Outrunning the Law

I was 18  or 19 years old, driving home in the dark evening. I came to an intersection in town where I needed to turn left. Across the intersection, facing my direction, was a car that apparently was going to go straight across, past me on my left. On the left side of the intersection was another car that apparently was going to go straight across from my left to my right. We were all stopped, waiting for for our lights to turn green.

When my light turned green (solid green, not a left arrow), I pulled out a bit and waited for the car across the intersection to go past. I waited for several seconds, plenty of time for the car to start. But the other car just sat there. I thought, Well maybe he has a red light, and I can go.

After I felt like I had waited more than half the light cycle, I went. I moved fully into the intersection and turned left. It was in the middle of my turn that the car across from me decided to move. (I don’t know if he just wasn’t paying attention and didn’t notice his light was green before, or what.) The car started off and then slammed on his breaks to keep from hitting me. What melodrama, I thought. What an idiot.

It was then, as I passed, I noticed that the car that had been on the left side of the intersection was a town cop. He made the mistake of turning on his lights prematurely. He was facing the opposite direction and would have to pull into the intersection to turn around. Some strange, wild idea came over me: I could escape while he turned around. I could see him in my rear-view mirror trying to make a three-point turn. That would take him several seconds.

This intersection was on the edge of downtown, and there were plenty of criss-crossing streets for me to cut down. I immediately turned down one street. I sped down a ways, then turned onto another street, then onto another. I quickly found a street with several cars parked on it, and I zipped in between a couple. I turned out the lights, cut off the car, slid down in my seat, and listened to the siren approaching.

Peering just over the door lock, I saw the flashing lights and heard the siren pass down a street one block over. I waited about five minutes before moving. Then I started my car, turned on my lights, and continued my journey home.

I was rather surprised at myself, not only for pulling off that evasion, but that I had even tried it. I can’t believe that I even had the thought go through my head. I’m not that kind of guy, even as a teenager. I could have gotten in serious trouble for that action.

But I was mad at the guy in the car across the intersection from me for just sitting there and not moving when he had a green light and I was waiting to turn. I felt like he did something stupid, but I was going to pay the price for it. I was not impatient, I was not being reckless, or anything like that. I was trying to follow the rules, but his mistake made me make a mistake, and when the cop turned on his lights, the combination of anger and fear prodded me into taking a major, and unadvised, risk.

But, I came out of it alive, without a ticket (or an arrest), and with a funny story to tell. My boys better never pull a stunt like that when they drive.

Bullgrit
bullgrit@totalbullgrit.com