February 8 – “Texas Thunder”

Day two of the big school extravaganza has come and gone.  The morning was spent listening to the lead teacher lecture some more.  He insisted that we would move on to role playing as soon as possible.  Well, that didn’t happen before lunch, so a group of us headed over to a barbecue place the instructor spoke very highly of.  I had their fried shrimp lunch special.  I know.  Shrimp at a barbecue place.  It was good though.  And I’m pretty sure we are going back again tomorrow.  The lunch special is baby back ribs. 

We finally got around to the role playing after lunch.  We were in teams of three.  One was the person needing help, one was the CISM helper, and the other observed the interchange and offered advice.  I was the first CISM person, and Theresa the cop lady was my person to help.  Something unusual happened, though.  We started the assigned role play, but she decided she wanted to talk about something that really happened to her, an officer ambush where several guys she knew lost their lives.  She opened up and really shared her heart.  Seems when the event happened she was so involved in helping others that she never got to debrief herself.  I hope the experience yesterday helped her out.  She needed it.  Our second role play was an actual role play, but the third one became another real-life event from a fire fighter’s past experience.  He ended up sharing with us how much has changed in the realm of “dealing with it” since the event happened to him 25 years ago.  It was quite a fascinating time.  Far overshadowed the loss of power just before time to leave for home for the day.

As the instructor was in the middle of his talk, a very loud clap of thunder happened.  He asked what that was.  Since he was standing right in front of me, I told him it was thunder.  Also asked him if they had thunder in Michigan where he lives.  He replied, “Yes, we have it.  It’s just not …”  I finished his sentence.  “Just not as big as in Texas?  Yep.  Everything is bigger in Texas.”  He kind of lost control there for a minute or two.  Said he had to give me that round.  It wasn’t long after that, though that every light in the facility went black, along with the sound system and the powerpoint screen.  It all came back before too long, but he was talking about the Texas thunder for the rest of the session.

Psalms 32:11 says, “Rejoice in the Lord and be glad, you righteous; sing, all you who are upright in heart!”

Father, thank you for keeping us all safe out in the crazy weather yesterday.  Amen.