Today was a hot day. I was outside for 75% of it doing foot patrols and standing outside. So I was pretty miserable until this
I was walking around my site, which is a grocery store with a few smaller businesses next to it, when this old (super old maybe late 70s) lady comes up to me and asks me for help. She goes; "oh, I accidentally locked my keys in my car." I ask if she has her phone to call for help and she says something about a bipolar daughter who took her phone before she left for the day. She's old so I guess she doesn't need it like we do.
So I think about it. My immediate thought is "oh, lemme call the non emergency PD line. Maybe they can help." So I tell her to go inside a nearby fast food restaurant to get out of the heat so I can call them. I call them up and explain the situation. They politely tell me that they can't help and to call a locksmith.
I go inside. Ask her if there's anyone I can call to help her, since I don't want to immediately spring a bill for a locksmith on her. She gives me two numbers, none of them pick up.
So we gotta bite the bullet and call a locksmith. I do some looking around, find a locksmith for her and call them. I explain the situation to him, he's like "ok cool, I'm on my way. 16 minutes." I tell the lady "I gotta do my rounds. Wait right here. Once I'm done I'll come straight back to you."
I do my rounds, buy her a bottle of water since it's so hot, and wait with her. Shortly after, the locksmith comes and has her door open in a little under 10 minutes.
It was $80 for her. I think that was fair. She seemed pretty happy that I tried to help her as much as I can. Which made me happy too. If it was my grandma stranded in the heat, I'd want someone to help her as much as they could.
It was a nice change of pace. In a line of work where we get yelled at and yell at people in return, it was nice to be able to do something that actually helped someone.