On the Exhausting Expectations We Place Upon the Uniformed and the Unfortunate

Hello. Glad you made it.

Not long ago, I was walking through a rather picturesque Swiss town –the sort of place where even the graffiti is grammatically correct and smells faintly of lavender. Anyway, there it was, lying right in the middle of the street: a large, black, unidentifiable object. Could have been part of a car, part of a spaceship, or part of someone’s very bad day. Either way, it wasn’t supposed to be there. Enter: twenty-eight police officers. I counted. Twenty-eight. All striding past in matching uniforms, heading in the same direction like a particularly well-regulated boyband. I soon realised they weren’t responding to an emergency — they were simply on their way to lunch. I know this because I followed them. Not in a weird way. We were just headed to the same direction. But yes, I did slow down to observe. I pick things up because I was raised to believe that if something needs doing and you’re there, you do it. Radical, I know. But there were twenty-eight police officers right there. Surely, I thought, one of them will do it. None of them did. Except the very last one — Officer twenty-eight — who, in a beautiful act of reluctant responsibility, stooped, picked up the object, and carried on walking like it had been his plan all along. Hero.

Contrast this with an incident in London, where I was cycling past Buckingham Palace and — as one does — forgot it was ‘Changing of the Guard’ time, that daily moment when grown men in hats the size of houseplants march around to confuse tourists. In the chaos, I realised I had a flat tyre. I spotted a police officer and asked if he knew where I could find a public pump. He didn’t say a word — just summoned his colleague, who materialised like a bicycle butler and proceeded to inflate my tyre himself. Right there on The Mall, surrounded by gawking tourists and at least one corgi. I wasn’t expecting much –a shrug, maybe directions to a pump that hasn’t existed since 2003. What I got was someone who just… sorted it. No fuss, no fanfare. Just did it. Which — I’m sorry — was just really cool.

Funny how quickly we decide what people should do, based on nothing more than a uniform. Or a job title. Or the fact they once fixed your printer. I work in IT. Which, to the general public, means I must know how to fix every digital disaster known to mankind. Internet’s slow? Everyone stares at me like I’ve personally throttled the bandwidth. Computer won’t turn on? I’m expected to lean over and whisper it back to life. Toaster not cooperating? Naturally, I’m fluent in small appliances.

I also speak Swedish, which apparently grants me mystical access to the entire Swedish language, including 16th-century poetry and local dialects spoken only by sheep in the mountains of Kiruna. Mention Japanese and it’s even worse. People get visibly upset if I haven’t watched their favourite 900-episode anime from the early 2000s or can’t translate the sound a cartoon octopus makes when it’s surprised. I have a friend who’s a hairdresser. Every time she visits home, people start removing hats and saying things like, “Oh, since you’re here…” As if her job were not her actual livelihood but a portable party trick. She once cut her aunt’s neighbour’s ex-husband’s new girlfriend’s fringe. For free. She smiled politely throughout. I fear for her. And yet, there I was in Switzerland, projecting my own assumptions onto a group of police officers simply because they were wearing uniforms and had a general air of adult supervision. It’s easy to do. We expect things. From people. Because of what they wear, or what they do, or what they once mentioned at a dinner party in 2014. But maybe — just maybe — we should all be a little more forgiving. Not everyone in IT is a tech wizard. Not every hairdresser wants to cut your fringe in a pub toilet. And not every police officer is in the mood to wrestle a rogue piece of street debris before lunch. Except Officer Twenty-eight. You, sir, are a credit to the badge.

And to the gentleman who pumped air into my tyres outside Buckingham Palace: I will name my next USB stick in your honour.

Cheers, Ruby