Category: Texas

Fire

Published on by Sharron BurnettLeave a comment

fire-generic-750xx724-407-0-38When my youngest brother, Pat, announced to our mother that he wanted to become a firefighter I suspect that she believed that he was just going through an adolescent phase that would soon enough pass. She told him that she would not give him her blessing to enter the Houston Fire Academy until he had first earned a college degree, a requirement that he dutifully completed. With his diploma from the University of Houston in hand he returned to her once again to announce that he had applied to become a candidate for the Houston Fire Department. This time he was only informing her, not asking for her permission. Shortly thereafter he began his training and was so taken with the lessons and skills that he learned that he graduated number one in his class. It was a proud day for him and all of our family when he earned his badge and a job at the downtown Houston Fire Station Number One.

Pat threw himself wholeheartedly into his work and it was not long before there was a major fire in the downtown area that was so large that it made the nightly news and there in a photograph for the ages stood my brother aiming a stream of water at a wall of red flames that dwarfed him. The image showed his back with his last name emblazoned on his jacket. It was a frightening reminder of just how dangerous his job really was. As a family we tried not to think too much about the kind of things that might happen to him but again and again there were reminders that firefighters literally place their lives on the line each time that they respond to a call for help. They never quite know what kind of situation awaits them and for the most part they rarely discuss what they have seen with those of us who would rather not be reminded of the dangerous possibilities.

Pat was as happy with his career as anyone that I have ever known. He spoke glowingly of the brotherhood and friendships that he shared with his crew members. He proved his mettle as a leader and began to work his way up the ranks, eventually becoming a Captain at one of the neighborhood stations. It was apparent that his men loved him as much as he loved them. They became a second family for him in an environment where he felt confident that he was living his dream.

He returned to school first to earn an advanced degree in Public Administration and then another in Fire Safety. He became such an expert in his field that Mayor Lee Brown tapped him to become the director of the Fire Academy. It was a post that he cherished because it allowed him to share his expertise with young men and women who were as eager to serve as he had always been. He upgraded the rigor of the training process with an eye to preparing his charges for the special demands of being a first responder in one of the nation’s largest cities. It was a very happy time for him but before long he was moving into other arenas of leadership.

He became a District Chief and then a Regional Chief. He helped to investigate fires and to set and maintain high standards for all of the firefighters in the city, all the while humbly doing his work without mentioning his ever growing status within the department. He was always far too busy working for the betterment of Houston to brag about his accomplishments but the men who had worked for him often whispered their admiration.

One of Pat’s most exciting moments came when he accompanied a group of Houston firefighters to New York City on the occasion of the opening of the 9/11 memorial. They traveled by motorcycle all the way from Houston and then participated in a parade in downtown New York. He was so moved by the stories of bravery that he heard from comrades from all around the world. It was a grand moment in which he truly realized the importance of his work and stood shoulder to shoulder with people who understood the unique challenges and joys of being a firefighter.

I can’t imagine what kind of courage it must take to don the heavy equipment of a firefighter and hop onto a truck for a ride to an unknown disaster. On any given day our firefighters know that they may walk into situations from which they will never return. Even in the best of circumstances they often experience damage to their lungs from the continual exposure to smoke. They may fall from the rafters of an attic or have a ceiling come down on their heads. They encounter life and death situations over and over again and are only able to relax once they are safely back at the station. Still they eagerly report to work again and again just as Pat has always done.

Pat Little has served the City of Houston with pride and enthusiasm for thirty six years. He has tirelessly worked during hurricanes, floods, freezes and even when he felt sick. On some nights the alarms awakened him so many times that he had little sleep. There were Thanksgiving and Christmas days when he was faithfully executing his duties while the rest of us were relaxing and celebrating without him. Missing even a single day of work was always anathema to him. He rarely complained when he had to be absent for the milestones of his children or when he had to forego special occasions because he was saving a life. Now his outstanding and selfless career is finally drawing to a close. On Sunday his crew is hosting a party for him and on October 11, he will retire for good. He will be remembered and revered by both family and fellow firefighters for the joy and dedication that he brought to his job for all of those thirty six years. I have little doubt that given the opportunity he would gladly relive his life as a firefighter all over again.

