The thin yellow line

The thin blue line

The thin silver line

All blue bloods through and through

A family of blood sweat and tears

And on those rare occasions joy

Not by birth

Not by vocation

But by calling

By the blood we bleed

When we lose one of our own

You’re not born with blue blood

But you swear an oath

Uphold the constitution

Protect and serve

You earn that blood through the scars

Physical and mental

Seen and unseen

By the missed holidays

By the missed birthdays

By the shared trauma

Not born to it

But by God they’re family

You hear of a death across the country and your heat drops

No God not another you cry

Eventually the heartache becomes easier

Cause you’ve earned you blue blood

You’ve earned your scars seen and unseen

God there’s so many

Especially the unseen

No longer distinguishable from one another

Hard to tell which cane first

Where one starts and another ends

Everyday you put on the mask

I am strong

I’m unbreakable

Especially when you know you’re not

Especially when you’re falling apart

Because that’s what they need

And what’s expected

None escape unscathed

We all beat the marks

A lot of us now bear the diagnoses

PTSD

CPTSD

Depression

Anxiety

Major depressive disorder

Still you wouldn’t go back and change it if you could

Protect and serve

Doesn’t just mean physically

It’s it’s also psychologically

5, 10, 20, 30 years or more

Every day a battle

Holding the line

A career of war to serve and protect

From the monsters that hide in society

Sometimes in plain sight

“I have seen Evil True Evil and it wears the skin of Men”

Against our own Demons

We gained in our service

Or the demons that we had and were fed by it

Against the ever alluring promises of

Ineffective coping

Especially alcohol

Cheap easily procured and socially acceptable to a point

We know we’re appreciated and loved by many

But you don’t hear it or see it enough

This isn’t a plea or a demand

Just a glimpse of the scars

Of the people who we couldn’t save

The children and adults we’ve watched die

Sometimes in our arms

Of the screams, wails, and last words

That haunt the soul of dispatchers

When we arrive to late

The ones we lost to suicide

The ones we gave compressions and cpr to

Our brothers and sisters who lost their ward with their demons

Of the shots we didn’t want to take

Of the things we wish we could have stopped

The crying abused children

The battered spouses

Who welcome their abused back with a smile

Or with fear and trembling

Afraid of what will happen if they don’t

It all changes you

It builds you up and tears you down

It is what is and it’s what we live

Till we can’t take it anymore or we persevere and retire

Dedicated with love to all my Brothers and Sisters. Dedicated to all Dispatchers, Police Officers, First Responders, and Correctional Officers all of which include County, City, State and Federal.