EMILY PRATT SLATIN

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She/Her/Hers Lesbian

Retired Career Fire and EMS Lieutenant-Specialist, Writer, and Master Photographer, living in Vermont.

A New Era

October 16, 2026—Middletown Springs, Vermont (Home)

This morning, I woke up thinking about the concept of eras. I put on Porcelain by Courtney Barnett, made myself a cup of coffee in one of Mom's favorite vintage cat mugs from France, and began contemplating the rather peculiar chronology of my life.

I'm forty-seven years old, both of my parents are dead, and I've been permanently retired since turning forty. According to the traditional American Dream, I've already entered the final era of my life, despite being decades younger than most people who arrive at this particular milestone.

I find that fascinating, especially because I worked extremely hard to make my retirement happen precisely when it did. What I never anticipated was that I would be living this part of my life without either of my parents.

Tomorrow is the anniversary of Mom's death. Her birthday was October 31, which means she died exactly fourteen days before turning eighty-one. Two weeks. Fourteen days. It is an interval of time that has appeared throughout my life with such remarkable consistency that I have occasionally wondered whether the universe is operating according to some unspoken administrative policy.

Growing up, practically everything came with two weeks' notice. My father first announced that I was going to summer camp two weeks before I was set to leave. Boarding school, and college proclamations would follow an identical amount of notice, and I would have exactly fourteen days to make arrangements. Apparently, he believed this was more than sufficient time for a child to reorganize her existence around whatever decision he had recently made on her behalf.

I was kicked out of seventh grade two weeks before the end of the school year. The following year, while attending school in Cooperstown, history repeated itself with considerably more entertaining results.

I had been required to see the school psychologist every week simply because I identified as female, despite my father's insistence that I was his son. The psychologist and principal were friends, both men of approximately the same age, and neither seemed particularly interested in accepting the fact that I knew who I was.

Eventually, after an entire school year of weekly visits, I decided that the situation had become ridiculous enough to warrant an appropriately ridiculous response.

"You will never reach me. The devil controls me. Obviously."

I was trying to be funny. Apparently, the psychologist failed to appreciate my particular approach to humor, which was unfortunate because I thought the deadpan delivery was excellent.

The following day, exactly fourteen days before graduation, the principal handed me my eighth-grade diploma and told me never to return. My father had just dropped me off that morning, and had already started the hour-long drive back home.

"Fuck yeah, two MORE weeks of summer vacation."

He suddenly changed his mind, but by then, mine was already made up. I had received my diploma, which was precisely what I had come for, and I had absolutely no intention of giving it back. I ran out of the building while he shouted, "GET BACK HERE!"

I did not return. As far as I was concerned, eighth grade was over, and I had been given an unexpected extension to my summer vacation. If the principal had intended to punish me, his strategy had failed rather spectacularly. I spent the rest of the school day wandering through Cooperstown, eventually stopping in at Price Chopper out of sheer boredom.

Mom later picked me up from school. I told her exactly what happened. She and I agreed that my father would only hear that I had graduated from grade eight and that I had chosen to not attend my graduation.

So much of my childhood involved other people deciding when one part of my life would end and another would begin. Adults made decisions, and I was expected to accommodate them, frequently with precisely fourteen days to prepare. It was an interesting way to grow up, especially for an autistic girl.

My father died when I was thirty-three years old, only months before I would be promoted to Lieutenant. I would have loved to have seen the look on his face when he opened the newspaper and discovered that his daughter, whose career had been chronicled in the local paper for years, had now earned herself a title. He had spent years telling me that I was a failure because I identified as female. He believed in female hysteria, male superiority, and the notion that men would always have greater opportunities. Meanwhile, I was a lesbian and a feminist, working in a profession traditionally dominated by men, and I was doing well for myself.

I didn't particularly need his approval. I wanted the satisfaction of standing in front of him with proof that he had been wrong. For once, I wanted him to confront a reality that contradicted everything he'd insisted upon believing about me. The newspaper would have made an excellent exhibit.

He died before the promotion, and I never got to enjoy that moment. It still bothers me on some small level.

Nobody tells you when you begin emergency work that someday you will perform the last call of your career. It will simply happen, and only later will you understand that there was never another one.

