As I round the corner in the big field in North Boulder Park, the snow has just started to fall. I can see the finish line now and I am minutes away from finishing the 5K I am running in this morning. I can see a couple of runners ahead of me, who are just crossing the finishing line.
The finish line is in sight, and I am feeling happy to be almost done. Running in the cold, makes the distance seem longer. I look down at my watch and it is showing an elapsed time of 34 minutes.
The Fast and Flurious 5K started with 136 runners. If I am not the last place finisher, I will be very surprised.
There are 3 women my age who are huddled at the finish line and as they see me approach, they all start woo hooing for all they are worth, they are telling me I look great, and I am done now. They hold out my "finisher" medal and point me in the direction of hot coffee and cocoa. I want to hug every one of these women, their enthusiasm does not seem to be diminished by the temperature, time of day, or the fact they had to wait so long for me to finish.
As I look down at my finisher medal, I can't help but smile. Participant medals should always remain in place for the very young and the middle-aged people who complete 5 K runs and remain upright at the finish line.
"Am I the last runner?" I ask the lady handing me a finisher ribbon.
"No, there is one more guy behind you" she smiles, and I turn around to look. I cannot imagine who would be slower than me.
We decided over beers one night early in January that we were going to bond doing runs, obstacle courses runs and other quasi athletic events together. We are going to close the year, with the Tough Mudder obstacle course in Breckinridge.
Gary and Christopher are walking up to me at the finish line with what looks like hot coffee. Both are pointing behind me with a look of astonishment, smiling, and shaking their heads. I turn around to try and see what they are looking at.
Of the 136 runners today, I am in 135th place and to the surprise of everyone Chris is number 136.
Chris is 6' 4", naturally athletic, lean and runs like a gazelle. Chris is jogging towards the finish line with a pained expression on his face. He looks tired and completely worn out. He looks at me and shakes his head.
I do the only thing I can to care for my brother on a day he appears to be struggling.
"You Pussy! I outran you today! I point at him and start laughing at him. I can see him shaking his head and looking back at me. Although he is trying to glare at me, he can't help smiling back at me.
"You got lucky and beat me on a day I don't feel that great" he says smiling.
"I fucking beat you, don't be a pussy and make up excuses" I tell him. As I say it, he really does not look that good.
At breakfast stop in Boulder, after the race, Chris is starting to look more like himself. I remind him over blueberry pancakes, that I have something to hold over his head for the rest of his life. It does not matter how many 5 - 10K's that we run from this point forward, or how many times he beats me. I will always have one in my pocket, where I can go back and remind him that I beat him in the 5K in February.
"I am going to make an appointment with the doctor I think, I really did not feel that great." Chris said.
"The doctor is going to tell you that you are a pussy" I tell him laughing.
Chris and I have learned each other through all of the years we have spent together at Station 3. There is a bond that forms when people work and live in the same space. That bond strengthens when you are routinely in situations where you depend on each so much to make bad days manageable for complete strangers. Christopher, Gary, and Chris are brothers to me, we have all put our lives in each other's hands under the most demanding, dangerous, and heart wrenching circumstances there are.
There is a bond that we have with each other that is hard to articulate. The guys that are sitting across from me at breakfast this morning, would risk their lives to protect mine. They would do this without regard for their own safety and regardless of what the circumstance was. We do this for each other during every shift and for all of those moments in everyday life that happen outside of our shifts at Station #3.
"Call me after the doctor tells you that you are a pussy" I tell him when we are getting in our cars to go home. Chris smiles and nods to me and says he will.
Chris calls me on Monday to tell me he has his initial visit at his primary care doctor in the late afternoon. I tell him thanks and remind him to call me after he gets an update. I go on with my day and do not give it another thought.
Monday and Tuesday pass and I still have not heard from Chris about his doctor visit. I am frustrated he did not call to give me an update on the doctor visit. Chris is methodical in everything that he does, when he tells you he is going to do something, he always comes through. He is not forgetful and is the go-to guy for everything.
