Following late husband into the fire

THE CADET FROM Northeast Philly left at dawn yesterday in her freshly starched uniform, nervous and ready for something new, but the person she'd always imagined kissing goodbye before that journey began wasn't there to see her go.

Maria Gill was a Catholic school teacher when she fell for Philadelphia firefighter Timothy Gill. It was the uniform, she said. When he'd come home after a shift, Maria would listen to Tim's stories while she graded papers or prepared lesson plans, and she was drawn in by his tales of firehouse bonds, the big cookouts between the runs and those days when they'd beat back the flames and feel blessed to be alive.

Tim balked when Maria first mentioned joining the fire academy years ago, but she said he quickly became her biggest supporter, always pushing her to apply.

"Timmy made me love it. I wanted to experience what he experienced. I wanted it to be husband and wife, both firefighters. That kind of fell through, though, after he left," she said Sunday morning on her front porch while her daughter, Amanda, sat next to her.

For all that he shared about life at Engine 78 at Philadelphia International Airport, Tim kept memories of Iraq to himself and they ate away at him for years when he returned from duty in 2006.

Sgt. Timothy M. Gill served as a chemical-operations specialist with the Pennsylvania National Guard's 128th Chemical Company and wound up clearing roads in an M1 Abrams tank. He suffered a traumatic brain injury in Iraq and had been treated for PTSD. The Daily News wrote about Tim Gill, 38, and a South Jersey Marine he befriended in PTSD counseling sessions after both men had taken their own lives in separate incidents.

"He was a good guy and he loved his family. Sometimes this thing just takes people over," Judd Gillin, who served with Tim in Iraq, told the Daily News in 2013.

Tim's death also made Maria's dream of becoming a firefighter more of a necessity, she said. Their daughter, Amanda, 6, has a heart condition and the realities of a Catholic school teacher's salary, even after 17 years on the job, were immediate.

"I just want to be able to sustain her and not have to live paycheck to paycheck. I've just got to make sure she's OK," she said.

Maria knows it makes sense to sell Tim's big, Dodge Ram pickup. It still sits parked across the street, clean but not as gleaming as he kept it.

"I can't seem to give it up," she said of the truck.

When Maria learned she'd been accepted into the fire academy earlier this year, the news came with the same jumbled feelings that birthdays, holidays and anniversaries bring on.

"I'm emotional because he's not here to see me do it," Maria said. "The other day I was sitting and watching television and looking at his picture and thinking, 'God, I wish he were here. I just wanted to tell you I got in. I wanted you to be excited for me.' "

Members of the firefighting community, including Engine 78 and Engine 36 up the street from her house, have been her biggest supporters on the quest to get in the academy, she said, pushing her to stay the course.

"I talk to them all the time," she said. "They'll tell me, 'Don't you dare think about giving up.' "

There have been naysayers, though.

"I have friends who say, 'Are you sure you want to do this? It's a risky job' and I say, 'So is being a teacher,' " Maria said. "It doesn't psych me out. If it's going to happen, it's going to happen. I could walk out my door one day and there it is, I'm done. You just never know. I don't want to not take the chance and miss out on something that was meant to happen."

The fire academy consists of 23 weeks of training, beginning yesterday with a physical fitness test and followed by weeks of EMT training, simulated firefighting and lots of tests. Maria said she was up to 40 pushups and 21 situps in the allotted time, flexing her biceps as proof of her training.

"The mile-and-a-half run is killing me, though" she said.

Maria's not looking for any special treatment, no favors from the instructors or sympathy because of who she is or what she has gone through. She'll run the whole distance.

Come December, though, after she graduates from Cadet Class 190 and charges into her first fire, she'd like to be wearing badge 3791.

"I'm hoping I can get Tim's badge number," she said. "I would like to carry his badge with me when I'm out there."