Missed moments? Not really.

I'm a firefighter. I work a 24-hour shift. Within a three week period, I will have worked every day of the week. I'm either working a Friday, Saturday, or Sunday every week--in short a lot of weekends. As a result, I miss many of the social outings my friends have. The 24-hour shift means I miss many of the events at home too. With an 11-month old daughter at home, this would seem to take on an even greater magnitude as she is starting to complete "the firsts"--first steps, first words, first time sleeping through the night (still waiting on that), etc. I'm going to miss a lot of these firsts. But, it doesn't really bother me. I may miss "The First," but there will always be a first time for me, and it's just as good. I liken to Uluru in Australia. That rock has been around for a few million years and millions of people have seen it. But, it was still quite a moving experience when I saw it the first time. This is some solace for me, as the worst part of my job is that every third day, I leave my family for 24 hours. The reconciliation of that is that I get the next 48 hours with them. That's 48 hours of make-up time, and I'm grateful for it.