The Aspiros Family

Here, read the transcript of the interview with Sylvie and Valmont Aspiros, a captain and a retired lieutenant from the Saint-Eustache Fire Safety Department.

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In our house, there were five of us girls, so with my parents, it was a big family – seven of us. But my dad, in addition to his real family, he always said he had a firefighter family too. His team. And honestly, my dad is a really good guy, a team player. My dad always used to say, “You know, you can’t be good when you’re all by yourself, but your strength is in being… on a team.” And my dad would never have let down a member of his team because he knows that if he’s there for a member of his team, the team will be there for him. So, that’s something that really influenced my career. And my mom was a really determined person. My mom used to say, “If you want to do something in life, it’s your choice, Sylvie, do it.” So, I had that combination of determination and my dad’s strong family values, which were: don’t forget that you can’t do anything all alone, you won’t succeed that way. So as far as I’m concerned, dad, you gave me the most.

Valmont Aspiros: Well, that’s great! Well, that’s right. I always thought: family, family, family. I had eight guys. There were teams that were already formed. I had eight guys. And at the beginning, you don’t know them. It takes a bit of time to get to know them. And then, when you start to know them the way you need to, there are good ones, there are excellent ones. But unfortunately, there are some who… who drag their feet a little. What I liked was when we’d been out responding to a call, and when we got back to the fire hall, there were… firefighters who would come to see you and ask, “Why did we do such-and-such?”[Sylvie Aspiros]: And then, dad would say, “It’s like this, that’s how you do it, and you won’t have as many complications.” And that was it. And I knew that the next time, if the same thing happened, we’d know what to do. The guys knew too.