I have been a firefighter for a little over a year now. A couple of months ago, while I was still very new at the station, we got a call for a house fire.

When we got there, we didn’t know if the house was empty or not, so we went inside. The first thing we always do is check for kid’s shoes. If we find any, we start looking for kids in the house.

To my horror, there were two small pairs of sneakers right by the front door. It was my first call involving kids possibly stuck in a burning house. I was deeply disturbed and I wanted to do everything I could to find them.

The smoke was very thick and with all my gear on, I could hardly hear any sounds coming from the house. I went upstairs and found a kid’s room.

Since I couldn’t see anything, I started to feel the inside of the bed. Suddenly, my hand fell on something that was shaking. I yelled “I found a kid!”

I was very excited and very proud, until I took the “kid” rush out of the house and realized that it the kids in my arms is, a “Tickle Me Elmo” dolls.

Needless to say I am still teased about that. I will probably be teased about that forever, especially when I’ll have to explain where that new nickname “Elmo” comes from!