Tickets

As I rode along with a police officer I thought back to the many tickets I received in my life time.  I earned every ticket I received. I laugh now about some of them, but they weren't very funny at the time. In the 70's, one Sunday morning on my way to church, I was pulled over for speeding. The biggest majority of my tickets were for speeding. On that Sunday morning the officer asked where I was going in such a hurry on a Sunday morning. I told him, I was going to church. He replied your the fifth person I pulled over for breaking the law this morning on their way to church. When I was 19, I got pulled over for speeding on a two lane highway near Sprague, WA. I was doing 80 plus in my 58 ford with a car load of teenagers. I saw the officer attempting to turn around in my rear view mirror. We had been going opposite directions. Instead of getting on the freeway at Sprague, I drove into town hoping to lose the officer. He found me, and pulled me out of the car and back to his car where he gave me a lecture I have not forgotten to this day. I had a car load of kids, six including myself, and old car and I was doing 80 plus. If I had an accident, I could have hurt every one of my passengers and myself. I didn't tell the officer that when I pulled over my transmission was stuck in high gear. I had to limp my way back home, burning the clutch every time I took off. We got home safely. I wonder if I had made it all the way to Spokane that day if I'd been able to get everyone home again with my car stuck in high gear.  Once I got a ticket for not wearing my seat belt. I was just driving from the place I caught my carpool to the house, not very far. I had chosen not to wear my seat belt because I was driving my old truck and the seat belt was sorta dirty. As I was stopping I tried to pull the two parts of the seat belt together but the half on my left I couldn't find it. The officer asked why I wasn't wearing my seat belt, I was trying to think what to say, I had the right side portion laying on my lap with my hand on it. He says and the other part is hanging out the door. A good giveaway that I wasn't wearing it. Like I say I earned every ticket I got. In 2001 I received four tickets. I remember I received one in Seattle for speeding and the very next day, I received one in Tacoma. I don't remember where the third ticket was from. The fourth ticket that year I received when I had a minor accident for failure to stop. The State of Washington suspended my drivers license and to get my license renewed, I had to get SR22 insurance. Expensive is what SR22 insurance is. I checked one time what it would cost if I bought a car on time. My insurance payment would have been $450 a month, just for insurance. I didn't buy a new car. But that got my attention, and I believe my driving got better when they hit my pocket book hard. One morning when I was driving my T1000, a stick shift car, I pulled away from the stop sign with a cop right behind me. I went through the gears 1st, then 2nd, then 3rd, then 4th. By the time I hit 4th, I was speeding and the cop put his lights on and I got a ticket. I thought about what I had done and have driven mostly automatics since then. I had a tendency to use all the gears and not stop until I was in high gear. I also have tried to get cruise control on my vehicles since then, and use it. Like I say I earned every thicket I received. I do appreciate the law officers that tried to keep me safe by writing a ticket for speeding so many times. I really do try to do better today. That SR22 insurance helped me a lot, it hit hard on the pocket book. God bless our officers as they work to keep us all safe. Civil authority is ordained by God, Romans 13.  God bless, LVZ.