By Ed Meckle, Retired LAPD
Ask most street cops what they consider truly valuable: what is the most important part of their professional life, if forced to, the last he/she would consider giving up.
I feel the answer would be their partner.
Partner defined: “One associated with another, especially in business or action.”
“Associate or colleague.” OK so far.
“Either of two persons who dance together.” (define dance)
“One of two or more persons who play together in a game against an opposing side.” and “sharing risks and profits.” Yes and yes.
You should pick your partner with the same care as you pick your mate because you are going to be as close to and spend as much time with them as you do with the person you married. Choose wisely.
Start with the obvious—you need someone who you can get along with; who will be there when your life depends on it. Someone dependable, someone who will not lose it when the “fit hits the shan.” Trust me it will, and that’s a hell of a time to discover you picked wrong.
Choose someone with a mindset such as yours yet different enough so you complement each other. He/she sees what you might miss and vice-versa. Someone in whom you can see and appreciate the good qualities and ignore the unimportant bad ones; someone you feel comfortable and communicate easily with.
“On the right, by the alley.”
“Got it.”
Someone who knows what you are likely to do in a particular situation; who can understand and also convey a message with a shrug, nod, grimace or some other gesture you hadn’t even thought of.
Your Huntley to, his/her Brinkley (dating myself here); during a stop and on your feet taking and maintaining a good position. Moving sometimes as though choreographed. His/her Rogers to your Astaire (yet again).
And when it’s “come and get it time,” and the world is spinning out of control, his Butch to your Sundance.
As the saying goes, “someone who runs TOWARD the sound of gunfire.”
Consider the following:
You begin your tour by seating yourself side by side with your partner in a visibly marked vehicle. You are going to spend the next eight plus hours together directed by the radio to solve various problems.
When free from the radio you are on the “prowl” and “looking for trouble.” Let me repeat that: looking for trouble.
Does this sound like the sort of job description where you drive to the labor pool and pick someone from the crowd? I think not.
You hope to find out before it becomes critical that you have chosen to right person, since by then it will be too late.
They say you are lucky or rich if you have one truly good friend in your lifetime. I would think then that if the same could be said of partners. I am truly blessed.
Ward Fitzgerald and Hal Brasher, both WWII vets, taught me “the game.” Both were my kindly old “uncles.”
Frank Isbell and I were the “proverbial identical twins separated at birth” who found each other, while Richard L. Sullivan “Sully” and I were truly soul mates.
I will lie for you, I will bleed for you, I will take a bullet for you and I will, die for you.
Dedicated to PARTNERS everywhere.
Thanks, Ed. Any readers recall great partners? Leave a comment, let us know who and why.
7 replies on “The Call Box: Partners”
I loved reading this about partners; especially because my Dad, Ward Fitzgerald, was your partner. Thanks for remembering him and mentioning him. Thank you also for connecting my sisters and I to our Dad’s dear friend, Bob Baumgartner. It’s been a gift to us all.
❤️Maura Fitzgerald Sekas
Big thanks to Ed!
MAURA; I can’t say enough nice things about your dad. Never raised his voice and never lectured. I learned by watching the best, he and Hal] He would ask the occasional question to see if I had ”picked up”
on the example just given without having told me it was a lesson. When the last of the WWII vets finally left the job it was the passing of an era. As Tom Broakaw put it “The Greatest Generation””
Hope this finds you and yours well.
It really is pure joy for us to read or learn any little piece of how our Dad was from his friends on the LAPD. I am the youngest of his 5 kids and was 6 years old when he died. Sounds like he partnered similarly to how he parented. We only knew him from a child’s perspective, so it is fascinating to know how he was with adults. Again, thank you for honoring him and what you two did as partners and giving us a glimpse into a part of his life that so few can share with us.
Maura
YOU MAY REST ASSURED MAURA YOUR FATHER WAS A TRULY REMARKABLE MAN. I JUST TURNED 84 YEARS OLD AND HAVE DONE EVERYTHING AND SEEN EVERYTHING. IN MY LIFE TIME I HAVE ENCOUNTERED THOUSANDS OF PEOPLE UNDER ALL MANNER OF CIRCUMSTANCES.. THAT SAID I CONSIDER YOUR DAD TO BE ONE OF THE FINEST PEOPLE I EVER MET.
IF YOU HAVE NEVER CARED FOR, BLED FOR OR CRIED FOR A STRANGER THEN YOU DO NOT HAVE THE FAINTEST CLUE WHAT A POLICE OFFICER DOES. YOUR DAD WAS ONE OF THOSE CHOSEN FEW.
Thank you, Ed. It means so much.
Love to you,
Maura
Ed was dead on, a good partner is vital to a happy career as well as living. I had many good partners in my long career, I also had a few duds. some of my I picked and others picked me. shortly after the union you know if you had chosen wisely.
a good partner made the job fun and you actually looked forward to coming to work, how many jobs can you say that about. I’m still in contact with the good partners and cherish their friendship.