The Man

Robert W. Burke once said, ~Entirely too much energy of our state police is [spent] controlling honest citizens, simply because it is something they can succeed in doing.~ If you think about it, we all go through some sort of Pavlovian response when a police is near or within the vicinity of our location causing us to become considerably paranoid individuals. Although we may have done nothing wrong to be considered a possible suspect in any unlikely crimes, one is aware of that you can't help but be a bit jumpy especially when a police car is right behind you. For it can truly be a nerve racking situation indeed to have a police car traveling behind you as it causes you to not only automatically tense up to where you're not only constantly looking in your rear view mirror, but also do a visual, mental, and physical checklist.

Let me ask you this question, what is the first thing you do when a police car is behind you? If you're a person like myself you tend to visually scan how fast you're going leading you to change your driving speed from the fast and furious to driving Ms. Daisy. I think we've all been in a situation where you're rolling down the road 10, 20, possibly even 30 miles over the posted speed limit and you spot a police car either coming in the opposite direction, getting ready to turn into the same lane you're in, and/or waiting in the proverbial wings for some unsuspecting soul to give him/her a reason to get pulled over causing one to make that split second decision to slow down. Let me tell you something, sometimes you get away with it and there are times where you suffer the consequences as you see the blue lights shining behind you.

Without a doubt, having a police car right behind you is not only visually nerve racking, but it can also be mentally as well. Why? As said before, we may have done nothing wrong and yet there comes a point where you think he/she is punching in your license plate number and checking to see if you're wanted for anything. Thinking about it, it's that type of paranoia in which your mind plays tricks on you as you're glancing into your rear view mirror nervously wondering why he/she keeps eyeing the back of your car, looks down to his/her right, and then backs to your car again. Essentially, you go through a mental checklist of the tickets/citations you received, paid, and hopefully sent to the right address, which believe you me can cause you to become a majorly obsessive compulsive individual because of it.

For the question can be asked, do you physically change your driving position when a police car is right behind you? What I'm asking is do you suddenly find yourself sitting up straight with both hands on the steering wheel, radio turned down/completely off, and/or if any of your friends are in your vehicle you tell them to quit messing around or are you the complete opposite? What it all comes down to is attitude and how you can either let authority take control of you or the other way around. For some people they are the cautious type who don't want to take any chances while others don't give a crap who is behind them as they can be nearly out view in the driver's seat, one hand on the wheel, blaring CD/radio at full blast, and your friends are getting down with their funky selves as if they're in Mitsubishi Eclipse car commercial with Moby's Dirty Vegas playing.

In retrospect, the police are there to protect, as well as serve us. Yet there are times when they are never around when you see something such as someone speeding or running a red light and when you do it they seemingly come out of nowhere flashing their blue lights in your rear view mirror. I think we can all agree each one of us have snickered at someone who was pulled over by the police leading to people rubbernecking to see the pool soul in question embarrassed to no end. However, it doesn't feel good when the shoe is on the other foot, so to speak, when you are pulled over leading everybody to rubberneck as they see you as the poor soul in question embarrassed to no end, especially if you get pulled over in front of your kids at work...no comment. In the end, when it comes to the man it's best to just obey the law and if not then I'll be on standby with bail money for you and hopefully you for me.