It’s been more than a year but I still remember the look on the police officer’s face when my car slid to a stop, just inches from where she sat in the passenger’s seat of the cruiser.
Her mouth was open and her eyes wide with surprise…before she narrowed them in a glare.
I was driving through an intersection on a light I had watched turn green on my approach. I had slowed to accommodate two cars squeezing in left turns on a red light in front of me. In a split second I reacted and took in that those drivers too, had narrowly avoided hitting the police cruiser which was proceeding straight through the red light.
The officer gestured that I should pull into a nearby parking lot. I did, immediately. Her partner, a young man with a ruddy face and an endearing expression approached my car.
“You came pretty close to hitting us back there,” he said.
“But the light was green. I didn’t hear a siren; you didn’t have your lights on.”
He shrugged. “Maybe you had your radio on?”
“No.” I didn’t.
He glanced in the back of my car, Graham fidgeted.
“Talkin’ to your baby?”
“He was asleep until just now.” I gulped. “I was watching the lights and the intersection. No one was stopped. Those two other cars almost hit you too.”
“Wait here.”
He went back to the cruiser where his partner still sat, glaring at me.
I waited. And waited. Graham started to wail. It was 15 minutes before he returned.
“I’m gonna have to charge with you failure to stop.” He looked at Graham. “Is he okay?”
“He’s just frustrated,” I said. “We both are.”
The police officer sighed and I thought I saw something flash across his face. Sheepishness?
Emboldened I stammered, “I’m a very careful driver. You didn’t have your siren or your lights on. Someone less careful would have hit you.”
He leaned in and handed me a ticket. “Go to court,” he said. “It’ll get knocked down.”
And so I did.
It was a few weeks ago. I took a holiday day from work, partially so I could attend and partially to attend to a million other errands I had been neglecting.
He was there. In a nice suit and looking younger than I remembered.
The prosecutor pulled us aside. “So, you can plead guilty and we’ll accept an $80 fine and no points. Does that work?”
Inexplicably my eyes filled with tears.
“I did stop. I know you think I’m just some stupid woman driver, but I’m not. I have spent years studying how to maneuver a few tons of metal around.”
Both men shuffled uncomfortably.
“Do you want a trial?”
I sniffled and nodded, mortified because the tears would not stop coming.
“I can’t plead guilty to something I didn’t do.”
And so I got a trial date two weeks hence. And on the way out I fell in step beside the young officer.
“What did you mean by that?” he asked.
I shrugged, embarrassed now. “I’m a pilot.”
“Wow, cool.” We walked in companionable silence.
“You know, you could be a Formula One driver. You still almost hit me.”
I stopped.
“You looked at me like I was some kind of cliché, silly woman driver. But if I didn’t have the training I have, I would have hit you. You know those other cars almost hit you too.”
“Yes.”
“How come they never heard your siren or saw your lights?”
He shrugged. “You have to do what you think is right.”
I showed up for the 1:30 p.m. trial yesterday on my lunch, with the naïve hope that I could make it back to work within my allotted hour.
The young officer saw me enter and scooted over to sit beside me.
“Are you sure you want to do this?” he said. “If it’s financial, I could talk to the prosecutor.”
I bit my lip and sighed.
“I don’t want to sway you. But you stand a real good chance of getting convicted.”
I looked at him. All of a sudden I felt tired, exhausted really.
I thought about how busy my life was lately. I thought about what a long and difficult winter, financially and emotionally, Rob and I have endured: about how many things, important things, have caused me stress over the last several months.
I thought about a piece I wrote a few months back in which I expressed a desire to teach Graham which battles are worth fighting. I considered that if I left in the next 10 minutes I wouldn’t have to use any more holiday time.
I thought about how my dogged insistence on doing things the hard way has always made things difficult for me. I thought about how I wished that Graham would learn a better way.
And I sighed and I lifted my damn stubborn, figurative foot off the brakes.
“I want to move forward,” I said.
He smiled.
So I pleaded guilty and accepted a reduced fine: $50 and no points.
But I still asked for, and received, 90 days to pay it.
Because I don’t want the Man to think I’m dead just yet.
