My first vehicle was a gold blazer. I loved that truck kept it clean and often used any excuse to drive it. I liked that truck so much that I threatened passengers with penalty of beat down if they did anything to cause my truck to part from my ownership in any way. However, the truck seem to attract a lot of unwanted attention. Driving through towns south of Beltway 8 felt like a crime. Without fail, patrol units would cruise behind my vehicle. If I drove someone else’s car there was no problem. (…was this truck a magnet..or was there history…is that why I got such a good deal on it?)
In one particular town, there was only three cops. I had , recently, started traveling through those towns, because a family member lived there. At first, it made me nervous to visit. The cops rode so close to the bumper, I was afraid if I stopped the car, his vehicle it would wind up in my tailgate. When my husband rode with me , I did not have these problems. I encouraged him to ride with me more often.
After awhile, I quit traveling through the main roads. It was safer to take the country roads into the small towns and visit with my family. Friends told me those small towns and villages south of Beltway 8 were just heavily patrolled.. don’t worry about it. Okay I said.
One night a reverend invited friends, his family and my future in-laws to his house. We were having a geek night. The plan was to go to the reverend’s house to watch three geeky movies in a series and then go to a movie theater for the last geeky movie in that series. The movie’s release would start just after midnight.
We arrived early in the evening and wound up having to go deeper into the town for snacks. Family members directed me to a local Krogers. As soon as I turned out on to the main roads, a cop left his post and followed my truck all the way to the store. We made jokes to lighten the mood. ” My own private security escort service… stupid college stickers and tassles.. they know I’m an out-of- towner… and hummed the jaws theme.. ”
We shopped for over an hour in the store and went back out. Another cop followed us for a shorter distance after we left the store. Once we got back into the neighborhood another unit followed us. Friends told me don’t worry about the last guy, he was new. The last cop, that had followed us, sat in the field next to the rev’s church. If you don’t do anything wrong, you have nothing to worry about the rev assured me. Okay I said. .again.
We stayed at the reverend’s house for more than six hours. At 11:00pm, we left the reverend’s house. There was a caravan of us, so I took a position in the middle of the line. As we left the neighborhood, I saw the cop was still in the field next to the church.
When the movie concluded our caravan split up. I also took on some more passengers. We dropped a friend off in another neighborhood and my fiancée’s brother decided to check and make sure he had locked the rev’s church up. We returned to the church. He checked the doors and then returned to the truck. When we pulled out I wound up going the wrong way and turned around. I went back down the street in front of the church. The cop pulled out behind me. Before I could get the words out of my mouth, the cop turned his lights on. D!@#E$%!!!!! IT !@#$%^&*!!!!!
Instead of remaining on the road where all the houses and the church was.. he had instructed me to pull off on a lonely road with no houses or businesses. A dark lonely side street…like the ones you see in a horror flick or in one of those crime pieces that end with…” and no one saw a thing…”
This street was completely out of a slasher film. There was only one light and it was coming off of another street. The one street lamp we stopped under had flickered off. Fog rolled out from the fields , thick as pea soup and concealed the deep ditches around us. It was so dark, my lights couldn’t penetrate what could have easily been a black hole in front of us. The darkness seemed to be absorbing the light. If we had crossed onto a dead end.. I wouldn’t have known. All we could see were tall grasses and weed trees. (First thing that came to my mind were all the murdered bodies code enforcement had found when they eventually cleaned out vacant lots that looked much like the ones that surrounded us. )
O.o
My passengers wondered what happened. I repeated the mantra.. I didn’t do anything wrong.. nothing should happen.. I stared at the cop coming out of the car. He took his flashlight out aimed it up and put his hand on his gun. I didn’t do anything wrong.. nothing should happen.
My fiancée’s brother rolled the window down ” Problem officer?” (… that’s right bro.. poke the bear.)
The officer jumped and looked around the truck. All he could see was a senior woman, the brother in the back and my fiancee and me in front. He aimed the light in my eyes. I squinted and he removed the light. He said that he saw us go up to the church.
My fiancée’s brother said he worked at the church and that he went to make sure it was locked. The cop aimed his flash light at the trunk area. He repeated to the cop..” what was the problem?”