Congratulations, Chief Patrick Little, on a job well done. We are all proud of you and humbled by your quiet courage and your unflagging determination to make a lasting difference in the world. You have done well in a world that is all too often marked by evil and greed. You are our hero, a man who has shown the meaning of service.

Tree

Published on by Sharron BurnettLeave a comment

tree1024x1024There is a tree in Rockport, Texas that has been growing in the same spot for centuries. Some wise soul thought to save the old oak forever by declaring it an historical treasure and building a fence around it. People travel from all parts of the world just to stand under the shade of the sprawling limbs and to marvel at the girth of the ancient trunk. They snap photos of the wondrous image and try to imagine what the old tree has seen in its time on this earth. If only it could talk we might hear of native people pausing under its branches to rest after a day of hunting and fishing or learn of explorers from Spain who traveled along the Gulf Coast searching for cities of gold. Did the tree once see vast flocks of whooping cranes wintering in the area in their annual journey from Canada? How did it manage to withstand the forces of tropical storms and punishing hurricanes? What is its secret to long life?

We humans have love/hate relationships with trees. We plan trips to Vermont in the fall to marvel at the glorious colors of leaves but also cut down beautiful specimens to make way for factories. We plant trees in the yards of our new homes that once sat in forests that we eliminated to build our suburban communities. We enshrine trees in metaphorical poetry even as we topple them in real life. We use them for our own whims often forgetting that they are helping to provide the very oxygen that we breathe. They cool us and shelter us and we all too often take them for granted. When we flee from natural disasters we abandon them to bear the brunt of wind and water and fire.

Along the Big Thompson Canyon on the road leading from Loveland, Colorado to Estes Park is the dead stump of a once mighty tree. It is bent and gnarled into a contortion created by the power of the river that took homes from their foundations and turned nature’s bounty into piles of rubble. Somehow that tree has become a work of art. Its determination to hold fast to the rocks in which it once grew is a testament to its strength and flexibility. It stands as a sentinel as rugged as the huge boulders along the face of the canyon. It has somehow withstood the onslaught of both nature and humans.

We personify trees. They teach us lessons. We track our human history in their branches. We have a special kinship with trees, especially when we are hot and weary. We sit under their branches cooling ourselves and dreaming of futures that we may never see but they are more likely to enjoy. Trees remind us of ourselves as they travel along with us through the seasons and the years. They are our silent partners in a lifetime journey.

My paternal grandmother was a child of nature. Her father and her grandmother are buried in a national forest in Arkansas where their homestead once resided. It seems fitting that her ancestral home is now protected and allowed to return to a wild and unfettered state. She so loved to walk in the woods under a canopy of trees that sheltered the birds and critters that she enjoyed. When she died my grandfather handpicked a spot in the cemetery that sits under a grove of oaks whose limbs reach gracefully over her final resting place. She would have loved the serenity of the area. In life she marveled at nature’s wonders and seemed almost to be a mischievous sprite as she wandered in the forest behind her farm naming every tree, plant and bird that crossed her path.

Hanging on the wall at the entrance to my home is an image of an enormous tree spreading its limbs across a landscape of green. I have placed it there to welcome my guests and to remind myself of the glories of the natural world. The painting calms me and makes me smile. Gazing at it takes me to my roots. I think of the people whom I never met who had to live in order that I might now exist. Like the tree they once began with a tiny seed and then reached to the heavens with their dreams, becoming ever stronger with each new branch. I know their names but not their stories. I can only imagine what their lives had been based on what I know about the places where they lived. I wonder what they would think of me and the world in which I exist. I suspect that they would be happy that things have turned out as well for me and my extended clan as they have. After all, each of us wants the best for our children and grandchildren. We want to know that they will be safe.

One of my favorite books is Shel Silverstein’s The Giving Tree. I have presented it as a gift many times over. I never tire of its story of unconditional love and sacrifice. I have now travelled through almost seven decades from the time when I was born. I have been the child, the teenager, the young adult, the middle aged individual and now the old person described in the tale. I have known both the exuberance and the drudgery of life, sometimes forgetting the people who have brought me to the place where I now linger. Like all humans I sometimes take my blessings for granted and even abuse the kindnesses that have been shown to me. I forget to be thankful and to simply enjoy the shade and the sound of the wind whispering through the leaves of the tree of life.

