What a day!

Saturday was one of those days; you know the kind I am talking about. The kind that cause you to forget to eat, the kind that are so busy you realize at 6pm that you have not even showered, the kind that even though there is an engagement party at 7:30 your bed seems so much more inviting. Well this past Saturday was that kind of day for me.

I was up pretty late on Friday night baking Strawberry Champagne cupcakes for the engagement party on Saturday and making Chicken Tortilla soup for my sickly man. So Saturday morning came way too early and way too abruptly for you see I was not woken up by my alarm I was woken up by a homeless man screaming outside my window. I jumped out of bed to see what was the matter (name that book) only to find a man simply yelling at himself…….the adventures of living in heart of urban Tulsa. Being I was up I figured I might as well get my day off and running. I trained Lindsay and as I side note while we were training were discussing the soup I made. I mentioned how I was going to buzz out of the house to run a few errands and leave the soup simmering on my stove, but at the last min opted to just turn my stove off (this will prove to be relevant later in this post). I got my hair cut and I finished the cupcakes. I headed over to Matt’s to deliver the magical get well soup and the cupcakes, for the party was going to be at his house.

As I scurried home to try to get in a quick run before I needed to get ready for the party my evening took a quick left hand turn. You see as I was tooling back to my place I saw some black smoke and because it didn’t look quite right……..who I am kidding, because I am an ambulance chaser I buzzed down a street in the hood to see where all the smoke was coming from. As I came up on the backside of a home I noticed the entire back end of the house was engulfed in flames…….I slammed on my breaks and called 911. I am embarrassed to admit that as I sat in my car calling 911, I thought is that all I have to do just call 911. For any of you (which I know there must be a ton) wondering that same question, yes that is all I had to do. The 911 dispatcher handed me over to the fire and ambulance department. I fumbled around as I was telling them what I was witnessing, for starters I had no idea what road I was on, I simply knew I was off 11th street near some street named Quincy, secondly fire is the one thing I fear the most. Anyway dispatch got it figured out and sent some fire trucks our way and when I say fire trucks what I mean is there were 9 of them. I began to drive away once fire and EMSA arrived and then I realize I have no idea what happened here, I don’t want to be seen leaving a potential crime scene, so I pulled back over and got trapped on that street among all the fire trucks.

Long story short an elderly man left something burning on his stove as he went over to a neighbor’s house, when he got to his house he found it going up in flames. It was quite possibly one of the saddest pictures I have ever seen as this man watched his house burn before him. Once I knew everyone was safe and I was not going to be questioned I thought I need to get going, after all I had not showered all day, even if I had I would need to shower again due to all the smoke. This needing to leave was great in theory, but the facts led to the truth….I was not going anywhere, I was trapped by 5 fire trucks on one end of the street and a hose being strung from the fire hydrant on the other end of the street. I realized I am stuck. I made a comment to a man in the neighborhood about really wishing I was not trapped, next thing I knew I was turning my car around in this very skinny spot in order to face the opposite direction and he directed me down the sidewalk and grass until I was able to hop off the curb at the other end of the street and finally find myself free. The irony is the fact I have only had to call 911 once and it happened to be on something that I am deathly afraid of, fire. I am so glad everyone was safe, but my heart still goes out to the man that lost everything.