Sam Donaldson Does Whatever He Wants

Getting pulled over is no fun. I always imagine myself being super charming and funny in the event that I'm pulled over, but I never am. It's because I don't really see any reason why I should be the one getting pulled over. My dad used to get out of tickets, multiple tickets, by saying the following words: I was just driving what felt good. I've also been told by different sources that my dad looks like, in the order of most number of times, Prince Charles, Andy Griffith, and Ted Koppel. Who in the hell is going to write a ticket out for those three? Nobody, man. Nobody.
We don't have to get into what I was pulled over for, because there's no record of it as far as I know. But I will say it was on a city street, and it was a local police officer that was leaning down into my window. His head was a block. It looked like one of those huge dungeon-face blocks that try to squish Mario.
Before he could say anything, I showed all my cards and said, "I was just driving what felt good."
I feel like the sound of "What?" caught somewhere in the man's throat. After a pause, what came out instead was, "Do you know why I pulled you over?"
I didn't immediately respond because I was just expecting to be waved on my way after the utterance of the magical words.
Then he wanted to see my license and registration. It was like when you look at your watch and then someone asks you what time it is. You just don't know, even though you just looked at your watch. I had no idea what a license and registration was. Did it ever get to this point with Dad? I was wishing I looked like Sam Donaldson.
The imminent exchange of gunfire was interrupted by my daughter making dragon/tiger noises from her car seat in the back.
"Oh, have your boss with ya?" the police officer asked.
I grinned like one of those people that don't have an empathy gland and said something akin to "You know it!"
I thought I didn't deliver that last line correctly, because his face suddenly went a little harder than it was before. He was looking back into the backseat pretty intently. Great. The car seat wasn't installed correctly. Of all things.
"Sir. Why are your child's hands bound?"
Bound? What the hell was he talking about?


Oh.


I wouldn't go so far as to say her hands were bound. Ok, they were bound, I had just never defined it as bound in my head.  She had her hands stuck in a pair of socks. Big, long soccer socks that made it near impossible for her to take them off. I started trussing her up like that because she kept taking her shoes off in the car, and it was driving me crazy.


I thought about telling the officer that her mother had taken thalidomide when she was pregnant. But I couldn't think of the word at the time.
I thought about telling the officer that every time I go to take my daughter out of the car and she's taken her shoes off, I feel like there's an anvil in my chest and someone is dully pounding it over and over.


I really didn't know what to say. I was wearing a tie and I've always felt like if you wear a tie you can do whatever you want. See: Smooth Criminal, American Psycho, The Bush Administration.


I told him she liked to play with socks. A nod from the toddler would have been great just then, but. I think she was siding with the guy in the uniform.


"Oh! Did she get tangled up again?" trying to jumpstart my empathy gland was proving difficult. So I added a "Thank you, sir."


Then there was some silence that I tried to chomp through with what I thought was a winning smile. Or, at least a flustered parent smile.


"Be careful pulling out, sir."