I have been very recently disscussing on another junior posting about juniors and their role. I also tend to go to the home page (not just juniors) of a poster and see what they're about. I can sometimes get a good feeling about what or why they are posting a comment.
I have seen a few persons post on their page things about "wanting to save a life". Now this got me to a thinking about what do they mean by save a life? I posted this question to a young man. He is probably (hopefully) still in class and so he won't be responding right away. I want to share with you all what I wrote. The reason why is because there are some out there that think saving a life is pulling some one from a buring building or a wrecked car. I believe that it is a small amount of the life saving that we do. I will let my posting tell more though;

Young Master Ben, I have a quick question to post to you. This is in no way a "trick" question or bashing you. I am just seeking clarification about your home page. What does "saving a life" mean to you? At your convenience you can post it here or on my page on my wall. I have my own definition of it just has I am sure everyone on here does. But I would like to discuss this with you. I could cheat and not give you my definition of it, this way I could get your true definition/opinion on this. If I did that though some (including yourself possibly) could call me a hypocrite because I did not set you up to succeed. After all of that typing that I did about setting up juniors to succeed would be pretty stupid on my part. Here is what I think saving a life is.
Saving a life is more than a Hollywood TV or movie. Saving a life is not always, and 99% of the time, making that save and dragging the baby or mom out of a burning building. I have met more FFs that save lives everyday and yet never once performed this feat of heroism. No to me saving a life is sitting there for has long as needed, on a couch consoling a wife that just lost her husband of 40 years because of a heart attack. Saving a life is when someone's home has just burned to the ground and them and their family have no place to go. You run home and rob your kids toy chest and run back to the scene to give their 5 year old son some toys to occupy himself because he just lost every toy he has ever had, but hey it is cool to that little kid because he has a new toy. For a brief minute that single mom doesn't have to worry about "fun" things to occupy their child. Then you spend then next few hours lining up someplace for them to stay (thank you soooo much to our local Red Cross) and get them some food and clothes. Saving a life is when your partner (and now Lt) is going through a rough separation and divorce and you spend hours face-to-face and on the phone assuring them that it will get better. Saving a life is after you get back from an MVI call that kills all 5 kids in a family because someone ignorant was behind the wheel of another car. You spend the next many hours getting CISD in place for everyone that was on that call so they can continue to make a difference in their community and personal life rather then slip into a deep depression because of this event. Saving a life is drilling and training a junior fire fighter on how to save their own life if and when 5, 10, 15 years from now they find themselves trapped in a building collapse and the will to fight is what gets them and their partner out alive.
I could go on and on about saving a life Ben. It happens in every little thing that we do. It is not just limited to pulling someone out of a burning building. I learned a great lesson the hard way. The little things matter. You Master Ben need to realize this. You need to take this precious short time that you have as a junior and truly become a master of this service like you state that you want to. In the future you may find that the life that needs saving, is your own. Will you be prepared?

I know that I share this feeling with many of you. Spread the word though. Pulling people out of buildings make newspaper heros. The real heros, in my opinion, are the ones that don't take for granted the little things that we do.
Be safe and learn something new today.