Hello everyone. This i my first blog ever on any site, so please be patient. My name is Mike Deniger. I have been a firefighter for almost 15 years with a couple of various companies in Southern RI and for a 1 year stint in Chester County PA. I joined FFN when the members were in the hundreds, not thousands we have today. I instantly took a liking to the forum's. (I do tend to ramble at times) If I post 10 comments, or 600 comments, whose business is it to worry about it, aside from my own? Am I not extending my wide variety of training and knowledge to those who could truely use it. (this post does not reference any of my friends on FFN it was a random person who isn't on my friends list that sent the comment)

There have been some comments left for me, and also sent to me as messages on my FFN page about the credibility of my content due to my age. Yes folks, I am 28 years old. I feel that the content I post is not only relevant, but I haven't seen many disagree with what I say for facts I lay out in forum posts. I do have a varying opinion, and thats the beautiful thing of this website is the ability of firefighters from across the globe to share and compare experiences. (it would be very easy to get caught if you tried to bs your way through the forums) Yes I do post a ton on the forums. Yes I do comment a bunch on the forums. I enjoy the ability to try and help those who need it, be it advice on equipment, safety, procedure or any other topic I have seen come across the boards. My only point of frustration on the forums is the swamping of the forums with odd posts that would be better suited for Blogs, but it is not my place to mitigate who says or posts what, thats web chiefs.

Safety seems to be a burden to most on the forums. I find it disheartening that safety forum posts get buried before many folks comment on them. Remember safety is always our number 1 concern. (well according to FF1 it is) It may not play a serious role in some departments daily operations, but I am thankful for having great leadership in my department where safety is not only taught, it is trained on, and excercised.

When I started as a Junior member in a FD I will not mention, (yes you local folks should know who I mean) I was treated as a slave. The missle of the night calls where we laid hose, it was all rolled, and it was the Junior members (myself and 1 other) whose job it was to roll it out and repack the hose. (3am while everyone else went to bed) I was expected to do all the jobs not fit for a senior member. There were racial terms used when they wanted something from me. I was even embarrassed when we went to 4 fire musters and my shirt was labeled with "Toby." After going through my 4 years as a Junior firefighter I vowed to myself that I would never allow the things that occured to me to happen to any other member of the fire service so long as I had a heartbeat. To this day I take Junior firefighters under my wing to ensure they get the training they need, and help them to not just read the training material, but to understand the material. If they spend their junior years learning how to become firefighters with good training, and safe practices, 90% of the time we can retain them as active members throughout their adult lives.

I am not sure how these blogs work, but most people fall asleep after the frst 2000 words, so I will end this one now, and create a new one tomorrow about my search for a Career Firefighter Job, and my persuit of the dream of not being considered a Low Income family.

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