"We've got to stop meeting this way," an Oxford, Maine police officer commented to me around 2 a.m. as we stood on a rural road and contemplated the latest Chevy Camero rollover.
But we didn't.
It seems that every time one of those Cameros rolled over as its final activity at the hands of a testosterone-driven teenager, I was there with one cop or another and my trusty camera.
I hated 10-55s, the police radio code for accidents, because often it meant someone had just died or been seriously injured so their life had in that moment changed forever. I wondered about those who gathered to watch, the spectators, and why they were there.
At one fatal accident, I was taking a photo of part of the victim on the far side of part of the car. I tried to take photos that were as sensitive as possible. As I was clicking away, a young man spectator called sarcastically from the roadside, "You like to do that don't you?"
"I'm here because it's my job," I replied. "Why are you here?"
I didn't hear a comment.
One morning when I had just arrived at the scene of an accident and was walking near the road, below a bank that dropped away from the road, a big town officer ran down the bank. He literally picked me up by the shoulders from behind, dragged me up the bank, and said, "Take photos before someone comes along and corrupts the scene."
I did.
This wasn't an order but a request. This friendly South Paris cop knew I would help and get him prints for his investigation.
Another South Paris cop and I were at the scene of a fire in the county jail one afternoon, when his radio crackled an accident report about a quarter of a mile from where we were standing.
"I've got to go," he said.
"I'll go with you," I said.
It was kind of handy that I did, because in the jail parking lot the officer discovered that another officer had 'borrowed' his cruiser while he was watching the fire.
"Can you take me down there?" he asked.
I did.
Late one night on my way home, I came across an accident that will stay with me forever or as long as 'forever' lasts with me. A young woman or teenager -- I wasn't sure in the dark -- was standing alongside the road, looking down the bank at her wrecked car.
I stopped and offered her a ride to the nearest house to phone the police, since this was BC -- BC Before Cell phones were in everybody's hand all the time, too-often causing accidents through distraction.
She told me she was a deputy's daughter and that her father would be really angry. I knew the deputy and agreed without saying so. This deputy had a short fuse, in my opinion. Since the accident was in a town with no police department, I phoned the dispatcher. She got the sheriff for me. I explained the situation, especially the daughter's fear of her father.
"Don't worry, I'll make sure he won't yell at her," the sheriff said.
He did. I never had seen that deputy so calm and quiet before.
One friendly police officer in Southwest Harbor, whom I'll call Frank because that was his name -- and still was when I recently saw him, retired, and chowing down in a local restaurant, impressed my teenage son with his driving and later comment. Scott and I were heading north along Route 102 from Southwest when Frank passed us at about 70 skadzillion miles an hour with no lights flashing. We were curious if our Sally Subaru could also do 70 skadzillion, so I nudged the accelerator and we kept up with him.
Next time we saw Frank, he chuckled, and said, "Did you know that after tourist season, the speed limit goes up to seventy?"
"No, I didn't. Thanks for telling me," I responded.
Scott was duly impressed.
Next time I was with the police chief of another Mount Desert Island town, a police chief who was, in my opinion, humor-challenged, I asked him if he was aware of the after-tourist-season 70-mile-per-hour rule.
"Oh, no," he said, very seriously. "That's not true. There are no signs saying that."
I didn't prolong the conversation and left almost immediately. I didn't think it polite to laugh right in the police chief's face.
Because he too was a nice guy. Still is, as far as I can tell. I see him now that I'm retired from being a news guy and am reactivated driving my Island Explorer bus. He usually waves to me -- or is trying to get me to pull over -- I'm never quite sure.
Some time I'll ask him.
I used to hate fairs, but only because I had to go to them all the time with my trusty Minolta and take photos from in front of the pulling horses -- 'hosses,' to pronounce it correctly -- as they charged toward me, the crowds cheering them along. Being in front of Belgians, stomping their way straight toward me, always made me a bit nervous. Even though I was hanging from the outside of the fence while taking the pictures.
Also usually at the fair was this deputy, who always was threatening me with arrest and bodily harm, accompanied by slanderous loud comments whenever an audience was nearby.
"You can't come in here!" he hollered, as I was heading onto the Fryeburg Fair grounds.
"Thank you for that information," I said. "I'll be sure to spell your name right."
I may have, but usually didn't include him in that day's tale of stomping, snorting, Belgians charging at me with only a sled full of heavy, heavy stone holding them back.