I spent approximately two decades working in career fire, EMS, and rescue. There was a time when I carried enough equipment on my body to communicate with people miles away, stop bleeding, make light, cut things, write things down, and identify myself to several government agencies. I still occasionally leave the house without remembering my grocery list.

I eventually retired from career emergency services and later became involved with the local volunteer fire department. Amelia had concerns about my returning to active incidents and told me that she would not marry me while I continued responding. I understood her concerns, although I wasn't necessarily finished with the idea of firefighting.

Then the department responded to a major incident involving numerous agencies, and instead of including me in the response, they left me alone at the neighboring fire station in Poultney. Amelia had to walk from the farm to the Middletown Springs fire station, retrieve my car, and drive to Poultney to bring me home.

After two decades of career fire, EMS, and rescue, including service as a Lieutenant-Specialist, I never imagined that I would respond to a major incident only to be left behind at another station by myself. I had worked in emergency services long enough to understand operational assignments, staging, resource allocation, and the practical realities of incident command. What happened that day was not something I was willing to accept as part of my continued involvement.

I resigned immediately.

I arranged my turnout gear in the center of the truck room floor exactly as I had been taught at the New York State Fire Academy. The boots were positioned together, with the bunker pants folded down around them and the waistband upright. The front closure was spread at forty-five degrees. I draped the bunker coat over the arrangement, positioned the sleeves at the correct angles, placed the gloves, and set the helmet on top, facing forward. Between the toes of the boots, I tucked a note explaining that, after twenty years of professional service, I had never expected to be treated this way.

I was done. Forever. No matter what.

I still donate money to volunteer fire departments, and next year I plan to contribute again. My distrust of the volunteer system doesn't mean I have anything against the people who devote their time to protecting their communities. The folks in Middletown Springs seem to try harder than most, and I appreciate what they do.

This has been the absolute greatest era of my entire life.

I take my time seriously, especially in this era of my life, because it is the one resource I can never recover after spending it. Yesterday was a particularly good example of how this arrangement works.

I woke up at approximately 7:30 in the goddamn morning and thought, "I'm Emily Slatin. Fuck yeah!"

Having established that it was a great day to be alive, I decided to get dressed, go to the general store for supplies, and spend the afternoon mowing the lawn with the tractor.

My favorite general store is H.N. Williams in Dorset, Vermont. It has excellent parking, a genuine Vermont atmosphere, fuel for the Bronco and tractor, and practically everything I need for life in rural Vermont. It also has picnic tables outside, which means I can enjoy lunch without getting crumbs all over the Bronco. This is an important consideration that I believe more establishments should take seriously.

I bought strawberries, two pairs of Vermont Tough hiking socks, chocolate milk, a chocolate chip cookie, a roast beef sandwich with cheddar cheese and mayonnaise, three Italian pork sausage links, two New York strip steaks, a French baguette, local crackers, strawberry yogurt, local eggs, a red bell pepper, and sesame-seeded bagels. I also filled the Bronco with ethanol-free premium gasoline.

The cashier rang everything up without any reaction whatsoever. Nobody questioned the combination. Apparently, this was an entirely normal shopping trip by the standards of H.N. Williams.

On my way out, I noticed several plastic Adirondack-style chairs arranged outside for customer use. I thought this was exceptionally thoughtful, particularly because it's only a matter of time before I walk into the store and another customer exclaims, "OH MY GOD, ARE YOU EMILY?"

I've already had at least a dozen people approach me unexpectedly this year in Vermont. Frequently, they've been following my writing and adventures for months or years before meeting me in person. To me, they're people I'm meeting for the first time. To them, I'm apparently someone they've known through my stories for quite a while.

These encounters can easily turn into thirty-minute conversations, and I suspect the employees at H.N. Williams would prefer not to overhear another one while trying to conduct business.

The Adirondack chairs are therefore an excellent arrangement. We can simply move the conversation outside, sit comfortably, and continue talking without interfering with anyone's work.

I returned to the farm, ate my sandwich, and prepared to mow the lawn. The tractor had approximately three-quarters of a tank of diesel, and I noticed that the reserve cans I keep in the fireproof flammables cabinet were empty. I figured I had enough fuel to finish mowing, so I started the tractor and headed out.