Trees keep me optimistic. They remind me that there is a continuity in this world that is bigger than our individual human efforts. We may falter and even become a bit full of ourselves but the ebb and flow of life remains essentially the same. We all benefit from being a bit more like trees. It is important that we “Stay grounded. Connect with our roots. Turn over new leaves. Bend before we break. Enjoy our unique natural beauty and keep growing.” (Joanne Chaptis) If we remember these simple rules we will surely find more of the contentment that we seek, especially in a world as seemingly mad as the one that we now face.

That tree in Rockport has seen more than we might ever imagine and still lives on. There is something rather nice about knowing that it is there and will be even when we are gone. Like the giant sequoias of Yosemite, the groves of Aspen in Rocky Mountain National Park and the countless shady lanes that soften the highways and byways across the land trees are the constant that we all wish to be in the world.

The Test

Published on by Sharron BurnettLeave a comment

56750d678ee6c-imageFridays in the fall always meant one thing to me. There would be a test in on of my classes and a test of our school’s football team on the gridiron later that night. I was always feeling exhausted after a long week of assignments and high expectations from my teachers. Even though I was a Hermione of sorts when it came to academics I just wanted to get through the educational part of the day as quickly as possible and move on to the possibilities of the weekend, a time for taking a deep breath and avoiding the stress of study if only for a moment.

My school didn’t have a band but we did have an all girls drill team with a drum and bugle corps. It was considered a big thing to belong, a way of forming endearing friendships and being part of something revered by the student body. Surprisingly I wasn’t a member of the group. My decision was a huge disappointment to my mother.

My mom had spent money that she didn’t have to provide me with baton twirling lessons from the time that I was in the third grade. In my middle school years I had performed as a twirler in the drill squad and had eventually risen to the rank of Captain. Mama had assumed that I would continue the quest to become the drum major in high school but in an uncharacteristic fit of rebellion I had refused to try out for one of the coveted twirling positions and had instead chosen to become a lowly marcher on the team. Due to my then diminutive size I was in the very last row of performers, a kind of afterthought.

My downfall from the glory of leading the group as a twirler was more than my dear mother could handle and she announced that if I wanted to be on the team I would have to find a way to pay the fees and attend the practices on my own. Since I barely had enough money saved to purchase the many school supplies that I needed it became quickly apparent that I would have to drop out of the coveted drill team group and become a nameless member of the horde of students that freely trolled the stands under the Friday night lights. I chose the unconventional road and it ended up being not so bad after all.

I never had a car or a driver’s license. Such luxuries were not included in our very tight family budget. I bummed rides to the football games with anyone that I could find and thoroughly enjoyed our free and easy excursions. We had no uniform code or rules. We were just out and about for the evening. We’d crank up the volume on the radio which was always tuned to the popular stations of the time and rock to the songs of The Beach Boys and The Animals. We’d laugh and sing and swear that on this night our team was going to topple the opponents. We’d whisper our hopes of encountering  certain male someones from our classes and scoring romantic conquests of our own. It was all so glorious and magical.

Our football team always tried but never ranked with the greats around our state of Texas. I went to a Catholic school that was rather small by public school standards. Our arch rival was St. Thomas High School, an all boys institution that prided itself in both academics and a championship athletic program. During my high school years they dominated football, winning the state title several times. Still with the optimism that was mine in my innocence I always dreamed that my team would one day be David to the St. Thomas Goliath. It never happened but it was fun to keep the faith and cheer for our guys even in the face of defeat.

I was an enthusiastic supporter of my classmates who braved the gridiron. I saw them as superheroes, young lions strutting their physical acumen. I yelled so long and hard at those games that I often returned home with a voice so weak that I was barely able to relate my adventures to my mom. I never scored with any of the guys with whom I self consciously flirted even though I often tried. I should have been disappointed by so many of those Friday nights but instead I remember them as being the highlight of my week. Win or lose it was glorious to shed the stresses of studying and taking tests and just hang out with friends. Screaming for my team and laughing at the antics of my fellow students freed the pent up frustrations and emotions associated with my attempts to successfully meet the sometimes daunting demands of my teachers.

