So I'm Going to Use This . . .

Oldest Son is a police Explorer. This caused no small bit of anguish in my family (if you are a long-time blog reader, you know I am terrified of law enforcement, and my family loathes cops/the law). My mother was upset and told me to talk him out of it. I haven't even TOLD my father because that would just be World War III. Considering the kind of trouble a 15-year-old young man COULD be getting into, I have made my peace with it. Last night, when he brought home the form for him to get his uniform ($133) . . . he asked me once again if I was upset. I told him I had spent the last couple of months accepting it and that I was proud. Maybe that's not the right word. I love my kid, so . . . you know, I ADMIRE what he does.

So that's the back story . . . yesterday, my beloved housekeeper told me she was stopped by the cops. She and I were sharing a glass of wine . . . we're more sisters now that anything . . . and she related the tale. She was on her way to her f/t job at 4:00 a.m., in her uniform (fast food establishment) . . . the cop stopped her. She was over the speed limit in a weird speed trap sort of stretch where the busy street changes speed from 45 to 25 or something for a short stretch. The cop asked her if she WANTED a $200 ticket. Why do cops do this? Does anyone say, "YES! PLEASE!" Of course, she was also terrified . . . deportment. She told him she didn't mean to speed . . . didn't realize . . . and she was late for work. He asked where she worked. She told him the specific establishment. He said, "All right, I will see you there when it opens." Then he let her go. She considered not showing up for work--but that would mean she'd get fired. So she went to work, set up and opened the restaurant . . . and sure enough the cop showed up--and ordered breakfast. He said, "If you had lied, I would have given you the ticket, but you told the truth . . . here you are. Have a nice day."

Now, in print . . . I'm not getting the inflections right, plus I am translating this from Spanish to English, but the demeanor of this officer was KIND. He recognized she was a worker not even making a living wage. And he let her off. And I thought . . . you know . . . this is the kind of little gesture if you wanted to make a cop three-dimensional in a book. Something small . . . some little act of kindness he does, whatever. I thought, "I'm using this someday." It's the right kind of detail.

So what was the last thing you borrowed from real life for a book you are writing?