I was having a pretty excellent time.

Then, after making exactly one circuit around the farm, the back wheel of the mower deck fell off.

Apparently, John Deere has decided that a tractor costing many tens of thousands of dollars should be held together with the cheapest retaining pins the world has ever seen. I find this approach to engineering rather disappointing, particularly when the inexpensive component in question is responsible for keeping the most critical parts of an expensive machine attached to the rest of it.

I raised the mower deck, put the tractor into drive, and went looking for the wheel. I found it without difficulty. The retaining pin and spacers, however, had apparently decided to pursue adventures elsewhere. I searched for them, eventually gave up, and parked the tractor in the garage.

Then I remembered that earlier that morning, while shopping at H.N. Williams, I had been standing approximately twenty feet away from the fucking pins and spacers I now needed.

FUCK!!!

I ordered an entire case of pins and a case of spacers from Amazon, knowing they're probably made in China and suspecting that, at this rate, I'll eventually need to replace another pin somewhere else.

While I was out earlier, Trevor had texted to ask whether he could borrow my crossbow for archery season. Trevor is the co-engineer for the town's Meshtastic project, and I know he's been hunting before. I told him he could borrow it, then asked how I'd know whether his hunting trip had been successful.

"I will bring you some deer meat… If that's okay."

"Fuck yeah. I love venison!”

Later, Trevor came over to collect the crossbow. I apologized for the condition of the house, explaining that materials for my various projects tend to accumulate wherever I happen to have available floor space.

This is especially true of half the things destined for Mom's house, because my schedule is so unpredictable that I frequently end up collecting supplies long before I know when I'll have an opportunity to install them. At the moment, there are industrial steel cabinets sitting in the entryway and a traffic light standing in the corner of my dining room.

Trevor noticed the traffic light almost immediately.

"Oh, sick traffic light. Does this thing work?"

"Oh, it will soon. I need some smaller wire."

I had actually ordered five traffic lights, specifically configured for household voltage. When I placed the order, the company told me that they get nuts all the time. Apparently, there are enough people purchasing traffic signals for residential and recreational use that the manufacturer has developed opinions about its clientele.

One of the lights is going to remain in my dining room, where it will cycle through the normal traffic-light sequence whenever I turn it on. The other four are destined for Mom's garage, where I'm planning two opposing sets. Downstairs will feature an intersection with a fire station warning and wig-wag lights. Upstairs will have a railroad crossing, complete with its own wig-wag and crossing arm.

Trevor didn't take me seriously. I suppose he hasn't known me very long.

Yesterday, I asked Amelia whether she thought there would ever come a time in our relationship when she'd tell me to stop. Would she ever look at me and say, "If you love me, you'll stop"?

She understood immediately what I meant.

"Never."

Amelia knows who I am, and she knows that my enthusiasm for life, freedom, independence, and the desire to experience all that the world has to offer are fundamental parts of my personality.

I also love the town where I live. Rural Vermont is such a wonderful place to live. I've traveled extensively throughout my life, and I continue to do so, but the farm is where I want to return when the adventures are over.

Amelia needs the city and hates Vermont because everything is so far away.

Tomorrow is the grand opening of the new library. I photographed the entire move into the new building, and my photographs were included in the local news coverage. When the library asked whether I'd photograph the grand opening, I agreed without hesitation.

Tomorrow is also the anniversary of Mom's death.

I never expected to be forty-seven years old and living without either parent. I planned to retire early, but I never anticipated the timing of their deaths. Mom died before she saw my creative career take off. At least she got to see me happy for the last six years of her life. I fell in love with Amelia the moment I met her. Mom adored Amelia and welcomed her into our family the same day they met.

I spent the day in my pajamas, wondering how I had made it this far in life, remembering mother’s words the day before she died when she told me just how proud she was of me and what I had accomplished in life, despite numerous factors that only made it significantly more difficult.

I have spent much of my life arriving somewhere after taking a route nobody would have recommended. Occasionally I arrived late. Occasionally I arrived bleeding. I still arrived.