One fine Saturday morning, we were working on an addition to Steve’s house. We all worked on each other’s home improvement projects over the years. It was free labor supervised by someone who actually knew what they were doing. I was part of the free labor portion of the crew.We were putting up board insulation for a cathedral ceiling and not having fun fastening it in place. Each missed hammering of a nail, which was easy to do when hammering upside down at an angle on the underside of the roof, created a hole in the insulation. Misses were as common as hits, and our frustration was building.
Bang–miss. Damn.
Bang–miss. Shit.
Bang–miss. Fuck.
Our pagers all went off simultaneously, a cacophony of shrill beeps in the confined room, the dispatcher announcing a house fire in Fleetville. Tool belts clattered to the floor where they lay abandoned as we headed for our vehicles, deciding who would ride with whom.
Only a couple miles from the scene, we arrived to find an old two story farmhouse with heavy fire blowing from the windows on the first floor. It probably was on the second as well, but we couldn’t tell at this point. We put on our gear while awaiting the first engine.
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