"50 year old male, DIB, feels hot"
Working in the ambulance service gives you a rather morbid sense of humour, gallows humour if you will. You find things funny that normal people wouldn't. Discussing dismemberment over a gourmet meal seems perfectly normal to you, death can be amusing and most situations the layman would find incredibly traumatic you laugh off without a second thought. That's life. It's a coping mechanism but one that rarely fails to disappoint!
We arrived at the care home and were taken to the patient. He was only 50, but had vascular dementia. Until 5 months previous, he had been a university lecturer in English literature at a prestigious university. Now, he was bed bound, couldn't talk, couldn't move, didn't recognise anyone and was simply waiting to die. His wife was sat by his side holding his hand. It was a very sad story but an all to familiar one. Life can deal some real hard knocks.
To cut a long story short, he was ill, ill enough to warrant a blue calll, ill enough to give us real concern. The trolley bed was brought in and we began assisting staff to put the patient into the hoist. Slowly he was lifted out of his bed. Suspended in mid-air, unaware of what was happening to him, we began turning him around so as to lower him to the waiting bed. However, during the raising and turning process his foot made contact with a 'Billy Bass'.
The fish sprung into life. The head turned 90 degrees to face us and started singing 'Knock Knock Knocking on Heaven's Door'. The irony was too much. Despite every inch of me trying to stay the consummate professional, I couldn't. I started laughing. So did my crewmate. So did the carer. So did his wife. There were tears running down our faces and the damn thing just wouldn't stop. It sang like there was no tomorrow. It's head swinging backward and forth, mouth opening and closing in no discernible rhythm at all. We couldn't stop the damn thing either, and why?... because our patient was suspended from a hoist in between us and the bloody fish. Eventually we pulled ourselves together and got him on the bed. Billy had piped down by now but as we walked off he started up again. This time it was Bobby Ferrin's 'Don't Worry, Be Happy'. A nice sentiment drowned out by the laughter. There is a time and a place for humour in our job and now was neither the time nor the place but what's a crew to do?!