A Defining Moment in My Life
Defining moments are a big point in anyone's life. A defining moment is a big event that changes the way you think or has an impact on who you are as a person. For example, in the story “Salvation” by Langston Hughes, he talks about how he was saved as a child. Langston goes to a revival at his aunt’s church, where the children are to be saved. The adults at the church tell Langston how it will feel to be saved and how Jesus will come into his life. The children are brought up to the mourners’ bench and the preacher starts preaching a sermon telling the children to come up to Jesus. Some of the children are saved and go up to the front of the church and are saved but most remain there. The congregation goes up to the children and start praying for them to see Jesus and be saved. Eventually all but Langston and one other boy are saved and up at the front of the church. The other boy tired of waiting to be saved gets up and goes to the front. Langston is now alone on the bench waiting to see Jesus but sees nothing. Langston begins to feel ashamed that he isn’t seeing Jesus and after seeing that nothing is happening to the other boy who lied about being saved he gets up and is saved. All the children were blessed and the congregation joyously sings. When Langston got home after this event he cried because he didn’t see Jesus like he was expecting, and no longer believed in Jesus.
Just how Langston Hughes went through a defining moment in “Salvation” I also went through something that changed the way I look at life. Back in 2013 I had an event happen to me that changed the way I view life and how anything can happen.
When I was an active duty firefighter for the United States Air Force I witnessed someone die. The day had started off just like any other day at work. I had shown up to work and was just getting ready to start the day. About an hour into my shift is when we got a call about someone having chest pains while running. We used to get calls about people getting hurt while running all the time, so my first thought was that it wasn’t a huge deal. I first realized it was something serious when we contacted the Medics who were working that day. We contacted the medics and asked if they needed us. They normally don’t request us to come out but this time they seemed a little panicked and were asking for our help.
Me and the individuals I was working with threw our gear on the truck and started heading out. Then, on our way it came across the radio that the patient was in cardiac arrest and CPR was in progress. At that moment it really struck me that someone was in trouble. I started to drive faster to get to the scene quicker. When we arrived at the location I stepped off the truck and saw this person laying on a gurney with six people huddled around them. As I was getting closer I was trying to figure out what I could do to help but, when I got close enough to see the person I could tell that they had already passed. The medics continued to perform CPR until we loaded the individual on the ambulance.
After we put the person in the ambulance and went back to the station, I couldn’t stop thinking about what happened to the individual. We started to do a debrief on the incident and what had happened. Then we got a call saying that the person had passed away on arrival to the hospital. For several days after this event I was kept awake thinking about how fragile life is and how you never know when something can take your life from you.
Works cited
Hughes, Langston. “Salvation.” The Center For Fiction, N.D. centerforfiction.org/forwriters/the-model-short-story/quotsalvationquot-by-langston-hughes/. Accessed 19 Mar. 2018.