#fixitticket

I was picking up my daughter from poetry practice on a soggy, dark night. My 15-year-old Beetle, affectionately known as #thugbug, had been parked in a flood zone overnight and flood she did. The natives of Tujunga Village get sploshed something fierce when we get even the slightest patter of rain.

Well, through the shadows of the dark eve came the unmistakable siren sound of an eager officer. I’d known a few. I’ve also known some of the best men and women to ever dignify blue uniforms and because of their grace and dogoodin’, I will keep it classy. (Although the cats I know on The Force also keep it real. We are simpatico in our love for humanity.)

So out of the mist comes Officer One. Although I know to only speak when spoken-to in matters of the Po’-lease, my inner Bette Davis got the better of me (again) after this Dewy Babe in the Woods asked for my I.D. 

I couldn’t help but quip, “I’m gonna need to see your I.D. too!” He looked 15 if he was a day.

Well, Baby Dewy didn’t break character and up came Officer 2 with a flashlight, to make sure #thugbug didn’t have any hidden Gats, Glocks or sundry other contraband. Dust bunnies, sure. Gats? As if! 

Being a midded-aged women driving an old but well maintained car, I was uncertain as to why I was detained, but I figgered I never got hurt keepin’ my mouf shut so hands on wheel, I waited for instructions. Miffed, cuz I had to turn down the volumn on Pulley “Sometimes,” which no one should ever have to do. Again, it wasn’t my roe-day-oh, so I sat tight. Real tight.

Sure, the darkness of the night had something to do with the dampness creeping over my soul, but it took a really long gaddman time for Baby Dewy to run my CDL (yes! I’m a mother in suburbia who volunteers, watches birds and eviscerates with my pen). True dat.

So after what seemed like a frightening long time, here they both come, for shorthand, let’s call ‘em Eins und Zwei, to let me know my left headlamp was out and I would need to fix it and that “it won’t cost me anything as long as I sign here.”

Well, among #thugbugs charms isn’t her ability to keep her left headlamp glowing for more than six months in a row, so I took my Fix-It Ticket, signed where Eins instructed me to sign, and I was released for Time Served. I cranked Pulley back up to 11, took a breath and texted my daughter that I’d been pulled over for a headlight infraction, of which I was not aware, and that I would be on my way as soon as The Heat backed off and my anxiety level goes back to bearable.

I recall the darkness of the safe street I turned down to collect her not sitting well with me that night. Things have a more sinister bent since the Hawkish Pageant Regime’s Victory Heist. It’s as if the rain and the wind are whispering, “Achtung baby!” on the same streets where I used to admire the foliage and the lingering smell of jasmine.

THE FIXER

Back at the ranch, Mein Hombre immediately took care of the headlight bulb and off I went the following week with the Fix-It ticket paperwork to make sure I stayed on the right side of the law, my preferred modus operandi.

Boy oh boy what you can learn when you make an attempt to listen. 

The thing I found, after standing in the first wrong line as per the instructions on the instructions I received in the mail, was thus: the instructions have no merit whatsoever.

The good news about being in the wrong line: I met a women whose son needs the kinda help a free press activist with ample media cred can offer, so I guess it was the right line after all.

Well, as I quickly learned by following all the incorrect instructions: 

I did not have to sign the ticket: that part was optional; I did not have to pay $20 to wait in a non-line in my car for a half hour, only to have a Cold Prickly tell me I “had the wrong paperwork. And only the signed ticket” would do. Well, I rifled through the glove box to find the ticket, only to be verbally told to amscray while I was rifling said glove box. I was told to vamoose in case another customer was fool enough to show up. Despite the fact there were no other fool customers, a lot of flapping ensued and I swear she was Strother Martin in “Rooster Cogburn” reincarnate. Any minute now, I expected the “round the horn” speech.

And just as backups were being called in to eject me from the inspection zone, victoriously, I waved my Authentic Violation through the moon roof. 

With impeccable timing, I held my ticket up high so they couldn’t roust me, and with great suspicion, and with much clipboard clicking, it became evident, my headlight was working. 

Off she signed, we exchanged pleasantries as she told me my next stop was the Courthouse where I would only have to pay $20 to be relieved of my crime.

Well, that was after two trips back to my car to relieve my handbag of such security measures as nail files and cuticle cutters.

Once I was allowed in the building, everyone was quite polite from there on out, after they took my money. 

First shocker/coulda saved a $20: the $20 extracted behind Door Number One for using the Valley inspection station indicated on my real fake paperwork was a “convenience,” rather than the multiple free, CHP locations that I could have used in SoCal. Of this fact I was unawares until I was correctly guided by kind workers within the system who whispered hidden truths to make sure I didn’t get screwed agin.

And for the Final Act of Thievery, I had the pleasure of going to Floor Number Two, where I was charged $25 to clear #thugbug’s good name from the Infernal System of the Damned. The Scarlet Letter F for F... Fix It.

It was two hours of my time, where I was forced to multi-task conference calls, miss appointments and generally piss people off who needed me to be other places. But along the way, I met more stranger angels, and we are here to help each other.

******

Author Heidi Siegmund Cuda is seeking a civil rights attorney to match with a client, whose son appears to be deeply injured by the system. Calling all you angels, please holla.