Our football team’s most successful year came when I was a senior. For a brief moment I imagined that we might actually topple the might St. Thomas Eagles but that was not going to happen. Back then I had no idea that I would one day meet a young man from St. Thomas who would steal my heart and teach me how to love my one time foes. We would become parents and then grandparents cheering new teams and still enjoying those Friday night challenges that light up entire towns across Texas on cool fall evenings.

Tonight we’ll be at the Pearland Oil Rig stadium to watch the clash between Dawson High School and George Ranch. We will be torn in our allegiance because the kids in our neighborhood attend Dawson. In fact the young lady next door is one of the cheerleaders. On the other hand our grandchildren attend George Ranch.  We’ll wear the George Ranch colors and sit on their side of the field but in the end we really can’t lose because we have grown to love all of the young people who live around us who catch the bus for Dawson each morning right in front of our home. It’s a win win situation all around.

I rarely have any kind of tests these days other than those to explain my medical ailments. I have left the stress of long academic weeks behind. I am retired so even work is no longer a worry. I have new concerns over which I have little control. I fret about friends who are sick and suffering. I tutor my grandchildren and students at local high schools and middle schools and often think of them taking a critical exam. I feel a bit nervous for them when I look at the clock and realize that they are in the midst of taking a test for which I helped them study. I pray that they will remain calm and remember the ideas that we discussed. I mentally root for them as much as I did for the athletes who represented me and my school so long ago.

Life is the ultimate test of our wisdom, courage and endurance. As I attempt to make the very best of what will inevitably be the final phase of my life I at long last understand that it is okay to be unsure of all the answers and to lose from time to time. We gain as much from defeats as from victories, from mistakes as from success. In the end we are tested not so much on our abilities as in how we have lived and treated those who have walked along beside us. I’d like to believe that most of us have passed with flying colors.

The Ascent of Humankind

Published on by Sharron BurnettLeave a comment

ad220478590first-lady-miche-e1474795934923I have always been a creature of habit. When I was still working I had to keep to a hard and fast routine or I would end up feeling overwhelmed. I told myself that when I finally retired I would become more easy going but found it almost impossible to live without daily parameters. I still generally follow a pattern of living not unlike the one that guided me for most of my adult life. I find myself measuring the quality of my day by the number of tasks that I accomplish. I follow the same steps both when I awake and during the waning hours before I retire for the night. There is comfort in the sameness at the beginning and end of each cycle of the sun. The things that I repeat over and over again provide me with a feeling of stability in a world that of late seems to have gone somewhat mad.

One of my morning quirks is to read the news while I eat my breakfast. I want to know what has happened in the world while I was slumbering. I know all too well what might take place in the dark of night. I have lived the nightmare of arising to learn that a loved one has died while I was blissfully dreaming. Waking to very bad news has happened to me and to my friends many times over. Perhaps it is one of the reasons that I have evolved into a restless sleeper, always on alert. I am thankful for each morning that I see the sun but also leery that I might learn of yet another tragic event.

Today I awoke to find that a shooter was firing at passersby at a strip center in my city. I am quite familiar with the area where the incident unfolded even though it is somewhat far from where I actually live. I have shopped and dined there. For many years I dreamed of living in the neighborhood near there. It is an upscale part of town, somewhere that always seemed safe and devoid of the problems that plague much of Houston.

The updates that kept pinging on my phone indicated that six people were transported to the hospital which luckily is only minutes away in one of the best medical centers in the world. The shooter was “neutralized.” The always very busy road where all of this played out was closed and there was a shelter in place for residents of an apartment complex located near the tragedy. In real time I learned all about an event about which I might have been ignorant in times past and I find myself wondering if all of this news to which we are privy is helping or hurting us. Do we actually have better lives because we are now able to be “eyewitnesses” to war and murder or is the continuous barrage of carnage somehow damaging our collective psyche? Are we becoming immune to the violence or is it frightening and inciting us? Is there a connection between the twenty four hour news cycle and the questionable character of the two people that we have nominated as the potential leaders of our nation? Are we indeed backed onto a dangerous precipice or is the continuous reality show to which the newscasters subject us merely hyperbole designed to keep our attention? How much do we really need to know and how much should we simply ignore?

