Out of Control
Chapter 1 excerpt.

Driven, committed, anxious, angry, frustrated, controlling, guilty, traumatized, haunted by flashbacks: my life is out of control. This new lifestyle of mine has drained my soul, altered the person I was over the last two and a half decades. I wouldn’t wish it on my worst enemy.

Since the fall of 2001, I have not slept through the night, relentlessly haunted by thoughts of the biggest tragedy this country has ever witnessed. Tossing and turning, cold sweats, and insomnia have become a nightly ritual because of an event that was beyond my control. Visions of the dead, burning rescue vehicles colossal in size, fire trucks with a gross vehicle weight of over 35,000 pounds, crushed like a soda can that has been compacted by a stomping foot. Remnants of bodies scattered as if discarded by a person who has carelessly littered the streets with trash. Human beings pushed to the point of making a choice: get burned by fire, suffocate by thick black smoke, or plunge over 1000 feet to their death. Massive fires began to consume surrounding buildings room by room, floor by floor.

These buildings, which once stood one hundred stories tall, were reduced to sixty-foot high piles of rubble and debris. They no longer served the purpose of conducting business or as a symbol of greatness of the city, but as a crushing tomb that claimed the lives of thousands.

A tremendous feeling of helplessness started to overcome my body. I started to experience tunnel vision, everything around me was moving in slow motion. Voices were muffled, not understandable to me. How can this be happening? Where is Michael? Has anyone seen Engine 28 Ladder 11? My life at this moment, that very day, collapsed with the same crippling force as did those buildings.

Every breath I took that morning after 0950 hours was thick. It felt like millions of razor blades were entering my lungs, tearing them from the inside out, burning as if they were on fire. Foreign substances have been inhaled; what will the aftereffects be? I don’t have a mask; I don’t care right now. I wanted to help people, and I wanted to find Michael.

I distinctly remember scanning the area around the wreckage, searching for someone, something, that needed immediate attention. But all I remember is being plagued by the sound of hundreds of firefighters’ pass alarms, roaring with distress signals. Pass alarms are emergency sound devices that are strapped to a firefighter’s air supply. They go off if a firefighter manually triggers them or if they remain motionless for more than one minute. Some were muffled by the wreckage that trapped these men. I remember thinking that these alarms signified a trapped or dead rescue worker, hundreds of them Who is going to save them?

Filling his boots
Chapter 7 excerpt

The week and a half before the first training day, I spent preparing myself mentally for the clear challenges that lay ahead. The sleepless nights and flashbacks started to intensify. They were beginning to control my emotions to a point where I found myself scared of the future. Was this a sign of the fate ahead of me? Was this Michael’s way of trying to make me reconsider? Night after night, I woke several times during the night, stricken by silence and a racing heart, the same way I was when I sifted through that wreckage that September day. I found myself constantly wondering if this was about my childhood dreams or proving to the world I had the courage to charge forward even though Michael was lost. I couldn’t talk to anyone about this; I didn’t want anyone to question my courage. I kept my emotions bottled up, and the pressure was building every single minute that went by. Was I going to follow through with this? Did I have what it took to fill Michael’s boots and continue our family legacy on the NYC Fire Department?