Out and About
A reflection on wildland firefighting and queer identity from the 1st print edition (pages 33-35).
Delaney Kenyon(she/her) ’23
WEMT-IV, EKG, RRT, FFT2
I have always been drawn to fire. And I have always wanted to help people, protect the vulnerable, and save the environment. It makes sense then, that I became a firefighter. I’ve also always loved women and men, and as my ideas of gender and sexuality have become more fluid, it makes sense then that I identify as bisexual/ queer. However, I’d never thought about how those two aspects of myself intersected until this summer when I was wildland firefighting and closeted again for the first time since I came out in high school.
Let me start off by talking about fire. Fire is beautiful in the way that it is basically a biological organism. When it comes to some of the most basic biological functions of humans, we are much like fire. We both consume fuel, inspire oxygen, and expire carbon dioxide. We both respirate and give off heat. Both organisms can create life. Both organisms can destroy. It astounds me that more people do not understand this, and don’t see the living, breathing, beauty in fire that all firefighters see. Yes, fire is our common enemy and yes, we are trying to stop it… but there’s something incredibly mesmerizing about how fire can rip through a stand of trees, jump from the ground to the canopy, and race up slopes. Any firefighter can appreciate how fire licks up the bark of a ponderosa pine until the cracks are blackened and molten, but the rest of the bark remains unaffected. I remember watching fire flow across an agave plant, the fibers curling and blackening as the broad leaves cracked under the heat. A reproductive stalk, so carefully and tediously produced by the agave plant, destroyed in mere seconds by twisting flame two times taller than me. The intense popping and creaking and roaring noise of it, ever-present, and the chokingly sweet smell of ash. Pastel pink retardant almost lovingly painted across a desert landscape, at once a harsh truth and an art exhibit. Topaz stars of flame fallen to earth on onyx mountains at night, orange opalescent lines in a marble sky.
Fire is achingly and destructively beautiful, it is only when humans are added to the equation that it starts to get ugly.
A fire camp is a peculiar place. It’s full of a lot of different people. Crews from Mexico/Canada/Britain, local organizations, state administrators, park rangers, environmental scientists, shower truck companies, catering, hand crews, hotshots, pilots, ranchers, EMTs, paramedics, nurses, administrative people, HR representatives, and more. The sheer amount of people when I arrived at my first fire astounded me. You would think that amongst the crazy amount of people, I wouldn’t feel like I belonged, but I did. I knew exactly what my role was in this and what was expected of me. At a fire camp, I am a medical provider, and I’m in charge of keeping everyone healthy, happy, and ready to keep fighting fire.
Throughout my life, Emergency Medical Services (EMS) has been one of the few places where I feel like I belong. When I’m in an ambulance, no matter what scene I’m arriving at and how different every situation is; I know what my priorities are, I know what questions I’m going to ask, and I know how to get done what I need to get done regardless of how the circumstances change. It’s one of the reasons I love EMS and the fire response world so much — having a clear purpose and understanding of what’s expected of me eases my near-constant anxiety.
That’s why it hurt so much when a fellow firefighter went on a homophobic rant right in my face, not knowing that I was gay. Being a bisexual/queer polyamorous woman has always been a massive part of my identity, and I’ve been incredibly privileged and lucky to have a loving, accepting family and friend group. My parents are both in the theater business and were not surprised when I came out to them (in the middle of a fight, I might add). They told me that they loved me and only wanted me to be happy. One grandmother really struggled with the concept of bisexuality and made some hurtful anti-bi remarks but compared to other coming out stories, mine was full of love.
Growing up in a relatively liberal part of central Pennsylvania, my friends and I were always able to keep a queer-friendly buffer around us and kept ourselves away from the homophobes. I never had to worry about if I was going to be kicked out of my home, physically abused, gaslit, or cut off financially, and for that, I am so, so, so privileged.
Coming to CC, I still felt comfortable being openly queer, embracing queer culture, exploring my sexuality, coming to terms with my polyamory, and coming into my own as a medical provider with Colorado College EMS (CCEMS). I never had to separate those two aspects of my identity — I was both an openly queer woman and an EMT.
All of that changed when COVID hit and I dropped out of school for the year, started to work as an EMT in the greater Colorado Springs community, and began a hetero-presenting relationship. I was never really “out” at my EMT jobs in the Springs, but I never really hid it either. Subconsciously I understood that the dynamic I’d had for most of my life had changed and I wasn’t able to be out, an EMT, and respected anymore. I’ve experienced plenty of sexism in EMS since I started in 2017 — from people thinking I couldn’t lift as much as my male presenting counterparts, that I would be more emotional on calls, or, simply, that I was just inferior to a man and couldn’t do the job as well as one. All of that is (obviously) categorically false and I have proven time and time again that I am just as, if not more qualified than the never-ending tide of men that surround me in EMS. But before wild-land firefighting, I had never experienced such open, blatant homophobia before. That is not to say that it does not exist in EMS, just that I had never seen it that obviously.
During that rant, the dynamic of “Keep this on the down-low, no one needs to know about your personal life” suddenly changed to “You are unsafe, absolutely do not tell anyone that you are queer.” The immediate and full-body terror that ran through me during that conversation and in interactions afterward was unlike anything I had ever experienced before. After I was able to get out of the situation, away from the person, and feel safe again I, with my nausea still in my throat, was so incredibly thankful for the privilege that meant I’d never felt like that before.
And so began the summer-long process of carefully dissecting my partners, other firefighters, and other people. How did they respond to mentions of gay characters in movies we talked about? Did they make homophobic jokes? Where did they fall politically? An anxiety that I hadn’t felt before settled in — could people tell from my short hair? The slit in my eyebrow? The converse I wore off duty? When I make a joke about an ex should I use he/him pronouns instead of she/her or they/them? I used to let my queerness shine around and through me. It was a running joke pre-Covid that I would ask my friends when we were going out “Do I look gay enough?” But suddenly these small, light-hearted celebrations of queerness weren’t possible anymore.
On fires, I was surrounded by people who I was trusting with my life, but not trusting with one of the most fundamental aspects of me.
It was suffocating, constant, and exhausting. The side of myself that I’ve tried so hard to connect to and radiate from me had to be dimmed, stuffed away, and closely guarded.
I decided for a variety of reasons to cut the season short and head back to CC early: I wanted to lead new student orientation, my ambulance broke down, I wanted time to adjust to being a student again, etc. But behind all of that decision-making was this relief that I wouldn’t have to hide for much longer. I was so exhausted – even after only three months – that I just didn’t want to do it anymore. Coming back to CC, I definitely overcompensated. Anyone who’s visited my apartment knows of the pinup wall, naked lady shower curtain, “girls kiss girls” poster, and butt-related art everywhere, and while that is part impeccable interior design sense, the other part is unbridled joy and relief at being able to express the queer side of myself again.
Since returning to CC I have continued my time as an EMT by co-directing the CCEMS campus squad, doing research into racial/mental health/LGBT+/gender bias in EMS, and teaching the CCEMT class about gender-affirming and non-heteronormative health care in my role as Teaching Assistant. Doing all of these things while also rejoicing in being an out queer polyamorous woman has reminded me of how much beauty can be found in queerness and how much joy can be found in medicine, and has shown me again that they do not — and should not — be separate. I am a better medical provider because of my queerness, and I am a better person when I am able to be open.
Delaney has worked as a wildland firefighter on the lands of the Blackfoot/Niitsitapi, Apsaalooke (Crow), Salish, Cheyenne, Ochethi Sakowin, Confederated Tribes of the Colville Reservation, Cayuse, Umatilla, Walla Walla, and paluspam (Palus) Peoples.