John pulled Dolores and me over one day in Somesville. I'll use his name, not only because it is one of the two or three names I actually remember besides Dolores, Scoopshe, our tiny pesky kitty, Big Guy, our great big non-pesky kitty, and Little Guy, the great big retired thoroughbred hunter I used to ride. I'll use it because not far below John's voice of bold beats a heart of gold.
John was always helpful to whoever needed his help.
But he did pull us over.
"Hey, you, pull over!" I heard him holler from the middle of the road where he was directing traffic as we came by in Tommy Toyota (pronounced 'Toyoter' in genuine Maineiac).
"What does he want?" Dolores asked, looking a little alarmed.
In New York State from whence she had hailed a number of years earlier, cops usually not being friendly when they hollered at you.
"Oh, he just wants to meet you," I answered.
I parked in a small parking area nearby, and we walked across the pedestrian crosswalk to talk with John, still in the middle of the street directing traffic. I introduced John to Dolores, and we chatted for awhile right there in the middle of the pedestrian crosswalk. After a bit, we were ready to leave.
"If you'd do you're job instead of standing here gabbing, we could safely cross the street to our car," I said to John.
"Go on, get out of here, and stop being a public nuisance," he hollered back.
John held traffic and we crossed.
Several years later at the same crosswalk, John accosted me again. I was driving my Island Explorer bus, crowded with passengers, and I had to stop while waiting for traffic. John was standing about eight feet from the driver's window, when he glanced up and saw me.
"People, get off that bus!" he hollered, "The driver's crazy."
"May be," I hollered back, "but which one of us is standing in the middle of the road hollering?"
No one got off the bus. None ventured an opinion as to which one of us was crazy. Some chuckled. This was their adventure vacation.
John was, in fact, a perfect specimen of a friendly, helpful, neighborhood Irish cop. I never met anyone who didn't like him. Including me.
The first time I met John was while I was checking the police report at the Northeast Harbor police station, and he was filling in details for my red-hot weekly police-beat column.
He said, "I hate reporters."
"That's fine with me," I replied, "as long as you keep on giving me coffee and news."
He did.
One night or early morning -- not sure which because I was sound asleep in the middle of the night -- a police officer phoned me. He explained that some person whom he named and of whom I had never heard had just robbed a store. The officer wanted to know if I knew where this suspect was at the moment.
Your imagination can fill in the remainder of that phone conversation.
Sometimes the police beat was downright fun, as it was the day when the Southwest Harbor police chief phoned me and asked if I was up for some entertainment. I said I was and met him at the town dock, where he showed me a scallop trawler moored to the pier. The police chief explained the ship had taken too many scallops, and the Marine Patrol officer was in the process of citing the captain.
From where we stood, we could see both sides of the ship, since it faced away from us. On the dock at port side, the 'clam cop,' as we lovingly referred to them, was talking with the captain. On the starboard side, batches of scallops were flying out the windows.
"By the time they're done, they may not have taken too many," the police chief explained.
I don't recall the story I wrote, only that scene.
Embarrassment at least once caught me while at a major fire in the center of South Paris. Fire trucks and police cars, town, county, and state, were all there, parked all around 'Sally' Subaru.
After I took my photos of the smiling fire, I walked back to 'Sally,' and as I approached I noticed that my registration had expired a month or two ago. Nervous, I eased 'Sally' out from among the law-enforcement vehicles, and we tip-toed the 100 yards to the town office, where I dutifully re-registered 'Sally.'
My sin of neglect wasn't noticed that day by the bunch, who would have had a great time at my expense.
But when I first bought 'Sally,' one town cop did notice. I hadn't had a chance to get new Maine Appalachian Trail Club and Appalachian Trail Conference* stickers for 'Sally's' left rear window.
"Get those stickers on that window, so we know where you are," ordered the town cop.
*The Appalachian Trail Conference was, I believe, begun in the early 1930s to create the Appalachian Trail from Georgia to Maine. A year or two ago, its mission was changed more to protection and fund raising to meet the modern task it does. When that occurred the name was changed to Appalachian Trail Conservancy. ATC is the parent organization of all the trail-maintenance clubs along its route. To learn more about it, go to www.appalachiantrail.org.
Milt Gross can be reached for corrections, harassment, or other purposes at lesstraveledway@midmaine.com.
Milton M. Gross Copyright 2008
