A Thousand Naked Strangers: A Paramedic's Wild Ride To The Edge And Back Quotes
"I am Richard Fucking Nixon, and this is peace with honor."
"Just like our patients, EMS is dangerous and a little mad and possibly contagious."
"EMS is medicine as modern anthropology."
"There’s never been any proof that drugs actually help patients in cardiac arrest, but still we give them. Call it better dying through pharmaceuticals."
"This is one of those moments when the reality of trying to save lives on an ambulance hits home."
"The breastplate quickly breaks free from the ribs; the connecting cartilage snaps with each compression and makes a percussive pop like thick ice breaking deep below the surface."
"It’s about the experience, and for the patient, the experience is going to suck regardless."
"A firefighter drops to his knees and begins CPR—a traumatic, almost obscene assault on the body."
"I straighten out Grandma’s arm but can’t find a vein. The thing about someone in arrest is, basically, she’s dead."
"The floor of an ambulance is steel, and the teeth break under my weight with a loud ceramic crack."
"The setup is simple, one of those things you’d never think about until it happens, and once it does, you wonder why it doesn’t happen more often."
"Chris grabs one side, I grab the other, and we yank. It splits open to below her belly button, just low enough for us to learn that Grandma doesn’t wear underwear."
"The rule for scenes with multiple patients is first in, last out."
"We’re the ones who show up. And really, the Perfect Call isn’t about the patient. It’s about us."
"There’s a distinct sound, a high-pitched bing that mellows into a whine and culminates in a series of beeps—dee-doo-dee-doo-dee-doo, doot-doot—signifying the charge is ready."
"In a job where it’s possible to scoop up a stranger’s brain, it’s important to have levity."
"As we’re about to leave, a niece asks if she can come. This is a tough call."
"You think I’m being ridiculous, but it could happen. Look around the next time you’re driving. Nobody is paying attention."
"So a mundane call in which the patient lives because of our efforts doesn’t trump a real shit-kicker even if the patient dies."
"This isn’t how it normally goes. Normally, this sort of thing happens near but not close, maybe heard but never seen."
"Once it’s open, I lean out. 'Hey, uh, you wanna get in?'"
"Ultimately, it’s the shooter who calls 911."
"Because he did something so stupid simply since he thought it’d be funny."
"I don’t know what treatment he underwent, how long it took to silence the voices, how long he remained on Thirteen."
"The trick is figuring out what the patient has taken based on what’s lying around."
"The gears turn, the furnace glows. Smoke puffs into the air."
"The dispatcher’s voice is rushed, and we know right away that our long dry spell of running nothing but nothing has come to an end."
"The more you try to pretend you aren’t staring, the more it looks like you’re staring."
"We’re under siege. By the doctors and the fire department and the cops."
"I’m unconscious before the bed knows I’m here."
"He’s going to think about the Kennedys and Lincoln and Lennon. He’s going to think about Jesus. And he’s going to strangle me."
"Lives are in the balance, and it’s just us."
"The fire chief—the one we ignored and disrespected and pissed off—has called our supervisors and raised hell."
"Eventually, he composes a handwritten apology and drives to Atlanta Fire headquarters to deliver it in person."
"Forget that we were right, that the chief’s own firefighters dropped the ball and were mishandling a patient."
"I ask Marty if he’s sure. 'Because once you leave, that’s it,' I tell him. 'It’s over.'"
"A death here isn’t merely undignified. It’s forgotten."
"This job’s gotta qualify me for something, right?"
"We speculate on how long he’s been here and why."
"The dying tend to know something is wrong, and if they can, they make their way to the bathroom."
"Somewhere in the darkness, something moves and I swing my light."
"We shuffle through the auditorium, stepping over fallen pieces of ceiling and piles of turd."
"The calls continue like this, one after another, as the bills stack up and people weigh their narrowing options."
"Maybe, just maybe, I have nowhere else to go and I was, in fact, left behind."
"But maybe not. Maybe I have nowhere else to go and I was, in fact, left behind."
"I’m not sure what I expected—pushback, maybe, or some frustration—but I definitely didn’t expect this."
"I thought she’d ask what I would do for a job, to make money and contribute."
"We were supposed to be leaving for Charleston in a few minutes, but there I was, or at least there was my presence, on television at the courthouse downtown."
"Sabrina is in the kitchen when I wake up. I walk downstairs. She smiles and asks how my day was."
"We’ve developed a routine for these calls, a system."
"In the end, I wasn’t fired. I never fucked up and got drummed out or got angry and stomped off."