Off the Hook

So you may remember reading a few days ago that I had a story involving a 2 calls to 911, a semi, and a police officer.  Here's a little more about that embarrassing story...

I was driving back from my MIL's house and had 13 hours of driving to accomplish in one day.  Yes, it would be a very long day, but I piled the toys and snacks in the passenger seat to hand back one at a time to K on the long drive.  All was going great until I reached about halfway.  I was passing a semi truck and was almost by him when he started drifting into my lane.  I thought he would realize and pull back over, but he didn't, so I honked my horn to alert him to the fact that I was there.  He then gave me the bird!  And in the very next instant, he started trying to run me off the road on purpose!!  I had K in the backseat (19 months) and me and 5 months pregnant and completely alone.  Not very intimidating.  I was terrified that this maniac truck driver was using his truck like a weapon, so I called 911  to report him.  I gave a description of the truck and his license plate number to the dispatcher and was told that she would alert the highway patrol.  I then got into the middle of a group of cars and passed the truck and was happy to be free of the psycho driver.

About 15 miles down the road, my adrenaline had almost worn off and I wasn't paying close attention to my speed (or the speed limit) and failed to see the highway patrol officer shooting his radar gun right at me until I was close enough to realize that I was going to be pulled over.  Great.  He pulled up behind me, flashed his lights, and I pulled over.  Here's a fact that you may or may not know about me, but is entirely true and somewhat embarrassing.  Every single time I get pulled over by a police officer, I cry.  Not the tears that come hoping to get out of a ticket, but actual tears of oh-crap-I'm-in-big-trouble.  I have no idea where this comes from!!  I don't have issues with authority figures, etc., but throw a police officer at me because I'm speeding and no matter how hard I try to fight the tears back, I have never yet been successful.  Now that I'm nearing my late 20's 30, I thought for sure that I could handle this like a big girl.  So while he was getting out to come and get my license, registration, and proof of insurance, I was rehearsing in my head over and over that I would NOT cry this time.  Well, he got to my window, asked for the 3 needed items and I nervously fumbled around looking for them.  My hands were literally shaking and I was trying not to let him see that fact.  He then asked me if I knew why he pulled me over.  That was it.  Blame it on the pregnancy hormones, or the fact that I had been run off the road twice by a semi driver 15 minutes before, or the fact that I was making a 13 hour drive alone, but I started crying and the story of the psycho driver spilled out and "yes, I was speeding but I didn't realize it until I saw you", and...

He took my papers and looked relieved to be able to get out of the situation.  Poor police officer!  No sooner than he got into his car and closed the door to run my information, the psycho truck driver passed and honked his horn twice as if to taunt me for stupidly speeding.  The nerve!!  I rolled my window down and pointed to the truck and started trying to tell the officer that that was the guy who had run me off the road twice.  He came back, told me I could go, and said that he was going to try and catch the psycho driver.  He told me that if I saw him with the truck pulled over, I should stop behind him.  I pulled myself together, got back on the highway, and proceeded to drive for another 15 minutes without seeing either the police officer or semi.  All of the sudden my GPS told me to keep left at the split of 2 major highways.  Since I hadn't seen the police officer yet, I was worried that he went right and I would miss him. Sure enough, just as I passed the ramp that exited to the right, I could see that he was down the ramp and had the truck pulled over.  It was too late.  I noticed that while I was passing the ramp going around 65 mph.  So I found myself with a major dilemma.  Should I make a several illegal u-turns to get back to the police officer?  Should I just keep driving and think, "See ya!  Wouldn't want to be ya!"  No.  I called 911 again and got the same dispatcher, explained the entire situation, and asked what I should do.  She told me she would pass my phone number along to him and if he needed to get in touch with me, he would call.  Feeling satisfied that in case he still wanted to ticket me, he could and I didn't get out of a ticket with a story,  I continued on driving (setting my cruise to a "safer" limit).

I never heard from the nice officer that stopped me.  I hope that the next time I am pulled over (because I know with my lead foot that it will happen), I will be able to keep it together even if it means answering only in "yes" or "no" so my voice doesn't crack and send me on a downward spiral!  Suffice it to say, I was very happy to arrive safely home, away from the psycho truck driver and free of an expensive speeding ticket.