I am as uncertain about such things as most people are these days. I take comfort in knowing that while we do indeed live in a brave new world that is fraught with uniquely modern day problems, mankind’s journey has wound its way through centuries and somehow we have managed time and again to continue moving slowly but surely forward. Time stretches so far back that it is unimaginable. Our history as people is recorded from thousands of years ago. Whether we take the Old Testament of the Bible for granted or view it as a kind of folktale we understand that murder, war and mistreatment have been a part of our natures for as long as we have walked on this earth but hope and promise of a better world have time and again guided us to the realization of our better natures.

I began watching a series on the history of India last night. It told of ancient Greek navigators who risked monsoons to sail to India in search of enchanting spices like pepper and cardamon. The narrator told of the development of the silk road from China and the earliest kingdoms that dominated what we now call the Middle East, Pakistan and India itself. Many of the places that became centers of invention, trade and religious pilgrimages still exist today much as they did thousands of years ago. Most of the progress and learning that prompted such adventures took place during long stretches of peace. When there was no war humans turned their talents and their interests to creativity and inventiveness. Sadly jealousies and hunger for power all too often overtook mankind’s better natures and brought violence that destroyed entire dynasties. Our collective story demonstrates a human pattern of renaissance and destruction that asserts itself over and over again.

We never seem to completely solve all of our problems even with our best intentions to do so. Sometimes events overwhelm us and we become swept up in realities that most of us would rather avoid. We become part of the cycles of both everyday living and history. Our hope is that somehow we will manage not just to survive the difficult times but also to become stronger and better because of our experiences. Our goal is to learn and improve and move forward, a dream that is at times easier to imagine that to execute. It requires the capacity and willingness to accept one another just as we are.

In a world that can seem cruel and unfeeling a breathtaking thing happened this past weekend at the opening of the new Smithsonian museum for African American history. A photographer captured a touching moment when First Lady Michelle Obama gave a big hug to a smiling former President George W. Bush. The photo shows a millisecond of unplanned, unrehearsed innocence and genuine friendship between two people who have often been scorned by the public at large. In that brief encounter lay the seeds of a better future, a time when we might become more capable of seeing each other not as philosophies or religions or nations but simply as the wonderfully beautiful human beings that we are. It is only when we can look past the slogans and posturing and opinion mongering that continually invade our space that we truly harness the potential for greatness that lies in each and every one of us. It is during the times that we grow weary of fighting and instead live and let live that our humanity most shines forth. That is when our most awe inspiring spirits have the room to soar and ascend.

I don’t know where we are in the unfolding our human history. I have seen both good and bad times in my almost seventy decades. In the grand scheme of things I am but an infant and yet I know enough about our human routines to believe like King Lear that we always circle back to peace and goodness even when we appear to be at our worst. No matter how bad things may look, we need to keep the faith. A new day will come. The sun will shine. A Leonardo da Vinci or an Albert Einstein will be born. The future lies somewhere in our midst, somewhere in each one of us, and it is good. 

Happy Fall, Ya’ll

Published on by Sharron BurnettLeave a comment

first-day-of-autumn-weather-for-all-love-season-3There is a chill inside my home this morning. The air is filled with the aroma of pumpkins and spices. Colors of red, orange, yellow and gold catch my eye wherever I look. It is the first day of autumn, my favorite time of year. But wait! The high today will be ninety two degrees here in Houston. The brisk temperature that I feel has been artificially produced by my trusty air conditioner. The lovely autumnal smell is only the product of a Yankee candle. I see fall colors thanks to the collection of artificial items that I place around my home at this time each season. Were it not for Hobby Lobby and Michael’s fall in Houston would look exactly the same as the middle of July. I have to conjure a great deal of imagination to realize that a change of seasons is actually taking place.

