Officer Fred in Washington Square Park, San Francisco

This guy right here deserves his own posting on the blog.  This is officer Fred of the San Francisco Police Department.  His job is to keep an eye out at Washington Square Park here in San Fran, which happens to be just down the road from Charlie's place.  He has been on the force for over 20 years, and this is only his second year stationed in the park.

So here is my story:
I got out of the house around noon after spending the morning in the apartment buying my Goonies 25th anniversary celebration tickets (which I am very excited about).  I was hungry,  so I went down to Cafe Divine, which is about a block away from Charlies, to grab a bite to eat and a coffee .   It was nice out so after my meal I took my book over to the park to read and looked for a seat in the sun.  The only seat open was on the same bench as this officer, so I took a seat and started reading...  With my A.D.D the reading didn't last long because every minute or two a new character from the park would come over to say hi to Fred and sit down for a few minutes to chat- Fred never moved from the above pose.  It wasn't until one man came over complaining that all the dogs in the park were off-leash that Fred spoke to me-   He told me after the guy left: "You can please all the people some of the time, and some of the people all the time, but you cannot please all the people all the time." he claimed that this was an abraham lincoln quote, regardless, his point was understood.  The guy who complained was homeless and a bit crazy- he didn't want the dogs to eat his food and had a valid point because having your dog off it's leash is against the law in San Fran... but in the next two hours the guy came back 3 more times with other issues... he thought people wanted to kill him, rob him, etc... and he kept asking office Fred to do something, which he did not.  He merely talked to this guy to calm him down, explained to him that the dogs meant him no harm and sent him on his way. 
He told me that there is the written law, and then there is the spirit of the law.  "The dogs are harmless and there are no leash free parks nearby, so I don't give the people a hard time"  He followed that by saying "the guy who just complained about the dogs probably wouldn't like it if I made him pull down his socks to reveal the Marijuana he sells in the park, but I don't bother him about it because Marijuana is not a problem around here" 
 For the rest of the time that we spoke he explained to me that he lived in the neighborhood, rides his bike all over the north beach area and talks to everyone.  It was obvious considering most people that walked by seemed to know him.  Some even referred to him as "Uncle Fred."  On numerous occasions, drunks from the park stopped by to say hello and tell Fred that they were dry and hadn't drank in several days.  Some of these were people he has arrested in the past year- yet they have no hard feelings towards him.  He expressed that he was proud of them and they moved on- he holds no grudges.  On a few occasions, Fred called over some "characters" to introduce them to me.  He told them I was traveling across the country and keeping a blog, he asked that they tell me their stories... Wow did I hear some interesting things.  I even got a farewell kiss on the cheek from a 70+ year old woman wearing pink pajama pants who hadn't eaten since lunch time yesterday (She gave fred a hug and a kiss on the cheek first, otherwise I would have turned the other way- she was sweet, just a bit crazy).  Fred gave her a few dollars to get some food and told her to stop back in tomorrow to say hi.  She is homeless and believes she is someone that she is not.  She was fun to talk to, but I couldn't help but feel sad for her.  She told me her favorite cousins name was Denny, and that she liked me because I reminded her of him.

Fred might look like the average police officer, heck, he might even look lazy just sitting in the sun all day on this park bench, but to me, he was a breath of fresh air.  He was engaged in his community, viewed everyone as equals whether or not they were homeless, wealthy, young, or old.  He was a genuinely nice guy who considered more than the book of law when making his decisions about when to serve and when to protect.  Fred told me, that without a doubt, alcohol is a far bigger problem than marijuana.  He even pointed out a few people smoking in the park in front of him.  He said to me "these guys think they will get a rise out of me if I catch them smoking.  They want me to come over so they can pull out their medical marijuana cards, but It doesn't bother me- alcohol is the big problem around here.  It is the drunks who cause problems and scare people, not the marijuana smokers- they merely fall asleep on the grass or play frisbee"

   

What a day it was.  I didn't get far from the apartment, but got more out of this day than expected.  Fred will be in the park again tomorrow and wednesday so I hope to pay another visit, hopefully this time with my real camera (this time I only had my camera phone).  I hope that the police in Seattle are similar to Fred- it would be nice to get to know my local police officers in a non threatening way- but I am sad to say that this is the first time I've encountered anything like this.

There is so much more to post about- Beautiful Lake Tahoe, the beginning of my time in San Fran, etc, but those will have to wait- I needed to post this while it was fresh.  Hope u enjoyed my little story and if you ever make it to San Fran, or if you already live here, stop in the park sometime and say hello to Fred.