What Goes Around Comes Around

Police officers, in the course of their duties, try to work though and solve crimes that they encounter. They meet a tremendous cross-section of people, encounter situations that are awful, and have real lives as they work. They literally stand next to the victims after homicides, rapes, robberies, burglaries, child molestations, and hours later find themselves in ordinary involvement with those around them. They understand the agony of victims and do not comprehend those who apologize for the perpetrators with "excuse-o-babble." These experiences are powerful and drive officers to search for understanding in the midst of senseless grief. In this era most police officers were military veterans, they were not as educated as those working today, yet in many ways they were closer to the public they served. In Long Beach at this time officers lived in every neighborhood - indeed they where denied the right to live outside the city. They shared concepts about justice and most cops believed in the axiom, "What goes around comes around." They still went through a difficult struggle - a hardening - as it sometimes became more and more difficult to "shrug off" memories of human suffering when there were no obvious solutions. They had to struggle, and today still have to struggle, to keep a balanced perspective of life and humanity. Many on the outside do not understand cops. There are some that never will understand. All cops, in every place on earth, understand. We understand each other.