Rewatching the police shows of my 1970s youth.
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The police officers who felt real to me were, paradoxically, the ones I watched on TV.
My resolutely anti-suburban parents somehow fit in.
As a small boy, I took in stride much of what I saw and heard.
All junkies want sugar.
It sounds chaotic, but it felt routine.
I had not thought about those Hollywood policemen for a very long time.
They were, for me, seductive in ways I had not wanted to think about for decades.
Those imaginary men in blue had an unnerving and enduring hold on me.
But my father would mutter Why are you watching that garbage?
For most of its seven-year run, it aired at 8 p.m., accommodating my bedtime.
I had a crush on Jim Reed years before I knew what a crush was or what it meant.
I could not have found words for any of that.
Adam-12premiered on NBC in 1968 in the wake of protests and riots in Newark, Detroit, and Watts.
It felt like knowledge worth holding onto.
(Why did I think he was so interesting?
Never mind, I remember.)
And then there was Lincoln Hayes, who had grown up in Watts as one of 13 children.
Anyone of a certain age who watchedThe Mod Squadwill remember how transfixing Clarence Williams III was as Linc.
Lincs trademarks an oft-repeated clip of him icily shrilling Liiiiiiiin-coln!
The first time my father saw me raise my fist, he barked, Dont do that!
Youre not some Black Panther!
What he was saying was,Dont let me catch you behaving like a Black kid.
Which is complicated because he never would have said it.
My father ran his own very small law firm.
Most of the people he represented were in show business, and most of them were Black.
I learned other words as well.
(He didnt use the phrase the N-word.)
Yousaid it, I said.
I also remember knowing that it wouldnt feel worth the slap.
But in fact, immense energy was invested in embedding those series in the collective consciousness of children.
Dell published 15-centMod Squadcomic books, and Topps soldMod Squadchewing gum.
(Related: Is anyone interested in buying a slightly used 39-DVD set ofThe Mod Squad?)
Their targets included racists, pushers, even a right-wing arms dealer.
It was occasionally the squads job to root out the bad elements who were undermining a good cause.
You must look like a princess!
Not yet, but my world was changing.
It smelled like scorched coffee and damp paper; stacks of yellowing bodybuilder magazines leaned against the walls.
I was extremely small for my age; it didnt seem likely that I would pull that off.
But I kept going back.
(Different streets, I would realize much later.)
These werent like the earnest series Id watched a couple of years earlier.
Occasionally, one of these shows would have an episode about police brutality or a dirty cop.
I had still never met one in real life.
God damn it, my father said.
Then the lights went out in the living room.
God damn it, he said.
We looked out the window just in time to see all of New York City go dark.
By then, it was 1977.
Do you think I have that?
he wanted to know the answer, even perhaps especially if it was something he hadnt considered himself.
It was the one in which Harry gets a female partner.
I walked out of the theater somehow crestfallen, and my father looked at me for a long time.
Youre sad, he said.
Are you sad because of the movie?
Its just a movie.
I dont know why Im sad, I said, because I didnt.
He stopped talking again, as if he were working through something for which my presence wasnt fully necessary.
Its all right, he said finally.
you could be sad.
It just means youre sensitive.
We didnt say anything more.
A year later, he was dead.
And yet:Sensitive.
The word stayed inside me, like a latent virus that could flare up at any time.
They were there to maintain stability and control the things I wanted more than anything.
But now that my world had spun out, that spell had been broken.
They couldnt do anything for me anymore.
They will have far less naivete to lose, or to fight, pointlessly, to preserve.
And they will not have to work to erase the lies they had the luxury of telling themselves.
Youre fine, the paramedic said, looking at me with searing, fully earned contempt.
We see four of you every night.
You wanna go to the hospital, Ill take you.
But a doctor will tell you the same thing.
I had learned my lesson.
As embarrassed as I was, I felt completely entitled to that protection.
I had been taught very well.
I knew how this worked.
I wasnt one of the animals.
How could I be?
I was one of the good ones.
