We got on the road pretty early, beginning our trip around 6:30 am, leaving from the Chicago suburbs heading to Alabama for a weekend visit. Things were going great and we were moving right along, possibly moving at slightly north of the posted speed limit signs, which are sporadically and strategically hidden from view, usually by just behind a state trooper's vehicle.
After cruising through Chicago-land with no issues, we entered Indiana, a state known for farmland, the recently traded Peyton Manning and some race I don't really understand or watch. A couple hours later we rolled into Indianapolis, navigating pretty mild traffic and looking at the small but quaint skyline.
We also noticed a bright light on a helicopter hovering directly over Interstate 65. "Hmmm," I thought, "I bet this is a police copter and they're clocking the speed of drivers out here."
Just a few seconds later my theory was proven correct as an Indiana state trooper's undercover white Dodge pick-up truck light up like Lake Michigan during the fourth of July fireworks display. Not wanting to prolong the inevitable, I began searching for a place to pull over and quickly moved to the shoulder of the highway.
Out of the white undercover Dodge pick-up truck hopped a skinny, young Barney Fife look-a-like, determined to save the greater metropolitan area of Indianapolis from all sort of vehicular mayhem, and I had been targeted as a criminal and supporter of all things evil.
After some fumbling, we managed to locate an expired registration (that's another story not needing to be published at this time :)). I also handed him my driver's license, after which he, the cop, continued to look at me very suspiciously because my wife (Asian) and my step-daughter (Asian) apparently didn't look like they belonged with a white redneck feller. He asked where we were going and I explained that we were heading to my mom's house in Alabama. Again, he looked like he didn't believe me, asked for my step-daughter's license (I reckon he wanted proof that we had the same address), checked the contents of the car (again), checking out my wife's packing of food, water and coffee for the trip, the blankets and pillows my step-daughter had crammed into the back seat, all the while checking my eyes for some obvious twitching brought upon by a recent toke on my crack pipe. I was feeling like I had just been visually accosted and violated by this guy.
He returned to his undercover white Dodge pick-up truck, lights still flashing like the Rockafeller Center Christmas tree in December, ran my license, printed my tickets (yes, plural--another story for another time) and finally returned to our car.
"Seriously? You're giving me two tickets," I asked?
"Yep," he replied.
He returned to his undercover white Dodge pick-up truck (south side of Indianapolis), single bullet in his shirt pocket. I began daydreaming that he would return to Check Point Chicky to report his ticket issuance to Andy, the police chief.
As I published to my Facebook account last night, I hope this guy's undercover white Dodge pick-up truck, which probably patrols the southern end of Indianapolis daily, breaks down, his radio is inoperable and he has to wait for help for hours.
And for now I will close, my personal mayhem currently in check because this guy puts his life on the line for you, my fellow traveler and the millions of people that traverse I-65 who admire the southern portion of Indianapolis, while this state trooper patrols in his undercover white Dodge pick-up truck.
My great grandma was a full-blood Lakota Sioux. Her daughter, my Grandma married a Wyoming rancher. Grandpa and Grandma had a black Lab named, "Bud." One day Grandpa was driving Grandma and Great Grandma to town in the pickup. Bud decided to go along and sat betweeen grandpa and great-grandma. A trooper pulled them over. Embarrassed, he explained that he thought that there were four people sitting in the seat of the pickup--mistaking Bud for a human. The trooper admitted his mistake. Then Great Grandma, completely without shame drops the "N" word as she asks the trooper, "And you thought I was sitting next to a buck (Insert N word)!"
ReplyDeleteIt was extremely uncomfortable that day on the highway out of Sheridan, Wyoming...