I know something is up when I look at my phone and see Chris is calling at 7AM on Wednesday morning.
"The doctor did not tell me I am a pussy" he said.
"You are still a pussy, what did he tell you besides that?" I am worried now.
"I have a heart valve problem and it's going to require surgery." Chris said.
"What kind of surgery?" I ask.
"Open heart surgery, in a couple of weeks." he says and I sit down and out of habit grab a pen to take notes. On the day he told me this, he was 46 years old and 2 months.
Fuck
We are immortal on Engine 3 and to the best of my knowledge we never stopped being immortal. A firefighter does amazing things because they train extensively, and they learn that every significant risk is mitigated by the trained crew who understands it is never about a single person.
My faith is shaken by the news and that is a surprise to me. When we crossed thresholds during our shifts on Engine 3, when we crossed thresholds in our lives, we did this together. We were never alone, no matter what kind of threshold we had to cross.
I always had a deep appreciation that I had people like this in my life. I felt blessed that I had the gift of people like this in my life. In the quiet times in my life, I have always thanked God for gifts like this.
I had a long-standing running joke with Chris. Whenever Chris said "thank god" or "say a quick prayer for (fill in the blank), I would always remind him that he had to be careful what he asked for from God. God, I told him will give you what you need, not necessarily what you ask for. I would illustrate this by tell him when he asked for a big dick, that God in his infinite wisdom brought Cliff into his life. Cliff is an old friend of Chris's that has been a giant pain in the ass for him and is in fact a big dick.
Chris is the guy who always did more than he needed to for all the people he touched. He is in the small fraternity of men & women who have actually saved lives. Under the most difficult circumstances, Chris extended kindness and courtesy to people who simply did not deserve or want that kind of support. He went out his way to find out what the people (both that he knew, and complete strangers) needed at the toughest times in their respective lives.
What is it God, that you think a man like Chris needs at this time in his life? What is it God, that you think his brothers need at this time in their lives?
On the day of his surgery, I am standing beside his bed with Stephanie, Christopher, and Gary. Today, he is crossing a threshold, and we cannot cross this threshold with him.
This is not the way we do things. When one of us crosses a dangerous threshold we all cross the same threshold. We are the immortals of station 3, and everyone always goes home. Standing by his bed, we all realize we are going to be relegated to being spectators while his crosses this dangerous threshold alone.
In the hospital bed, he does not look larger than life, I am used to Chris looking larger than life. He is quiet and seems retrospective. I break the silence of the room and I tell him he has completely screwed up my day and the next beer tab is on him.
It does not occur to me then that there is a possibility that I would not get to see him again. We have been in too many tough situations and pushed through to the other side because we were trained, believed in the crew, and just never gave up.
The nurse is starting to shoo us out the door. I grab his forearm with my hand and give it a squeeze and tell him I will see him in post op.
I can't sit with the large group of friends and family that are in the waiting room. Small talk under circumstances like this is a skill I do not have. I don't want people to see how worried I am. I get coffee and walk the grounds of the hospital, grateful for the quiet.
I start to head back to the waiting room, when the 4 hours is getting close. Back in the waiting room, Christopher meets me at the door saying doctor came out to get Stephanie (his wife) and his dad and took them back to see Chris.
Christopher says, the doctor says surgery went as expected. We should be able to see him in groups of two in 30 minutes.
Maybe we are still immortal....
When Stephanie and his dad come out of the post op door, we walk over to meet them. I want to get back and see Chris as quickly as I can. Before I can ask how he is doing Stephanie speaks up.
"They fixed one valve and will have to go back in when he is stronger". Her eyes are red rimmed, and you can tell she has been crying. His dad has a pained expression on his face.
She stops for a minute to catch her breath and says, "They found a growth on the front of his heart, and they need to find out what it is."
It feels like all of the air has been sucked out of the place we are standing in. I want to ask about the growth, and I am at a loss for words right at this moment. Does a growth mean cancer? Does it mean extensive heart problems or a pending failure?
