Melody Burns

Aprroaching me rather quickly is a Firetruck with lights flashing and siren blasting so I pull over and let  the emergency truck pass by. The man in the car behind me blows his horn and shakes his fist at me as he pulls around me.  Two blocks up the road, a Ford truck approaches me with his blue light spinning on his roof. Again, I pull over and give him full space to get where he needs to go.  I pull into my driveway, get out of my car and my husband comes running out the door, jumps in his truck and turns his blue light on.  I stand in our driveway and watch six cars past the driveway heading east and four cars heading west do the same as my husband sits in the driveway with the blue light on.  The blue light signifiying that he is a volunteer answering the call to risk his life by saving a home or a business from fire or to assist with a motor vehicle accident.  The blue light signifiying he will be helping someone, someone who may be driving past the driveway ignoring the blue light. The blue light signifying that someone he most likely doesn’t know needs his help.

I write this blog because I wonder when did we stop recognizing the role of volunteers who place that blue light on their cars and trucks? When did it become acceptable to ignore those blue lights? Who said it is ok to not pull over when a Firetruck approaches you from the front or back  or any emergency vehicle?  Did you ever think that maybe that emergency vehicle maybe saving someone you know or something you own? 

Not a matter which political party, how much money you make, how old you are or if you live in that community, it is a matter of common sense.  Emergency vehicles should have the right of way and you should pull over. Having said that, I am aware that common sense is lacking and we are the “all about me generation”, but sometimes, just sometimes there has to be a light blub that goes off in your brain that says, “pull over stupid, it could be a matter of life or death.” (with any luck, that light bulb will be blue!)