Sandy Hook

Rivers of ink have raged, almost as the rivers of blood that flowed all too freely have now stilled. I don't know when is, or even if there is, a right time to wade in to a discussion on a tragedy as raw as that of Sandy Hook School, where those killed are only now being buried, where their families have not even begun to really grieve. Parents of children are being forced to come to terms with a reality that none of us should ever have to face. Families of adults who died protecting the innocent battle with conflicting emotions; pride in the bravery displayed by their loved ones fighting for space in amongst the utter sadness at their deaths. 

And in the midst of it all, the all-too-familiar rhetoric begins. Pro-gun versus anti-gun is too simplistic. It's like saying that there are those who wish to live in a constant state of war against an enemy and those who want peace with the very same. In reality, everyone wants peace. It's just a question of how to get to that state. Rhetoric alone will not answer the questions that will race around the minds of a nation, particularly a nation in mourning. 

I have only questions, no answers, but feel the need to raise them here, if only as an outlet. I struggle to understand why this happens. Why it happens in America. Why is it that I live in a country where guns are a part of the daily view, yet we have mercifully been spared the awful scenes that have now been shown all over the world. 

I am torn. Torn between believing that weapons should be available so that it is not only the criminals and terrorists who possess them, and believing that they should be almost impossible to come by. Several times in the past, terrorist incidents in Israel have been halted by a passer-by who happened to be there and happened to be armed. Right place, right time. On the other hand, the readily available weapons allow for easier access to those who would use them to harm the innocent. 

However, one cannot walk into a gun shop here and buy an assault rifle "off-the-rack." The number of civilians carrying weapons is actually surprisingly low. Assault rifles are seen in the streets, but they are carried either by members of the armed forces or by members of response teams in the more volatile parts of the land. They can't just be stored at home as yet another item on a list of fixtures and fittings. Licenses are hard to come by and are enforced by strict regulation.

Arguments will appear on every media outlet, on social media, in conversations between neighbours and friends. Both sides will voice their opinion, all too often based on that cyclical rhetoric, bandied about by populace and politician alike. Slogans don't solve the problem, they just accentuate and polarise it. They certainly do not reunite grieving families with those that they have lost. Falling back on rights is as helpful as quoting often irrelevant statistics. It is, however, clear that something has to change, probably on both sides of the great gun divide. 

I don't have the answers. I may not even be in a position to ask the questions. I do know one thing for sure. I never want to see these scenes again. Not as a parent, not as a news reader, and not as a paramedic. Not on my own doorstep, nor on anybody else's. 

Yet another community will have to rebuild itself, brick-by-brick, one family at a time, united in grief for now, but hopefully in strength in the future. And all the while, the answers must be found to prevent anyone else from facing yet another unspeakable tragedy. 

Traffic Stop

Knowing that police are on scene and knowing that the scene is safe are two very different things. Once we know that the latter is true, we approach at speed. 

A bystander runs up to us and practically pushes me off my feet. 

"What the hell took you so long? The police have been here for ages." 

I push him off, lift the police tape that marks the outer cordon, and head into the neutralised area.

One of the officers signals to us to head towards the idling car, the headlights of a police van on full beam illuminating our approach. Sitting in the front passenger seat of the car is yet another officer, looking pale and wearing a blood-soaked shirt. A crowd stand around the cordon, some hurling abuse at the police, some at us, some at each other. The atmosphere is on a knife-edge, teetering on the brink of an all-out riot. In the driver's seat, unconscious and bloodied, sits London's latest gun-crime statistic. 

Two holes through the windscreen, almost perfect circles, the rest of the glass undisturbed. 

To the police, he's a victim; to us, a patient. The work we do could mean the difference between attempted and actual murder, between a life-threatening injury and a fatal one, between life and death. We move him out of the car, looking for injuries, and finding them too. 

Two holes in his chest, almost perfect circles, the rest of his body untouched. 

Entry wounds only, leading to only one conclusion: the bullets are still lodged within him. The visible damage is only a small part of the story. It's impossible to know what damage was caused after those tiny projectiles entered the body, where they veered off to, what organs they hit, what arteries they missed, how much blood has been lost. 

"Are you gonna just sit there looking at him all day?" 

The call comes from one of the irate crowd, someone who doesn't understand that just moving the patient could be the wrong thing to do. We need to have an idea of what we're dealing with, whether his lungs will hold out for long enough, whether we think his heart's been hit, whether there's anything we could possibly do to give him a better chance. 

There's no one else to send to help us out so we package him up into the ambulance, give a report over the radio and head to the trauma unit. Luckily, for a change, we're not too far away. On route to the hospital his breathing becomes more noisy, more erratic, and then silent. His heart changes from a rapid beat to a slow beat, to no beat at all.

The officer in the bloodied shirt meets us at the hospital and asks how the victim is doing. We tell him. 

"Damn. I only pulled him over because he had no headlights on, I had no idea that anyone else was watching him too." He shakes his head. "Can I go and see him?" 

We walk with him in the direction of the resuscitation room, and he knocks gently on the door. A nurse peeks through to see who's disturbing their work, sees the blood on his shirt and lets him in immediately. It takes a minute for him to convince her that he's not injured, that he just wants to see the victim. 

