As you are well aware, there was an extraordinarily tragic fire this week in Annapolis, MD* where it appears six people- two grandparents and four of their grandchildren- may have died in the blaze.  This incident has also gotten a significant amount of media attention, from CNN; CBS via WUSA; and any number of other conventional media outlets. Understandably, there […]

I was reading an article this morning about yet another mutt (just because they are a “member” somewhere, I refuse to call them “firefighter”) whose actions erode the community’s trust in us as they broke into their own station and vandalized it.  To me it seems like the fire service could weed them out. However, even in my own […]

I woke this morning for a third time, having gone back to sleep when the alarm rang (twice- it’s a holiday), then later taking a nap (third time). Feeling refreshed, I sat down to take care of the business end of Firehouse Zen: answering e-mails, checking the Twitter feed, etc.  I also decided a “first post” for […]

Back in 2012 I ran a 21-part series on Firehouse Zen on altruism and leadership (going back I realized I skipped Part 18- go figure).  There are any number of analogous theories that run along this vein, including just culture, transformational leadership, and servant leadership.  In each, the common thread is the concept of leading from […]

Over the Christmas holiday, a drive-by gunman shot and wounded a Jacksonville, FL firefighter. With the recent law enforcement killings and given the hate that has been fueled in the past weeks, it doesn’t come as a surprise to me. All of the incidents in recent years toward firefighters are going to start becoming more commonplace […]

It wasn’t long before a few of the crazy ones took instruction from the hate being spewed by the ignorant. While there are others, in just this weekend, three police officers (two NYPD, one in Florida who ironically, was originally NYPD) have been executed for just being police officers.  Not because of their viewpoints.  Not because they posed […]

The sign in front of one of the churches was advertising that “Prophet John Doe” [name changed for obvious reasons] was going to be holding a revival.  I wondered: “What are the job requirements for being a prophet? ” I kind of liked the idea of having the title “Prophet” in front of my name.  I […]

Lately I have been considering the sad affairs of our world in regard to our tendency to create scapegoats for the things that go badly in our lives. I have thought a lot about diversity in any number of angles and again, it is tragic to me that today there are still those who lump […]

The useful part of a wheel is not the wheel or the spokes, but the hole where all the spokes meet. We have to look past the obvious and turn to the esoteric; despite what we see, it’s deeper than that. Logical solutions exist to every problem, but the emotional mind fights those solutions because they aren’t, […]

You simply can’t plan for everything.  We do try to make our scenes safer, but conditions change, or situations are presented where we can’t even imagine how they came to be.  How many people considered that individuals would try to bring down the World Trade Center, not once, but twice, succeeding in the end and […]

I got back from some opportunities I had taken and began to reflect on what I had learned.  Over a beer or two, I happened to have a conversation with a fire service leader about my blog and we were talking about different approaches and the like.  One of the things he said to me was […]

Recently I have undergone Lasik surgery to “enhance” my vision.  I’m very happy with the result, although there were some adjustments that had to be made.  Sight has always been an important sense to me.  As someone who trained as an graphic artist and photographer, as a writer, and in the things I enjoy doing, my […]

You may not be familiar with Dr. Bruce Tuckman’s 1965 article, Developmental Sequence in Small Groups, but you are probably aware of the end result: The “Forming, Storming, Norming, and Performing” model embraced by many as the cycle teams experience as they go from infancy to becoming high-performing assets.  This article left out a very […]

In doing some research for a paper, I was reading about the difference between effective managers and those who become sidelined before hitting their peak.  While it might seem obvious that it has a lot to do with the way in which they motivate and inspire their followers, I still see traditional methods of “leading” […]

Watching a video today, I saw what was intended to illustrate that sometimes the people recording the video get a little too close.  The proximity of the videographer to the situation was MUCH too close.  As a photographer myself, I understand the shooter is more likely focusing on the picture and not on what is happening around them.   They had real […]