My latest such experience was on Saturday night at about midnight, when I had my first ride in a police car. I was in the passenger seat, with an off duty police officer. A new friend.
We went into the city for a late night snack, and policy dictated that he have his police radio on. I'd seen on the news the violence that happens in the CBD, but had convinced myself such incidences were infrequent and played up by the media. I'd never seen anyone bleeding on the streets, I'd never seen a gang fight, or a rape.
I was ignorant to all of these things.
Listening to dispatch reporting glassing after glassing, a brawl, a sexual assault, an attacked taxi driver and people passed out on sidewalks all over the city opened my eyes.
It prompted me to ask him a lot of questions, the most pressing however, "do you still have faith in people?"
After a while he shook his head and said, "I spend my time dealing with bad people, or the bad situations. It's uncommon for a policeman to see good."
It made me realise that there are jobs, and then there are jobs with responsibility. There are people, and there are extraordinary people. It shook me up. Jolted me awake from whatever coma it was I'd been in.
I want to be good. I want to do good.