The cop took his hand off the holster and said there had been robberies in the area. He was checking out who might be going up to the church this time of night. I saw you turn onto the street… he explained this is just a routine traffic stop.
“Well she made a wrong turn but she didn’t do it illegally….”
There was more chatter. The brother was explaining the owner of the church lives on the property, he can verify us if you call.. etc..etc .. etc.. but by now I was so nerved up it would have taken a crowbar just to pry my hands off the steering wheel. The cop sternly said it was just a traffic stop and now he knew everything was okay.
At some point the cop took my id, looked at it and handed it back. He had satisfied his curiosity and left. It took everything I had to not gun that Blazer out of there, but I’ll let you imagine.. just how fast out of dodge I ‘really’ went. ( That night I learned Blazers are not too heavy to launch and can fly great distances easily…)
I had a major melt down when we got home. My future in-laws did not understand my meltdown. You were safe, you hadn’t done anything wrong they kept reminding me. On the other hand my dad understood and I wound up getting a pill sedative and a liquid sedative.
Every traffic stop I had ever had either with my folks as a child and growing up into adult hood were laced with not so great encounters. The ol’ your rear tail light is broken was not just an opening line to a series of jokes for me growing up. It was an excuse to be pulled over and given a personal PSA… don’t stop anywhere in this town for the next 80miles. Vacation money meant saving up for the inevitable expense of miscellaneous tickets. ( Now that franchises litter the freeway, some of those towns have changed their tunes remarkably. We get everything from free casino perks to discounts on merchandise if we should decide to come through.) TxDoT, I think, was doing us a favor when they paved new freeways that bypassed the towns. Many of the new freeways don’t include exit lanes but rather exit ramps that take you further out the way. Rendering formally undesirable towns inaccessible, despite their reformed hospitable ways.
My future brother in law would understand it later why I freaked out. Our friends would recount tales of his subsequent horrific traffic stops with the same cop and then his own horrible routine traffic stop moments out in the Louisiana boonies and another in California by a angry, glazed over law enforcement officer. Nothing like being stopped late at night in the middle of nowhere and not understanding why you were pulled over. He was with his family and suddenly a feeling of powerlessness can over whelm you.. but ” you didn’t do anything wrong .. and it should be okay..” suddenly is not a good enough statement to soothe the feeling that at anytime for anyreason someone may pull you over for a ticket you might not be able to fight or pay. If he didn’t have understanding then, he has currently come to understand why I responded the way I did. Fear comes when a situation that should easily be worked out takes a left turn into Wrongville. I continue trying to keep my understanding. It was just the weirdness of a very stressful situation, that should have been a routine stop, in a neighborhood that sees more trouble from mailbox vandals or pranks played on that church than actual crime. ( The crime stats for this particular town jumped to an all time high of 8 thefts, 4 assaults, and 0’s on everything else…) The crimes were done by residents living in the area.) I don’t know whether to say keep up the good work or put the effort you use to watch outsiders to good use on the neighbors, too. But either way, the town’s safety can be attributed to the creepy, vigilant cop and tag teaming-tailgators.
Who knew quiet small towns could be so .. intriguing at 5 in the morning.
Lately, the towns have grown along south beltway 8. Inner city cops now share responsibility in patrolling the growing towns. Many of the tailgating complaints made by residents have decreased significantly and my experiences with cops have been more positive. ( It has grown into a lovely relationship.. you don’t bother me.. and I won’t bother you.)
Experiences like these have taught me that its time I start doing a bit more digging on how to prep for traffic stops. In hind sight the cop had been by the church and had seen where we had been all night before the movies and after the movies. His judgement to have me turn off to the middle of an isolated street was bad…. I should have gone to a more public place. Now that I am older I believe there are smarter ways to coöperate during one of these traffic stops. The best ways I found was through various Texas Law blogs,Nolo lawsites, FlexyourRights.org, and WiseGeek.org .
If you do the wrong thing these sites can’t help you, but if you’re trying to continue on the right path, these are excellent resources.
” …sprinkle some crack on [them] and let’s get outta here.” – Dave Chappelle.
SuburbanBlues 