Traffic Stop

It was several years ago, on a cool, clear night.  I don't remember exactly what the occasion, but I had been at the high school where I worked since before daylight.  Probably a sporting event, or a dance, but I had arrived at the school house before daylight and when I left that evening, it was long after dark.

I remember that as I drove home, stomach growling, that the fast-food jonts were closed.  It was probably after midnight, and it had been about 12 hours since I choked down the school lunch. at noon.  I was a bit dismayed that the burger joints had closed, but home was a scant eight miles away, and I know how to fry bacon and eggs.

I wasn't in a police car, I was piloting my F150 pickup.  But, I had my police radio on my belt, the microphone near my shoulder.  As I motored down the road toward the house, I heard the crackle of static, and a voice come over the radio.

"RP2, dispatch.  I'll be out with a white Explorer,on 28, about a mile east of Holloway."

"What the hell?", I wondered.  The Chief Deputy hisself, on a traffic stop at this hour of the night.  Still, he was the Chief, and I was just a lowly Resource Office.  If the Chief wanted to make a traffic stop, who the hell was I to wonder about it.  Besides, bacon and eggs waited just a few miles down the road.

Another mile down that two-lane highway, I happen to see blue lights flashing in my rearview mirror, so I pull over to the shoulder to let him pass, then I'm a bit amused when he pulls in behind me.

I hear his radio traffic.  "123,dispatch, I'm going to be out with a silver F150, license, WRF235, on 28 near Libuse."

I figure, what the hell, two can play this game.  So I key my mic.  "920, dispatch.  I'm going to be out with 123."  Dispatch replied "10-4"

I stepped out of the truck, into the headlights of the police cruiser.  "What the heck are you doing?"

The young deputy crawled out of his car.  "They sent me down here tonight to do traffic enforcement.  So far, I've stopped three state troopers, two city policemen, a registered nurse, and you."

"Well," I replied, "it's been 18 hours in these boots.  If we're done here, I'm going home to cook some breakfast, and lay down."  I cautioned him, "Be careful, the Chief is making traffic stops in Holloway."

He looked down the darkened highway. "Naw, not me.  I'm going back to Tioga and tell the sergeant that traffic enforcement ain't happening tonight."

He went to his cruiser, and I got back in the truck.  "920, Dispatch.  Everything is Code 4 here.  Show me out of service, please."

Just another night of traffic enforcement on the state's highways.