18 Spring 2012 Applegater
Tall Tales from the Editor
Evil violators
or
honesty
My first road trip for 2012 was a
senior road trip. No, it wasn’t a senior
high school road trip, but one with
my parents, who are in their 80s, and
me, older than I ever dreamed. Older
than anything an oddsmaker would
have bet on: 30-plus years past 30.
Honestly, I never saw any reason to
rack up numbers past 30 years of age. If I
thought I would have lasted this long I would
have partied harder—fast-lane living 24/7.
Of course, everything looks different
now. Such as 40 wasn’t a bad age. I sure
miss 50, and how I long for 55. My
prostate, which has since fallen victim
to cancer, was still my sidekick then.
When my parents asked me if I would
drive them from their place (Fairview
Bay, Arkansas) to see family in Texas,
I jumped at the chance. You see, I
have a rather large, actually more like
humongous, amount of karma to work
off with my parents from my youth. A
1,500-mile senior road trip would go a
long way toward working off some of that
debt load. Well, maybe only a little way.
My mother said I couldn’t use her
name in this story so I’ll just refer to her
as “mother” or “mom.” I don’t remember
if the “King” (my father) made the same
request or not (I’ve got that aging memory
thing going on). I’ll just refer to him as
“father” or “dad.” Even though I have my
own car keys now, why take the chance.
Driving the scenic back roads, we
weren’t making very good time, but it was
worth it to see the countryside. We were
20 - 25 miles past Hot Springs, Arkansas,
when I thought, am I having some sort of
flashback? But no, those were real flashing
red lights in my rearview mirror and they
were attached to a deputy sheriff’s car.
The police car had been behind us for a
while and we had three cars in front of us. I
assumed he was responding to a call, so like
any good citizen would do, I pulled off the
roadway to let him pass. He followed me
right into a gravel parking lot of a business
long consigned to the dustbin of history.
My parents were asking me what was
up. We hadn’t been speeding or anything
obviously illegal. “I don’t know,” I told
them, then asked my mom, who was riding
shotgun, to get the car registration out for
me. When the deputy reached my lowered
window, I had my driver’s license in hand.
As he took my official “Oregon tax permit
to be behind the wheel legally,” he asked,
“Do you know why I stopped you?”
“I don’t have the foggiest clue,” I said.
“Your tags are registered to a Ford
and you’re driving a Jeep. And those tags
expired last October. It’s now February.”
I looked over at my mother who
had all the contents from the glove box
O
nce the police cars
disappeared from sight, i could
hear my mother whisper, “thank
you, jesus.”
strung out across her lap and the car’s
dash looking for the registration. She
told the deputy that they had indeed
owned a Ford Explorer and had traded it
in on this Jeep Patriot this past summer.
“Madam, you have to pay an assessment
[another word for tax] and register
your car at the DMV after a purchase.”
“ I ’m s u r e t h e d e a l e r t o o k
care of all that,” my mother said.
“Not necessarily so, madam.”
As my mother continued her
nonproductive search for a registration,
she was telling the deputy that everywhere
they’ve ever lived the dealership
always took care of the paperwork.
My father hadn’t said much from
the back seat, but I couldn’t have heard
him if he had. I’m hard of hearing even
with aids and my father has a soft voice.
Then my mother leaned forward in
her seat so she could make eye contact
with the deputy (who may have been old
enough to shave) and said, “I heard on TV
that you should put the registration in a
lockbox to keep it safe. That’s probably
where ours is at.” I told her “It’s the car
title that you’d put in a lock box, Mom.”
The deputy had a nice smirk
o n h i s f a c e a f t e r t h a t re s p o n s e .
“Here it is,” said my mom and handed
me a paper that was from the dealership
all right, but it was for an oil change. I
knew the deputy wanted to laugh. I could
see it in his face when I smiled at him.
“I don’t know where it is. The dealership
always takes care of the paperwork. I’m
going to give them a piece of my mind
when we get home,” repeated my mom.
My mom gave me an insurance
ID card that I handed to the officer,
who really started smiling now. (I later
learned that it was the old expired card—
they did have a valid one, though.)
While the deputy talked to dispatch,
I started to daydream about the three of us
making a run for it. Yep, we all jumped
out of the car and headed for the hills.
The deputy’s camcorder would show my
father, who has Parkinson’s, shuffling away;
my mother, who has asthma and a battery
in her pacemaker in need of replacement,
would run about ten steps, then stop
to catch her breath. Me, I had a numb
right butt cheek—the numbness ran all
the way down past my knee. That meant
that I could run as fast as a handicapped
escargot. Our combined speed would be
that of the Rocky Mountains eroding to
sand pebbles or of the Applegate River
cutting a gorge like the Grand Canyon.
In other words, time standing still.
The deputy derailed my daydream
when he said, “I’m not going to issue
you a citation, but you need to get the
car registered and licensed.” All three of
us thanked him, then my mother said,
“We’re going on vacation. Do you think
we could register the car when we return?”
“Madam, I’m not giving you a citation;
that’s at my discretion. I can’t say what the
next officer will do. Drive safely now.”
With that, he left us to discuss
which options we might pursue. The
elders decided that we would charge
ahead into the world of evil violators.
This is very cool because, unlike
my Moab, Utah, outlaw buddies, my
parents have never ever knowingly
broken any laws. You can bet that
gene was not passed along to me.
We decided to run the Interstate
because we were less likely to have police
trailing us. I tried to get my parents to sing
along with me to the Judas Priest song,
“Breaking the Law,” but my mother was
too busy looking in her side mirror for law
enforcement vehicles, of which we passed
many looking for speeders. Once the police
cars disappeared from sight, I could hear
my mother whisper, “Thank you, Jesus.”
At my niece’s home in Austin, Texas,
my mother asked my niece’s husband,
who is on the Austin City police force
and in training for the SWAT team, if
he or any of his police buddies might
give us a warning ticket that could
work for a pass on our drive home.
“Granny, I don’t think that’s
a good idea. You’ll probably be
okay,” he told her. And we were.
Once home, the dealership did
indeed have some paperwork that my
folks had never been contacted about.
They paid the tax on the car at the
assessor’s office and when the lady at
the DMV offered my mother a way
out of paying a penalty for driving an
illegal vehicle, my mother said, “No,
my conscience wouldn’t let me do that.”
Oh, yes, the days of my parents being
evil violators vanished. Honesty has been
the code that my parents have lived by their
whole lives, excluding our ten days in Texas.
My parents are again traveling the
road of honesty. Can you imagine
what our countr y would be like
if lobbyists, lawyers, bankers and
politicians traveled that same road?
That’s another daydream, right?
ONLINE EXCLUSIVE!
For another story by J.D. Rogers, go
to www.applegater.org and click on
“additional articles” under “Latest Issue
of the Applegater,” then select “Black
and white or PVC pipe wrapped in razor
wire.”