I had planned to hug her and tell her he crossed another important threshold, but my brain feels frozen. I take two steps toward her and start to ask.
She looks up at me, and while she is holding my gaze, speaks up before I can ask the question. "They just don't know; it is going to be a couple of weeks."
I give her a long hug and don't say a thing.
Fuck, Fuck, Fuck
Time stops, in the world of unknown growths, scans have to be scheduled, postponed, and rescheduled. It has been a month since he has been out of the hospital and his scan is scheduled for Wednesday. I know I will not hear from him on Wednesday and no call on Thursday morning will be (I assume) good news.
During his time off, we ride motorcycles a lot more. Discuss the state of the world, our families, and the Fire Service over beers at the Rocky Mountain Saloon. We don't talk about heart valves or growths in front of hearts. We are planning our annual trip up to Sturgis, South Dakota for the Motorcycle rally.
Any fire (structure or car) looks daunting when you first see it. Fire never stopped being scary for me. Having an experienced incident commander, trained & dedicated responders, and plenty of resources can make an unmanageable fire look manageable. It will always be harder to watch a fire than to actually be part of a trained crew who is attempting to put one out. Firefighters are trained as crews; it is never about a single individual. Chris and I have been on the first responding engine for structure fires at homes, businesses, fertilizer and chemical plants.
We trained hard together as a crew, we always reached out to get additional resources, when the circumstances for medical, fire, or trauma required them. We fought fires in the most deliberate, measured way possible. When faced with the need to be aggressive, we were aggressive. When circumstances to manage a fire, accident, or medical needed more focus, we all provided and managed that. When circumstances required a measured response, we were versed in managing that. We clearly understood that you only risk a lot when you are going to get a lot back for risking so much.
Except for Superman, being immortal is a lot of work, but we always put in the work to make sure we stayed immortal.
I look down at the phone on Thursday morning and it is Chris.
"The doctor did not tell me I am a pussy" Chris said.
"You are still a pussy with a brand-new zipper on your tiny chest, what else did the Doc say?" It is just past 7 AM.
"When they did the full body scan, they found two areas on my spine and one on my hip that they say are bone cancer" Chris says without any emotion at all.
Fuck, Fuck, Fuck
I have to sit down and pause to catch my breath. I did not for a minute expect him to say that. I am the guy that always, always, plans for the worst and expects the best. That is my calling card, when things go to complete hell, and I stay calm it is because I have a plan in my head when it goes to complete hell. I carry two pair of everything and extra gear because things break, or someone will need the extra gear so we can keep moving forward.
I do not get caught empty handed, ever.
And despite all my training and discipline, I am completely empty handed when he tells me this.
Cancer never did pop into my mind or was a possibility that I considered. We are immortal, we don't get cancer and certainly not after all that we have done. I pause for a minute, "we" don't have cancer, Chris does. This is a man who has saved lives, has selflessly put himself in harm's way for others and always reached out when the rest of us were tired of doing that. How in the hell does this guy end up with Cancer?
"What is next?" I ask him after a long pause.
We have stood on a hundred thresholds together, waiting to go into an uncertain situations, confident in our knowledge that our training and crew would get the job done. Confident that at the end of the shift each one of us would go home. For the first time, we will walk up to the threshold and only one of us will cross into a tough, uncertain, and dangerous situation. We will be spectators when our brother crosses that threshold.
No offense to Hallmark Cards, but expressing empathy, support, and concern is a completely different exercise from standing side to side with someone and doing the imaginably tough work to get them through to the other side.
So, for the first time, instead of advancing a charged hose line through a door to attack a fire as a crew, we are going to have to do something very different this time.
We will be spectators for the first time. We will stand at the threshold of the doorway and watch our beloved brother attempt to put the fire out by himself.
