Promoted?

The chiefs & other line officers at my volunteer Firehouse have been bugging me for a while. There is a position of "EMS Sergeant" that has become open recently. Due to my education and possibly the fact that I'm the highest trained and qualified EMS person at the whole station, they've been pestering me to apply.

I really don't have the time. I'm worried that if I commit to doing more for my Firehouse, I won't have the time to do it and I won't come through. I'd rather say "no" than say "yes" and let everyone down. I've been deflecting their requests and encouragements with this very argument.

Then they got sneaky.

Herself and I had stopped by the Firehouse after walking Mr. B in the woods. He was all muddy and needed to be hosed off before we took him home. While we're there, the deputy chief, Sunshine, comes up to us and asks me if I've put in my application for the EMS sergeant position. I begin the usual argument that I really don't have the time to do all this, yada yada yada.

Meanwhile, Herself saunters over to the bulletin board where the position announcement is. She reads over the list of duties and responsibilities and says,

"You can do this. Hell, you do most of this anyway."

Sunshine smiles at me.

Crap!

Well, it turned out better than I had hoped. Helga had applied for the position too. She's on an opposite duty rotation from me. her strengths lie in the administrative and organizational areas and less so in training, field operations and orienting new members.

Chief decided to split the position in two. Helga is the EMS Administration Sergeant and I'm the EMS Operations Sergeant. I'm in charge of all EMS training, stock and supply on the ambulance itself, quality assurance of field practice and skills and making sure new people get trained and turned over in a timely manner. Stuff I already do.

Ok, then!

--Sgt. maddog