big firehouse, and never once have we ever sat down to dinner and not gotten a call 45 seconds into our meal. It never fails. At the smaller stations, which had three firefighters, families would usually visit their loved ones but only sometimes stayed for dinner. It depended on who was working. Since this year we were a hodgepodge crew devised at the last minute, there were no plans of any family coming to celebrate with us. But then the front doorbell rang. A voice over the PA in the station said, “Hey Christy, someone is here to see you.” I came to the door and there they were, my whole family! My brother, sister-in-law, mom, and two nieces drove all the way to the west side of Berkeley to say hi and deliver cinnamon rolls. I hugged everyone fiercely. We all took a tour of the fire station and finished in the apparatus bay where fire engine 6 stood in wait.

I opened the doors to the engine and as the air-actuated steps dropped the girls, 6 and 8 years old, couldn’t climb in fast enough. They started in the front, one sat in the driver’s seat and the other in what we firefighters call the “Front Seat.” This is where the captain sits and the decisions are made. Yes, you probably call this same seat in your car the same thing, but our Front Seat has great implications. And deserves capital letters. They then moved to the back of the cab where the firefighter sat. Yes, we are all firefighters, but our ranks and jobs are different. That’s when the fire engine number 6 dance party broke out. Still wearing their PJs, those two danced and partied like it was 1999. The cab became saturated with silliness and giggles and singing that sustained for me the next 48 hours at work—and then some—as I am still talking about it twelve years later.

The rest of the day was a typical Christmas day. The day was slow and then around 6:30ish, the 911 calls started to pour in. Everyone seems to hold it together through the day and dinner. People with that nagging chest pain that started in the morning put off taking care of it because they don’t want to ruin anyone’s Christmas. Then after a day of indulgencing in food, alcohol, and stress, that small heart issue has turned into and full-blown heart attack. Insert all other ailments in this scenario. The 911 calls continued all night. We didn’t mind, running calls helps us feel like we at least aren’t missing our families for nothing. And with the great engine 6 dance party infused in my heart and brain, nothing could rip the smile off my face.