The End is Near.... Thank heavens....

The end of my term as Chief is here...Just One More Day. Thank Heavens.

Finding out that one was duped... in any forum is disheartening to say the least... But the realization that it happened in an organization of which I've been a member for 18 years, really stinks.

But for the few members that have some real intellegence, I can quite frankly live without at least 27 members of my corps. The fact that they (the 27) re-elected the past Chief, the one that tampered with ballots after last years elections, boggles the mind. (but then again... the country elected Tricky Dick twice... so.....)

None the less, the days have dwindled down and soon I'll turn over the responsibilities of being Chief to her. It's almost a relief for me. My entire first year was spent putting out fires... not real fires, but the petty squabbles, intentional sabotage and in-fighting that are the clearest indicators of a split corps.

It's funny how some people can join an organization like ours, one that is dedicated to saving lives, helping the sick and injured in their time of need, helping to bring new life into this world and keeping the grim reeper at his distance because of our skills, and then could even think of not responding, staying away from, emergency calls for help, because I was Chief. To make me look bad? To raise our mutual aid numbers, which in reality makes the entire corps look bad?? Unthinkable, really sad... but true...

I knew this was the case early on in my one year as Chief. But there was little I could do to change it. I tried to be the good guy... to always do the right thing, the ethical thing, whether it made people happy or not. The right thing. When one is attempting to pull 50-60 people together against a tide of 20-30 people pulling it apart at every turn, is very hard. And remember, it is difficult to remember the original task was to empty the swamp, when you are up to your ass in alligators...

Prime example of what these people would do, the under handed tricks... Example, how about a past female Chief (older one, not the one just re-elected) currently Chairperson of the Board of Directors, offered to help me out by calling membership to try and get more people to come out on calls and instead attempted to destroy me in the same breath... What was I to expect? The fact that she would even have the nerve, the balls, the unmitigated gaul to say to many other members, "Larry is a burnt out, crispy critter" This should not really be all that surprising. Smiles in your face and stabs you in the back... Luckily, I have learned to take a lot of what happens with a grain of salt.

So tonight at 11:59:59 I will take my leave as Chief of the ambulance company. April 1st will mark the reign of a returning April Fool... At least this year, that's not me.

For the next year, I'll go back to being a first responder EMT, and serve on a shift like any other member... I'll have time for doing some things for myself, for my family. Will I run again?? Maybe, just to keep them honest... Well....as honest as possible anyway. Remember.... "HE ONLY WANTED THE CAR"... later...