911 is the emergency number here in Canada if you’re unfamiliar. 112, 999, etc if you’re elsewhere IIRC.
Do you remember the first time you had to use it?
What were you thinking, feeling?
First time I had to use it in earnest I was working front end at a post office and there was a random guy doing maintenance behind me in the back area of the office. Barely said a word to him, he barely said a word to me. I was fairly busy and he seemed kinda gruff.
Bit later all of a sudden he taps me on the shoulder pretty aggressively, I turned and was getting ready to give him some not-polite words about touching me like that and how he better not damn well do that again but I stopped when I saw the look on his face.
He just says, “call 911.”
I look blankly at him, getting some mental whiplash, and just dumbly go, “what?”
Him, “I’m having a fucking heart-attack, CALL 911!”
That got through so I called them, gave them the info. He went back into the office and laid down.
I was a bit in shock myself and just looked at the customers in line in front of me and said to the woman, “he’s having a heart attack, sorry.”
Honestly think I could’ve handled the situation better, at least gone back and been more empathetic but I was caught between him, customers, and making sure I was visible so I could wave the paramedics to where they needed to go.
The post office there was tucked into the back corner and most of the store didn’t even know about it until I told them later that day.
Never heard anything after, no clue if the guy survived, or not. Didn’t see him again either way.
You?
What if there first time I called 911 I didn’t have to call 911?
When I was 6, I decided it was time for my 4 year old brother to learn how to call 911. We were in like a filenes basement or something, and while my mom was shopping, wandered to the back of the store, and in the hallway with the bathrooms there was a payphone. So I picked it up, showed him how to dial 911, then handed him the receiver, told him that when someone picked up to say what was wrong, answer their questions, etc. I had no idea you could call 911 without a dime on a payphone, so when he started talking, I thought he was pretending. He said something like ‘hey, im hurt, and i dont know… were in a store.’ At that point some lady came into the hallway and was giving us a dirty look, so I hung up the phone and took him back to where my mom was.
Shortly afterward, we moved stores. Again I took spotted a random payphone, and took the opportunity to educate my sibling. This time he dialed, and told them hed fallen down, and bonked his head and was in a random store, surrounded by clothes. We then hung up and went to go find some toys to play with.
After that, it was time for lunch. When we went to food court, we noticed there were tons of cops everywhere. My mom said something about it, and my brother chipped in, ‘maybe its cus I told them i booked my head!’ And I told him ‘no silly, that was pretend, remember?’ And he said 'oh yeah…" and that was that.
Hahaha my story is similar but not nearly as fun.
I went for a walk, back in those days “go outside and play” meant I don’t want to see you until the sun goes down, so I walked to strip mall where the video rental store we went to at the time was, as well as a few other places and a safeway we shopped at.
I was however old you would be between grade 2 and 5, and started playing with a phone. And kind yourself I thought you had to put money in it for it to work. I knew how to read and PAYphone seemed pretty self explanatory so I started pressing buttons pretending to call people. Well I had learned about 9-1-1 recently so I pressed those numbers and kept playing around. Well I didn’t have the headset near me but I did realize afterwards i did hear a voice though not what they were saying.
It wasn’t until I heard the sirens that i clued into why I was hearing them. I definately ran away thinking the cops were looking for me, so I ran into the bush where I knew some places to hide because of course the cops knew who I was and that it was me who used the phone without paying and they were looking for me to be arrested and that I was gonna go to jail forever if they caught me. They didn’t because I was so good at hiding if course