I remember...

It seems like a dream, but it really happened about 25 or 26 years ago...
Next to the house where I grew up there was a vacant lot that had a footpath through it. The city planners, during their layout of the streets, decided not to run a street between the lots my parents own and the lots the neighbor owned. I guess enough people travelled through there to get from one street to the other that they wore a footpath. I even saw a car drive through there once. Anyways, my dad used to let the grass grow high in that lot because he didn't own it (therefore he felt that he shouldn't have to mow it). I certainly don't blame him. As we were returning from eating out, I remember my mom and dad talking excitedly, but not in a good way. Dad was looking to the left as he was turning into the driveway, so I sat up in the backseat and stretched my neck so I could see out the window to what dad and mom were looking at. I saw smoke, then flames. And then an image that etched itself into my mind so vividly: the frail old man from next door was in the middle of that lot between the flames with a shovel, trying to spread dirt around to smother them. Dad ran out to the shed to get a shovel to go help the old man. Mom took us kids into the house. I remember feeling afraid that my dad was going to get hurt. Surely the old man was burning up. But shortly after, dad returned, a bit dirty, and said that the old man's actions had surely saved our house from burning to the ground (the old man wasn't burned alive by the fire, either). I had told my parents, up to that incident, that I was going to be a fire fighter. I guess I changed my mind after that.