Saturday, October 08, 2005

in trouble with the law

It is early. I am wating for a Charter Communications person to stop by. He is not here. The phone is ringing. A potential buyer is asking about the van (I ran an ad for it in the paper today). I’ll be there to show you the van in an hour.

Don’t sell it to another, I need it! He begs. (Why does anyone need a 1993 minivan with a torn seat and a broken headlight?)

The Charter person never shows. Thank you Charter person. I get in the car and drive to meet the potential van buyer. My van is parked off of Monroe Street, in a residential neighborhood, where it is unlikely to be damaged or bothered or disturbed in any way. I am already on Monroe and my cell rings. Are you coming? The potential buyer asks. On my way, on my way, I answer, weaving my way past slow moving cars.

Half a block from my destination I see the telltale blue and red lights flashing behind me. Shit. I do apologize for the vulgarity, but there is no other word for it. Crap might do equally well, I suppose.

The police man comes over and tells me I did a number of reprehensible things, the first one being my driving without an updated registration sticker.

I know, I know, it’s registered, I explain. It’s just that the journey from envelope to car license plate is a long one, oftentimes not taken by me. I am sorry!

And about your weaving in and out of traffic. Let me ask you this: have you been consuming alcohol?

At 8:30 on a Saturday morning??
Officer, I have not even looked at a something containing alcohol (unless you count the toner I now use on my face after being scolded for not moisturizing several weeks back). Last time I consumed an intoxicating beverage was at around midnight on Thursday at the Karaoke Kid. You can read about it here, officer.

I feel he is leaning in to see if a whiff of something mightn’t be found anyway. He seems disappointed as he leans back out.

Finally, you are speeding. Ten over.
Finally? Shouldn’t that be firstly? Indeed. I am going the speed of the car in front of me. That kind of an answer, of course, will get me nowhere. I hear my mother saying: if your friend jumped out the window would you do it as well? – a favorite question of hers, implying, at the very least, that I have suicidal friends.

The young cop takes my license and disappears with the reassuring words we’ll get you out of here and moving soon. Sounds like something you’d day to a person who already is sitting in jail, not simply waiting to sell a van off of Monroe Street.

He comes back and tells me: you have a spotless record. Yes, I know that. I have never had a moving violation in the 35 years I have been driving. I have traversed all continents (well, almost) without putting so much as a dent into any vehicle under my control. I have trucked tour groups around narrow lanes and mountain passes. I have navigated cars through storms, tornados, downpours, heatwaves and blizzard whiteouts and have come out unscathed. You do not need to tell me about my driving record. I am proud of it. And, sadly, it is about to be deflowered, right there on Monroe street, in front of Michael’s Frozen Custard.

I’m letting you go without a citation, he tells me. He hands over a brochure, put together by the Madison Police Department, with the assistance of the Michigan State University Police Department, the Miami University Police Department and the New Castle County Police Department in Delaware. An eclectic bunch, wouldn’t you say?

The brochure asks for feedback, of the “how am I doing?” sort. It is right for him to hand this to someone who has just gotten off without a citation. Even though I have never taken it upon myself to call those numbers on trucks that say “call and tell me how I am driving,” this time, I want to help the MPD. I feel warm and fuzzy toward them.

Except, well, except I think the brochure is all wrong. It outlines what you should do when you get stopped by a cop. It invites a recurrence. It does not have faith in my continued attempts at keeping within the boundaries of the law. So I wont comment. But I did want to use this opportunity to say thanks to the dear man patrolling Monroe, on the look out for signs of early morning corruption and depravity. My purity is preserved.

7 comments:

  1. Whew! I thought for sure you were going to get a ticket!

    You are right to be so proud of your spotless record. That's extraordinary, and I'm glad you got to keep it!

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  2. I'm glad you got off, too -- cosmic justice realignment would seem to require it, frankly.

    Having given up an hour of time I could have spent with my children on Wednesday to attend to a display of those "Don't you freaking maniacs know the speed limit is 25? Slow the f*** down!" signs along Monroe St., though, I'll just say on behalf of the Dudgeon-Monroe Neighborhood Association's Transportation Committee: Slow down!

    BTW, did you get to show the van in the end?

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  3. My feeling was that the car was having a mini rebellion against my week-long neglect. I mean, when the cop told me I did not use the turn signal to switch lanes, I knew that something was not kosher. I am a compulsive signal user, to the point that I'd flick it on leaving the driveway.

    The van ad has already, in six hours, had more calls than six weeks of house-listing ever had. And the first caller, who offered full price, sight unseen walked away with it.

    In some ways, I felt sadder saying goodbye to the van than to the house. I remember so well my first ride in it with WERN full blast playing Bach's double violin concerto and me thinking - wow! It has a radio. That plays. Stereo no less. My cup runneth over.

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  4. Your experience reminds me of the police literature handed to me (gulp!) whilst innocently walking through Amsterdam's red light district (for those who at the mention of 'red light district' assume that I could be up to no good in such a place, let me point out that it's at the center of town and a great place to go for cheap meals). Three burly cops asked for my passport and then asked if I was carrying any weapons. Well, no, I replied, as an American tourist, it's rather had to get, say, a rifle on an airplane these days. Then looked me over and handed me a little blue pamphlet about what sorts of weapons are not allowed in Amsterdam's red light district.

    Good to know.

    Paul

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  5. aaaahhh! my head's exploding!!! as a person who's come damn close to having their liscense taken away (9 out of 12 allowed points racked up in one calendar year!) I'm outraged, outraged, I tell you!

    well, not really... you, of all people, should be able to pull this off, I grudgingly admit.
    hmpf.

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  6. Paul: at least they spoke English!

    SEP: I'd like to think it's my beguiling ways but really, I think he just wanted someone to write nice comments on his behalf to the MPD.

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  7. Well, they actually spoke Dutch, but I speak Dutch as well. They switched to English once they saw my american passport, something that annoys me to no end. I refused to switch from Dutch and so we had the mini-spectacle of two Dutch cops telling me in broken English not to carry "pistols" and me replying in heavily German-accented Dutch that I was an American tourist and not likely to! :-)
    Paul H

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