Tonight, a guest blog, and the blogger is Battalion Chief (ret) Donald Howell. Although Chief Howell and I share long service at Howard County Fire & Rescue, we never served together as members. He retired a year before I began working there. We became co-workers, and then friends, while he was Executive Director of the International Critical Incident Stress Foundation (ICISF). He hired me to be his IT Consultant back in 2001. 

This past Friday, we lost a dear friend, another retired firefighter who also served with ICISF. His name was Don Gow, and he was one of the dearest, most loyal, most giving souls I have ever encountered. But I couldn’t memorialize him half as well as Chief Howell did in this wonderful essay, so I asked permission to share it here.*

Take it away, Chief Howell.

I just wanted to let you know I lost a good friend of mine today, Don Gow.

Don loved his God, his Country and his family (Jean, Sissy and Donnie). The rest of us fit in somewhere behind those three, and probably even behind his love for his dogs, Duncan and Pixie. Continue reading →