I just returned from a week long stay in the mountains near Rocky Mountain National Park. There I enjoyed the true splendor of autumn produced by Mother Nature at her finest. The landscape was awash with spectacular colors that seemed almost to have been painted on the leaves that fluttered enticingly in the wind. I wore my sweaters during the day and snuggled under a warm blanket at night, all without the aid of mechanical devices designed to keep my environment comfortable. The clean smell of pine overwhelmed my olfactory senses. The world around me seemed to be balanced and as perfect as it ought to be. The cycle of seasons was operating so perfectly that even the animals understood what time of year we were entering. It felt so right.

I love the fall but have had to manufacture it of late because I live in the south near the waters of the Gulf of Mexico. There are actually people who begin a yearly pilgrimage to my part of the country at about this time. They are fleeing the coming ravages of winter which will most surely visit their northern homes. They live like snowbirds who seek warmer climes in which to survive the harshness of the coming days. I see their trailers in the RV parks and their foreign license plates from places like Minnesota, Nebraska and Michigan. They flee from the very weather that I have never really seen and would so love to experience.

Each year as my fall birthday approaches in the middle of November I am just as likely to be wearing shorts and flip flops as one of my sweaters that never wears out. I only replace my winter gear when it becomes hopelessly out of style. I rarely use it enough to tarnish its sheen of newness. Unless I travel to one of the colder places it often seems like overkill to even take my coats from the closet where I store them all year long.

There used to be a sliver of fall and winter here in Houston. When I was a child I recall enjoying seventy degree days in October and as November rolled around we always lit the pilot light on our heater because we were bound to have some cold nights. I suggest that all climate change deniers spend some time where I live to realize that it appears to get warmer and warmer every single year, a fact that worries me intensely. Even my rabidly conservative but science-oriented brother admits that we are indeed experiencing a worldwide warming trend that is having a dramatic effect on our very existence. We humans are changing the rhythm and flow of nature and ultimately the results will be devastating if we don’t agree to take measures to slow the tide of a warming atmosphere that is artificially creating a climate that brings us more and more severe weather patterns and natural disasters. The data doesn’t lie no matter how much we humans choose to ignore the facts.

I just drove through the heart of what had been the dustbowl during the Great Depression of the twentieth century. The drought that overtook parts of Colorado, Oklahoma and Texas would certainly have caused many problems for the farmers who lived there but the situation became even more dire than it needed to be because they had interrupted nature. The people had plowed over the native grasses designed to anchor the soil to the earth. Without those simple little plants the winds carried the dirt high into the sky like great filthy clouds. There were continual storms of dust rather than rain that often made it impossible to see or even to breathe. The desperate people lost their incomes, their lands and sometimes even their lives. It was only when proper planting methods were eventually introduced that the area began to slowly come back to life. Sadly the ravages of that era are still apparent in some small towns where buildings on main streets are empty and populations continue to decline.

There are scientists among us who have studied such things. They understand the soil, the insects, the plants, and the weather. They are able to explain the symbiotic nature of our world. It is time that we listened to their warnings or the day may come when we humans no longer have the ability to create the comforts that we seek. We may simply have to endure the assaults from nature that will most surely come if we choose to ignore the warning signs that are all around us.

I love the natural flow of the life cycle. I enjoy being as one with the earth, a visitor no more important to the way of things than the tiniest bug. I don’t want my footprint to disturb the earth but I instinctively know that it does. I want to do my tiny little part to make my presence a bit less destructive. I suppose that if each of us were to begin just one form of conservation on a daily basis our collective efforts would begin to make a small dent in the problems that are making our earth sick. Instead of ridiculously asserting that climate change is a myth our politicians need to join together in crafting a global plan that will be as painless as possible to people everywhere. We must use our natural human abilities to find acceptable and forward thinking answers without destroying livelihoods. We have done it before and I have little doubt that we might do it again.

So on this first morning of autumn I intend to enjoy my favorite time of year with a bit of gardening if I can manage to endure the heat. At my age there is always an uncertainty that I will see another September 22 so I have to seize the day with all of the gusto that I am able to muster. With all of those fall wreaths showing up on the doors of my neighbor’s homes pumpkin cheesecake can’t be far behind and what is better than that? Happy Fall to those of us north of the equator and Happy Spring to everyone below. The world is still a wonderful place. Let’s keep it that way.