The third cubicle along has the curtains drawn. Monitors all around ping with electronic bells, whine with wavering warnings, but the monitor in cubicle three is silent. The officer steps in, the nurse follows and we stand by the curtains. The victim's face is already covered, and the nurse slowly, gently, mournfully pulls the cover back. The officer takes one final look, shakes his head again and turns to leave. 

"A traffic stop. Just a simple, damned traffic stop." 

Movies

The feet appeared first, his legs skewed apart

mimicking the lines they draw in the movies.

His upper body hidden from view, the suspense building, 

following a plot like the movies.

Climbing over a table to see blood spattered walls,

and a gun lying spent on the floor. 

Finding him there, motionless, lifeless. 

Faceless.

Looking for some way to help. 

Finding none. 

Realising that this isn't the movies. 

And knowing, again, that happily-ever-after 

is often nothing more than a movie, a wish, a dream. 

Survivor

Today is International Holocaust Memorial Day. This repost is my attempt at keeping one story alive, honouring one memory, and teaching just one extra person, in the hope that if we remember our history and learn from it, we are unlikely to repeat it. 
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Like a herd of elephants, we charge into the sanctuary that has been their home for the last forty years, maybe more. Eyes withered with age and a hand crippled by arthritis, a tattooed number just visible below the three-quarter length sleeve, pointed us in the direction of the upstairs rear bedroom. She lay there, exactly as she had done for probably several hours, a peaceful look on her immobile face. There was nothing left for us to do. Back downstairs, waiting for confirmation of the inevitable, was the person who had lived with her and cared for her for the best part of seventy years. 

As soon as we broke the news, the lifelong protector broke down in tears, and after a minute or two, composed herself, and began a breathtaking monologue.

"She's my baby sister, younger than me by three years. She was five years old when our parents were dragged out of our house, along with our six other siblings, and machine-gunned. I saw it, couldn't help but watch in warped and terrified fascination, through a darkened window in the cellar of a neighbour's house. Eva was still hiding in a drain when they marched off. To this day I don't know how she ended up there."

Rosa's perfect English is betrayed every so often by a Germanic twang to some of her words, labeling her for all eternity with a past she'd rather forget.

"When it was all done, they were dumped into large wheelbarrows, taken just past the tree line not fifty paces away, and thrown into a mass grave. As a parting gesture, the soldiers fired on them again, silencing the few voices still calling for help. Or praying for the end. Whichever would cease their suffering quicker.

"After they disappeared to look for more fun, I ran out of my hiding place and went to find Eva. We had seen death around us, heard it, tasted it, but this was the first time it hit us directly, and we knew we had no-one left. For a few days we hid where we could, and once a day I left Eva and went to steal any food I could. One day, when we heard more soldiers coming, we ran into the woods, and never looked back. 

"For over a year that forest was our home. We even hid in the graves, where we learnt to play dead if we heard anyone coming. Bodies were dumped on top of us, and we'd have to dig our way out. We slept in barns when we could sneak in, found abandoned houses where they at least had a roof, even if no windows. We stole food, ate dead animals that we found, every so often a friendly home owner would give us something small, but they'd never let us stay. The fear in their heads ruled the compassion in their hearts. 

"About two years later, we were finally caught. It was a blessing in disguise. We were taken to a camp and forced into different jobs. The Kommandant's wife took a liking to Eva, and decided she'd take her in as a maid. It saved her life. All other children her age were taken away, often literally snatched out of the arms of screaming mothers, and never seen again. I was put to work in the camp itself, anything from scrubbing floors to sewing uniforms and repairing soldiers' socks. Beatings were a regular part of life, but so was a daily slice of bread and clear soup. No more fighting for food, or stealing it. I saw Eva every few days, when one or other of us managed to sneak across the camp.

"We survived so much that others didn't. We were the lucky ones. At the end of the war, after we were liberated, we eventually found our way to London. I was fourteen, and Eva eleven, but our life up until that point gave us a look of several years older. We were taken in by a children's charity and cared for until we decided we'd never again trust anyone else. We worked hard, saved some money, with it we bought our own home, and have lived here ever since.  I don't know how I'll live without her here."

Once again, the tears flowed. Rosa's mainly, but we weren't doing a great job of hiding ours either. I sat, pen and paper in hand to fill in the necessary forms, but as Rosa's sobs ended her story, I found that I'd not written a single word.

"I'm sorry", she said, wiping her face dry. "I have more than sixty years worth of crying to do. This is the first time since."

At her request, we contacted a friend who arrived within minutes of our call. We left the room to allow them to talk and grieve together. To comfort each other. To shed those reluctant tears. Whilst they did, we reloaded the ambulance with our equipment, sat in silence as I completed the paperwork that I'd struggled to fill in while in the house, and fought to comprehend all that we'd heard. After writing the empty words that described all that had clinically occurred, we returned to the house one last time to explain to Rosa what would now be happening.

Once we'd finished and offered our condolences, Rosa got up and saw us to the door.

"Don't worry about me", she started. "I've got my friends and neighbours. They'll help look after me".

And as we stepped back out over the threshold, as a farewell comfort from her to us, she called us back again.

"I'll be fine", she said. "I'm a survivor".

I know she is. I just hope I've done her story justice.

Street Escalator

A misunderstanding that led to an argument.

An argument that develops into a fight.

A fight escalates into acts of revenge.

Revenge takes form as a bullet.

The bullet takes a life.

A life, so young.

A waste.

At the top of the escalator, flat on the floor, lies the misunderstanding.