As the holidays approach, you're likely to find the American classic A Christmas Story while flipping through your cable stations. It is one of those films that you can watch a dozen times and never get tired of it. Thinking back on our childhoods, I'd bet most of us could identify with some aspect or scene in the film.

Having grown up in the Midwest, I can't help but identify with the scene where a child dares one of his classmates to stick his tongue to a frozen flagpole in below-freezing temperatures. The kid's tongue becomes stuck, and the fire department is summoned to free him. Admittedly, there is great humor in watching a kid get goaded into a harmless act of silliness with a triple-dog dare, but it's the fact someone thought the incident was an emergency and called the fire department is what sticks with me still.

Everyday, fire departments respond to minor medical emergencies — or what people perceive as emergencies. We debate when, how or even if we should respond to calls that aren't cardiac arrests, working fires or some other “worthy” emergency. But those who worry that such responses cost too much or who think they are somebody else's responsibility are forgetting their mission.

In these trying times, good people in this country are dealing with personal emergencies every day, whether it is because of their health, finances or just the stress of uncertainty — a lot of people are on the edge. When people reach their tipping points, the fire service often is called in to send resources. We are called because we are seen as charitable and knowing.

The fire service's can-do attitude and problem-solving ability recently was portrayed in a Nextel commercial. It asked what would happen if firefighters ran the world, and it implied that we would have a better community. And that idea of the fire service being connected to the community and to charitable acts dates back to some of our most-traditional fire departments.

My wife's grandfather was a member of the Philadelphia Fire Department, serving at the Germantown station. The Germantown station was very much a part of the neighborhood and connected to its people. I've been told that firefighters maintained a garden to share food with their neighbors. An elderly person in the area had broken an ankle, and the fire department showed up to build a ramp or fix a step with materials they got from a local hardware store. The fire department personnel in that station knew every business owner and most of the families in that neighborhood. The station is very different today, but the stories live on.

Recently I went back to Iowa to lecture to a mostly BLS crowd at a rural EMS conference. Every few years, I sign up for what I can only describe as the humbling experience of speaking to people who do this job for nothing, yet do it with more heart and desire than you can imagine. The conference was held at the local fairgrounds, and I sat grumbling about the AV set up in the cattle barn while waiting until I could have one of those prized Iowa steaks for lunch. Throughout the morning lecture, I watched the Boy Scouts serve breakfast and a group of ladies from the local woman's auxiliary peel potatoes. In particular, I watched one woman who was wearing a surgical mask.

She was wearing a shirt that I couldn't quite make out, so despite my fears of flu, I decided to get closer. I was surprised to see the shirt identified her as the recipient of a donor heart. She was on anti-rejection medication and needed the mask to protect her from the crowd.

The local EMS and fire department had become this woman's community within a community. They had been with her through the tough times of her old heart and the triumphs of her new one. Somewhere EMS had made a gallant attempt to save the donor, and for that she was grateful. She was simply there to help out and support the EMS association's fund-raiser anyway she could.

After Sept. 11, 2001, fire and EMS agencies were given a gift from the American public and the world — their love and admiration. Yet at the same time we began to harden our stations and slowly withdrew into them. This has distanced us from the community and begun to change our perception of who and why people need our help.

While fire and EMS have leveraged the goodwill and tradition of days past into higher salaries and benefits, the public has begun to question how and why we do business the way we do. As most of the fire service's work is EMS, that experience is offering the most common opportunity to define the value of our service.

As we miss the details of so many EMS runs under the strain of call volume or understaffing, our worth is coming into question. As we “process” calls, people start to become widgets. For every action there is an equal or opposite reaction, and this depersonalization of EMS or public-assistance calls by fire crews is beginning to take its toll.

Take, for example, this blog post I found in a local newspaper.

Angry Taxpayer wrote, “I think that firefighters have long since overstepped their bounds. They have been greedy and used their ‘hero’ status as a shield from criticism and as justification to continuously abuse the system to get pay that's off the charts. They have a sense of entitlement so strong about pay, overtime, you name it … they just don't understand what the average citizen thinks and feels anymore. They have lost touch as a group with the citizenry. I'm hearing more and more and more negativity about them. If they don't willingly curtail their own greed and excess they are literally — and sorry for the bad pun — going to burn a bridge with the taxpayers. Most people have very good will towards individual firefighters and what they do on a daily basis. That does not mean that pay that isn't in line with reality can be or should be tolerated. We live in tough economic times, [so] everyone … other ‘hero’ classes … nurses, doctors … cops (who indeed do put their life on the line every day) are far far lower paid than many firefighters. There are many fire captains who earn far more than the average doctor or lawyer or highly skilled engineer. What is wrong with that? That is not reasonable. In the history of the profession of firefighters, I think this stands out as a place where they are grossly overpaid.”

A customer-service guru once told me that people really only want two things: to feel valued and to be around good will. Each EMS call is an opportunity to help someone, to solve someone's problem. Each presents a chance to provide value and good feelings. Some of the simplest tasks — such as keeping people warm, protecting their dignity and calling them by name — go a long way toward accomplishing this.

Fire and EMS agencies need to get out there and meet the people in their districts before the 911 calls. At the station level, or even company by company, it is important to get out and know your people. Visit one new business every shift, not necessarily to conduct a fire inspection but simply to make friends. Find new uses for your customer data. There are firms that will mine your customer data from EMS calls and phone the patient or the patient's family members to assess their customer satisfaction. These firms even can have the results available to you by the following morning.

Be generous. Give, participate or support charity events for a variety of causes. Our department supported breast-cancer awareness by hosting the notorious pink fire truck for a full day of events to raise awareness of this disease. We have to start caring more and pulling together as a community. It doesn't have to be about the money, but more so the presence of fire and EMS workers to show support. These actions will be met with more positive reaction and an opportunity to provide the best service.

Finally, I'd like to remind you of a very old fable that probably has been told on every continent in some variation. In a time of great famine, people hoarded whatever food they could find, hiding it even from their friends and neighbors. A soldier came into the village and began asking questions. He was told there wasn't a bite to eat in the whole province. The soldier told the villagers that he was thinking of making some stone soup to share with all of them. He pulled an iron cauldron from his wagon, filled it with water and built a fire under it. Then, with great ceremony, he drew an ordinary-looking stone from a velvet bag and dropped it into the water.

Hearing rumors of food, most of the villagers came to the square or watched from their windows. As the soldier sniffed the “broth” and licked his lips in anticipation, hunger began to overcome their skepticism. “Ahh,” the soldier said to himself rather loudly, “I do like a tasty stone soup. Of course, stone soup with cabbage — that's hard to beat.”

A villager approached hesitantly, holding a cabbage he'd retrieved from its hiding place, and added it to the pot. The village butcher managed to find some salt beef, someone else found carrots, and so on. At the end, there was a delicious meal for all. The villagers offered the soldier a great deal of money for the magic stone, but he refused to sell it and traveled on the next day.

Like this fable, people need to work together, contributing what they can, to achieve a greater good. I triple-dog dare you to try. Fire and EMS agencies are going to find themselves needing to work together more to provide hope, reassurance and solutions to the non-traditional problems of the fire service. We must re-engage the public with a sense of community and help people solve even the most trivial of problems.

While it is a slight breech of etiquette to go right to the triple dog dare, the custom is it cannot be refused.

Bruce Evans is the EMS chief for the North Las Vegas (Nev.) Fire Department. He also is the fire science program coordinator at the Community College of Southern Nevada and an adjunct faculty member for the National Fire Academy's EMS and injury prevention courses. He has an associate's degree in fire management and a master's degree in public administration.