A lot of frustration

Hello and good morning everyone. As I certainly don't need to point out to you, today is September 11th, and it's almost hard to believe that it's been six years since that tragic day. I just want to spend a few sentences on this before getting into my normal routine, if you don't mind.

I'm sure we all remember many details as to where we were and what we were doing as the events unfolded. The combination of very different emotions was a powerful one, and that day became the "Where were you when..." for an entire generation that was too young for JFK's assassination, surpassing my life's landmark events of the Challenger explosion and Princess Di's car accident. I very briefly want to mention something that happened a couple of days after September 11th. I was on the phone with my mom, and she told me that the list of victims' names (to date) had been released. On the list, there was a man named Peter Klein. Peter Anton Klein, to be exact. I don't know anything about this man, his family, or what his life was like before that day, but seeing his/my name on the list of the dead brought it all much closer to home for me. It made the act feel even more senseless and the individuals' deaths more random. I don't have any grand conclusions or summarizing thoughts to pull this aside together, but I wanted to share what I was thinking with you.

And now, like a 14 year-old sneaking out with his dad's car, I'm going to violently and unprofessionally switch gears. Here's an attempt at a transition: There were countless heroes in the police and fire departments six years ago today, but my story involves someone who unfortunately didn't do his uniform justice.

During my senior year of high school, I drove three or four other people to and from school. Two lived on my street, so there wasn't any hardship at all, and two friends of mine lived right near each other on the way to ole Birmingham High School. One afternoon after the last bell rang, we all met back at my blue Bronco 2 in the parking lot. As I approached it, I saw something that looked like a ticket on my windshield. "That's impossible," I thought, and it should've been. When I got there though, I saw that it was indeed a violation. "No Permit Displayed," it read. I looked back up at my car, and my parking permit was on my windshield, right where it had been for months.

I asked my friends if I was reading something wrong, but they confirmed that the ticket was saying that the sticker in front of us wasn't there. There wasn't anything on the dash obstructing the view of the permit or anything like that, so I couldn't for the life of me understand why I had this ticket. "Do you guys mind holding off for a minute while I see if I can find someone about this?" I asked. One got a ride from a friend, and the others agreed to wait.

I found the office of the campus police, and I very politely asked if I could speak with someone. A gruff man who clearly was unhappy with his station in life barked at me: "Whaddya need?" "Well, this ticket was on my windshield saying I don't have a parking permit, but I actually do have one and have since September." He snatched it out of my hand. "Yeah, I wrote this. You didn't have a sticker." "Um, sir, yes, yes I do." He sighed, clearly implying that I was a nuisance that was forcing him to exert more energy than he planned at this time. "Fine, I'll humor you and walk out to your car." Yes, he actually said that.

Walking over to the lot with him, I was very curious as to how the scene would unfold. Presented with the proof, would he admit his error? He'd better, I thought, because otherwise it would come down to his word against mine. We got to my car, and I pointed to the sticker. He paused for a moment, as if to choose his next words carefully. "I'm not calling you a liar," he started, "but I was standing right here when I wrote this up...and that puppy wasn't on there." "Um, it actually was, officer," I said, remarkably politely even though I felt like strangling him. "No, I remember this one. I even walked around the car because some kids like to put it on the back even though that's not where it's supposed to go. Nope, that puppy wasn't on there."

If you know me at all, you can probably guess the two things going through my mind at that time. "You've gotta be fucking kidding me," and "Stop calling it a fucking puppy!" My friends were watching me carefully, worried that I might snap since my normal tools of logic and reason were failing me. Instead, I calmly told him again that it has indeed been right there for months, and I asked if there was any way I could prove that to him. He walked up to the car and looked carefully at the inside and outside of the where the sticker was. Slowly, he dragged his finger along the windshield, probably just as he would've if he'd passed his detective exam. He held up his finger with some dirt on it - dirt that wouldn't have been there on a newly-placed sticker. I quickly realized what this meant, and I was hoping the ordeal would now be over. Instead, he boldly uttered the following: "I don't know how you did that," he said, "but that permit wasn't on the car when I wrote this ticket."

It was utterly preposterous! (Hey, you can't spell that without Peter either. Wow, now I have persistent, perfect, pester, reporter, profiteer, predetermined, and preposterous. I'm sure there are more.) I felt like saying, "Let's consider the options. I either snuck out here sometime this afternoon, placed this sticker on after you gave me a ticket, and somehow made the dirt on the back of it match the rest of the dirt on my windshield without leaving any fingerprints around the area...or you were mistaken." I didn't say that, and instead I asked again how I could prove that he was mistaken, and I offered to swear on whatever he could think of. This time, he provided me with an option: "If you can bring me a receipt that shows me that you did in fact purchase this permit in September like you say you did, I will consider voiding that out." I told him I'd do that and see him tomorrow.

The next morning, the office that sold me the permit had no problem whatsoever providing me with that receipt. I marched over to the officer's quarters and showed him, trying my damnedest to keep any smug smirk from slipping out. He shook his head like I had somehow just written up that receipt, and then uber-begrudgingly, agreed to take care of it. A couple of months later, I received something in the mail saying I had an unpaid fine. I went to the appropriate office again, and they said that I needed to fill out a form and have the officer sign - he could never have just "taken care of it" on his own without that form. I followed the procedure, and it was finally over with.

I think I speak for all of you when I say, "Dude, fuck that guy." I don't know what the deal was, but I would've fought that high school parking lot violation all the way to the Supreme Court if I had to. What? They don't take those cases? Well they should. In any case, I'm pleased to report that justice prevailed. For the rest of that year, the officer correctly saw my permit without incident, and that puppy probably angered him every time he saw it.

That's it for today, gentle readers. Just like Teenage Peter, I urge you to continue to fight for what you know is right, stick to your guns, and don't let The Man hold you down.

Friends, I wish you all a good, safe, and healthy day. My calendar tells me that tomorrow is not only the beginning of Rosh Hashanah at sundown, but also the First of Ramadan. I like that; I'll see you then. Shaloha.