STREAKS

We seem to like streaks.

For those of you engaged in Snapchat, streaks are counted for the number of consecutive days you snap with someone else. At least, that is what my teenage daughter tells me.

Age is a streak – how many days have you woken up to live another day.

In sports, we measure all sorts of streaks, in particular in baseball. Winning and losing streaks, hitting streaks and scoreless innings streaks. We celebrate athletes like Cal Ripken and Eli Manning that play in in every game without taking one off.

One of my favorite is a green-light streak. Anyone who has driven uptown on 3rd Avenue in Manhattan can appreciate the thrill of hitting 10 green lights in a row!

Writing this blog post is the result of a streak. The archives section to the right, before this is published, shows a post in every month from February 2019 to December 2019. I need to keep the streak going for January 2020, and today is the last day to keep the streak going.

There are some volunteer fire departments with impressive streaks. Like the City of Hudson Fire Department, which has been serving their City since 1794! That is a 200+ year streak! 

Streaks are powerful because they create habits. Once it becomes a habit, the action is no longer forced – it becomes natural. Of course, it is possible that the habits are negative ones, but let’s stick to the positive. 

We need to encourage the positive streak of volunteer firefighting. 40 years ago, we didn’t have the overwhelming options of entertainment to compete with community service. Now, the volunteer fire service has to compete for attention. LOSAP is not the only thing that will keep people on their streak of volunteering, but it certainly helps. The goal of accumulating 50 points each year to earn the LOSAP benefit can encourage someone to stay active longer than he/she would have otherwise stayed.

Our property taxes and safety depend on our dedicated volunteer fire departments keeping up their long-standing history of service to their communities. Let’s continue to support them and root for  the streak to continue!