For the next 30 minutes Chris gives me a summary of what is next. Radiation and Chemo will start after the Sturgis Motorcycle Rally this year. When Chris asked about riding up to Sturgis, his doctor told him not to miss the trip. The time after the trip with Chemo and Radiation is going to bring a new set of challenges for Chris, Stephanie, and everyone who loves him.
Chris never stopped being Chris and never stopped being my brother. The only thing that changed was the patience and care he extended to the people who did not know what to say to him when there were significant changes in his life and appearance. I still remember how his tired face smiled brightly when I told him that cancer did not give him a free pass to be a dick and to not be a dick.
There is no way to write about what the next four and half years of his treatment was like. It was a roller coaster ride with progressively steeper downhills and sharper turns. There were days of genuine hope and relief when chemo and radiation seemed to be having the desired effect. There were also days when the news was heartbreaking in a way that is still hard to articulate.
There was so much that we simply could not do. Stephanie quietly carried the load for everyone. The toughest times he had to endure were made manageable by her complete love and unwavering support. We did what we could, we sat with him during chemo sessions, doctor visits, radiations, and blood transfusions. We took turns sending out updates on his status to a large list of his friends and extended family. When I reread these notes, it's clear how dearly he was loved by all of us.
We expected him to come back to us and rejoin at the threshold that he left us all at. I assumed that like every tough spot we found ourselves in that we would all go home.
Chris remained faithful to who he was throughout the four and a half years that he endured treatments and the indignities that his body had to endure. We still today do not know the worst of what he happened to him. The toughest days were the days that Chris was the quietest. He just never told us how bad it got.
On that cold December day, when Stephanie called and said that he was being taken off the ventilator and taken off meds so he could spend time with her and his dad, I still thought he would come back. A Do Not Resuscitate order was already signed and in place.
I drove down to the hospital to be there for everyone. I did not go to tell him goodbye; I did not go to have him tell me goodbye. My signature calling card, preparing for the worst, and expecting the best was again, completely gone. I was trying to figure how what to do, who to see, and what to say, when my phone rang while I was sitting in the hospital coffee shop. I looked down to see who was calling and it was Stephanie.
"He said, it would be too hard to say goodbye to you" she said her voice tired and raw.
I realized that once again, my brother, my LT, came over the last threshold to take care of me.
"When we were responding to calls in the engine, everyone wore headsets because the position of the seats did not let you see people. I never did need to see him; I could always hear him. When we're working on a tough call, I never needed to see him to know he was there" I said remarkably composed.
"Tell him not to be a Nancy, I will wait, tell him it's OK" I said as evenly as I could, not feeling composed at all.
On one of his best days, I gave him specific instructions. "If you die before me, come back to me and tell me you are good" I told him. "And DO NOT under any circumstances do anything mystical, just say you are good and don't fuck up my entire night". He laughed at that and promised it would be a thumbs up and nothing more.
On December 1, 2015, Lieutenant Chris Lawler became immortal. He was 50 years old and 2 months.
EPILOGUE
In my dream, I was working at a county fair as a paramedic. He walked around the corner and stood in front of me smiling. His thinning hair was chestnut brown (instead of white) and he looked like the guy that used to run me into the ground and make fun of me. He looked happy and healthy.
"I have sooo many questions for you" I said.
"And I will answer every one of them, but I will answer them when we ride that" he is pointing to a Ferris Wheel.
"You know I am terrified of Ferris Wheels....I can't ride a Ferris Wheel" I told him exasperated.
Without a word he begins to walk to the Ferris Wheel, and I reluctantly follow him. We get on the Farris Wheel, and I close my eyes and endure a 10-minute ride. Because of my fear of the ride, I can't ask him a single question.
When the ride is over, I am shaking and trying to catch my breath.
"I have to go" he says smiling.
"You are a dick" I tell him.
He starts to laugh hard and stops for a minute to wipe his tears of his face from laughing so hard. It's hard not to laugh when Chris laughs and as he walks away, we are both laughing our heads off.
I woke from the dream still laughing....
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