Today, I had my first-ever ride in the back of a police car. It's not as dramatic as it sounds; I wasn't arrested, and the trooper didn't even ask for my ID.
I had been walking from Monroe to Bothell; after shipping home ten pounds of my possessions at the local UPS branch, I had walked over to the on-ramp for Route 522, which according to MapQuest I was to follow for a little over eight miles.
There had been no precipitation all day long, and we even had a good bit of sun. Route 522 isn't a freeway (so yes, it's legal to walk on it), but with all the car and truck traffic roaring by in both directions, it feels like one. I walked along in my rain gear, sweating away as per usual, enjoying those moments when I happened to pass under tree shadows and experienced a bit of coolness. I squeezed my eyes shut whenever large trucks went by; their turbulence stirred up all the dust and grit that blanketed the road shoulder, and I didn't want to be breaking out the contact lens saline solution in such an environment.
About four miles into the 522 portion of my walk, the road curved and suddenly I found myself facing a two-lane bridge-- one with no sidewalk or bike path. "Oh, shit," I said to myself, wondering how I was going to make it across without being squished.
I noticed that there actually was a shoulder of sorts on the bridge. It wasn't wide enough for me to walk facing forward, but I saw that if I turned sideways and rested my backpack on the Jersey barrier, I could walk forward when there were breaks in the traffic, and stand still whenever cars and trucks were passing by.
After debating with my cowardice for a minute or so, I found a break in the traffic and started onto the bridge. As in previous walks, I stopped whenever vehicles blew by, but the difference this time was that I was up against a Jersey barrier, and often had to wait more than a minute before I could get moving again-- there were that many cars.
It was during one of those long pauses that a police car pulled up. I sighed. He was obviously here for me. State police, not local. Through his closed window, the trooper shouted something about getting off the bridge, but I couldn't hear him too well, so, presuming, I opened his passenger-side door and leaned in to ask what he was saying.
The trooper, Officer Boisen, was polite enough, even though we had effectively stopped traffic in the lane he was occupying. "Please get in the back," Officer Boisen said. I asked him to pull his car a bit away from the Jersey barrier so I should shrug off my backpack (taking it off and putting it on is a major chore). I eventually wrestled the pack into the car, then stuffed myself in along with it.
And that's how, for the first time in my life, I ended up in the back of a police car. While it's not an experience I'd heartily recommend, there was something undeniably cool about this particular experience.
Officer Boisen asked me where I was headed and what I was doing on the road. He also said, "You're not wanted for anything, are you?" The question took me by surprise, and I laughed involuntarily. "No, sir," I answered as our car started forward-- back the way I'd come.
"You're not supposed to be on that bridge," the trooper said.
"But walking on 522 is legal, right?" I asked.
Officer Boisen pulled his car into a turnaround to point me back toward Bothell, my goal for today.
"Yes," he responded, "but the bridge isn't open to pedestrian traffic."
This prompted the obvious question: "So if it's legal to be on the road but not on the bridge, how am I supposed to cross the bridge?"
I'm not sure I understood (or even correctly recall) the answer. If I'm not mistaken, Officer Boisen's basic point was that, even though it was technically legal to walk 522, the road wasn't "intended for" (his words) pedestrian traffic. The legal implications of "intended for" are lost to me; I'm curious to look up the actual law relevant to what happened today-- not because I dispute Officer Boisen's interpretation of it, but because I want to be clear about it in future, so as not to cause any trouble.
"I'll take you up to 228th street and let you off. You can walk to your motel from there," said my driver. I told Officer Boisen that this was my first-ever ride in a police car, and he laughed. Like Officer Chuck, he was a good-natured fellow, despite the fact that I had caused him to obstruct traffic for three minutes.
We arrived at the drop-off point. I thanked the trooper for having given me a lift, but also scolded him: "I'm going to have to make these miles up, you know," I told him. We shook hands when I was out of the car; Officer Boisen refused to let me take his picture, but after he shook my hand he wished me good luck on my walk, of which only 3.6 miles remained thanks to the state of Washington's kind intervention.
In case you're wondering: the back of a squad car is hard and uncomfortable, like the molded plastic seating in some subways. A clear shield (glass? PlexiGlas? Kryptonite?) separates the, uh, passenger from the driver. There's very little leg room, which must be a pain if you're the kind of felon who's used to luxury. I was happy that today's ride wasn't an arrest; I imagine the whole thing would have felt unpleasant had circumstances been grimmer. Luckily, they weren't, and the upshot is that I arrived in Bothell several hours earlier than planned, and have had time to rest my feet a bit more.
What a day, eh? Amazing!
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Marathon
12 years ago
6 comments:
Things like this are gonna happen A LOT -- as you know if you've read Fat Man Walking.
Hey Kevin
I'm amazed at the amount of content you're able to generate, with all the walking and talking you have to do as well. Thing is, for those of us who check in sporadically--and those whose knowledge of American geography is limited--it's a little hard to follow.
Is it possible to incorporate a little map thingy in the side-bar, which you could update with your location/route, giving us a visual indicator of your progress and the general scale of things?
Also, enabling the date function on your posts would be helpful. Or perhaps a day 1, day 2 kind of thing...
Sorry to be a demanding pain in the arse, best of luck on your journey.
R,
I can't generate a map from my BlackBerry (the GPS function costs extra for me to activate it), but if some enterprising reader wanted to create such a graphic, I wouldn't say no to it.
As for a "date function," the blog already time-stamps posts, and post dates are visible. One caution about the time-stamping, though, is that the stamp currently represents Eastern Time, not Pacific.
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I am interested in the inter-religious dialogue your walk is based on but I am becoming more interested in your civil liberties and possible violations thereof that you are describing.
I think you are handling things exactly right and as the son, grandson and husband of police officers, I appreciate the respect you give them, but please continue to ask them to explain their reasons for interviewing you.
As to the map (which I too would enjoy, though I do have some idea of Northwest geography): I bet you could somehow use Google maps. I think you can do a google map and then reference that map with a URL; if I'm right, you could do the Google map, with route marked using the get directions function, and then insert a link into your blog to that map.
I could be wrong, or only half right--it might not be all that simple, or maybe not possible to reference a map with the route marked on it--but you might try it.
Easy to track. He's essentially followed Route 5 line south. Go to live search maps http://maps.live.com
or google maps and type in the name of a city like Bothell, and you're there! I typed in "Locust Way, Bothell" and it took me to the street right between 5 and 405.
He's moving pretty fast. It's working out well, the coastal trek is prepping him for the hills, and the hill for the mountains, etc..
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