Waited for an Officer

 

Haven’t been inside a police station in a long time.  I must have been five when a friend and I stole a pack of baseball cards from a store downtown.  My friend promptly told his parents which ended up sealing my admission as well.  Dad took me down to the cops there in Harrison who showed me a prison cell.  I can still remember the cop saying something like: “Yeah, it starts with baseball cards and next thing you know it’s automobiles.”  I didn’t steal any more baseball cards. 

Fortunately, this visit to the New Paltz police department was on my own volition.  But walking into the station, you can’t help but take more care than you otherwise might.  Pull back your hair in a ponytail.  Straighten your jacket.  I thought against wearing the white hoodie with the photograph of mushrooms that my wife had made.  Walking in I saw the same cop I’d seen down on the trail, driving along in an SUV, the day I lost my phone.  He counseled that I try "find my iPhone."  I did.  But it didn't work.  I introduced myself to the woman behind the plexiglass.

 

I explained to this lady what I wanted and she asked for my driver’s license and asked me to sit, over where there were an odd assortment of plastic chairs.  Two enormous still bins, one for used hypodermic needles and the other for unwanted prescription medicine were my only company as I waited for an officer to see me.  Signs on the wall telling people about alternatives if they were the victims of abuse or crimes and reminding people not to drive while they were sleepy. 

A young officer welcomed me into the other room, decorated with similar fare.  I couldn’t help imagining what it would be like to be unable to leave on my own. It was, in fact the same officer who’d met me down on the trail.  I gave him the requisite info and my told him what happened, suggesting I’d already essentially given up on on the idea of ever seeing it again.  He was courteous and professional.  African American I remembered that another New Paltz police officer of African American descent was asked to leave the force because of some right wing political rhetoric on social media and wondered if this had been a hassle for officer Milton, who was clearly not the same gent.  He promised to look for my phone, once again, which was kind.  I don’t believe I’ll ever see it again, but now I know what the station looks like.  We parted with an elbow bump. 

 

 

 

 

Monday 5/31/21