On the phone on Friday at work, a woman who gave me a large piece of her colourful vocabulary. Apparently her son was a ...guest... in our back wing (where the little rooms are with the doors that don't open unless we say so) and she felt that the guys were unfairly targeting her son. I had fielded a couple of calls from concerned citizens in his neighbourhood who felt that he shouldn't be engaging in his chosen behaviour, (driving an ATV) given his level of inebriation, but I told her that she would have to talk to the corporal who brought him in, that I couldn't tell her anything. During the barrage of abuse that followed this, I merely waited, I don't even think you could call it listening, and then cut in and told her again that she would have to talk to the corporal, but that I felt that if she told him exactly what she told me, the corporal probably wouldn't want to talk to her. She called again a few minutes later and I let the phone ring through to the mobile so that she could talk to him. We (one of the constables and I) sat and listened to her being very polite and deferential to the corporal.

While she was yelling, I was fine. Wasn't taking it personally, wasn't attempting to defend myself or the corporal. Managed not to let the call go on too long. Afterwards I realized that I was a little cold. I still can't help the physical responses sometimes. And yet, when I get the calls where someone's saying "He's hitting her" and there's screaming in the background, I can (as Ed says) be removed and calm. Be the voice. -- What's your name. Where are you. Who is hitting who. The police are on their way. Someone will be right there.

And I've been sworn at before, but mostly the swearing happens right at the end of the call, I tell the caller that their matter is not a police matter and they generally say "Thanks a whole fucking lot" or some such thing before they bang the phone down. But then I just laugh and tell whoever is sitting around with me "That didn't make him/her too happy." But, just like the clip Delia had linked on her blog, there are things that I know that if I go into the coffee room or the squad room and say to the guys, "Someone has stolen old Mr. So-and-so's bottle of vodka" they're going to say, "He probably drank it," and no-one will move.