I don’t get stopped by the police very often, and years ago, I worked at a drugstore. And of course, I always got stuck working the weekends and the holidays. Well, this particular holiday was the Fourth of July. Our city has an absolute huge Fourth of July celebration. There can easily be 250,000 people or more that flock to this area, so I didn’t really mind working because I don’t like crowds, there’s too many people, and I’m shorter than everybody else is. So I didn’t go and I stayed at work. People came in and they bought munchies and beer and all kinds of things that they needed to go downtown to watch the fireworks festival. The fireworks festival usually starts at, like, 10 after 10, so it’s dark. So it was just getting ready to start by the time I went home
On the way home every day, and on the way to work every day, for many, many, many years, I have to stop at the railroad tracks because there might be a train coming, right? So on my way home there is a neighbor that puts on the most manic fireworks show you could ever think a person could put on. This fireworks — I have to say, tens of thousands of dollars is what this person spends in fireworks. They have so many fireworks that at the end — well, the next day, the fifth of July, very, very neatly stacked on the edge of the streets are boxes filled with empty mortars.
So this particular day — night, I’m driving home, and I see all of these fireworks and the booms were loud. I was just thinking about driving past all the sparks and everything. I just wanted to get home. And behind me there was a police car, and his lights went off. I did not think twice about it because certainly, you cannot have this kind of firework display in the city. Come to find out, he was stopping me. Why? Because I didn’t even stop at the railroad tracks. I was kind of horrified because it’s something that I do every single day, every time I go that way. It’s just automatic to stop at the railroad tracks.
So the policeman pulled me over and the first thing he did was he asked — oh no. Do you know what? He said, “Do you know why I stopped you?” And I said, “No.” He said, “Well, you didn’t stop for the stop sign at the railroad tracks.” I was kind of surprised that I didn’t stop, but I’m sure with how I was feeling about getting home and driving under all those sparks, I was — just wanted to get home. So the gentleman wanted to see my driver’s license, and I said, “Well, I know you’re not supposed to get out of your car, but it’s in my trunk, so I can’t give it to you.”
And he says, “What is it doing in your trunk?” Well, I had a logical answer for him. It was in my trunk because I was working retail and I’m not taking my purse in the store, and if I put it inside the trunk, then nobody knows I have my purse in my car, so it’s there. So he kept me there and was checking everything out, and I just said to him — I said, “I am so sorry.” I said, “I could appreciate people with PSD, but I just want to go home. It’s so noisy, and there’s mortars all over. I don’t — I just live around a couple corners. I just want to go home.”
So the end of the story? As you know, you’re talking to me, and I made it home, but boy, oh boy. Those railroad tracks, and going through — driving through fireworks, you just can’t imagine how loud and scary that actually is. Happy August!