I'm Calling it a Cop Ride...

My cop ride (or ride-along as we’re supposed to call it) was really a fun experience. The officer I had (whose name escapes me) was really nice and explained how things worked in the car and in town really well. Whatever questions I asked he tried to explain them as best he could. When we went out there really wasn’t much going on, so he decided to go and try to write someone a speeding ticket, because he joked that he had to give me something to write about. After sitting in a parking lot for five minutes without pulling anyone over, we were called to head up to a house where some teenagers were reportedly goofing around on this man’s property. By the time we got there the kids had left and the guy just wanted to complain about them being on his lawn. There wasn’t any damage to his house and it made me really question why people call so quickly. The officer said people call a lot for dumb reasons. He was really funny and told me that he calls it “the New Paltz bubble,” because it is such a small, strange environment that encompasses all kinds of personalities and types. He was probably in his late twenties and had been an officer for 6 years. He had worked in NYC for 2 years, but always knew he wanted a job up here since he grew up in Poughkeepsie. The next call we got was about another group of teenagers who had been kicked out of McDonalds and were just hanging around outside the Plaza Diner. The owner called because he wanted them off his property. We went there and heard that there was going to be a fight, but as we sat next to two other police cars watching the kids, realized they were just waiting for their parents to come pick them up and doing nothing bad at all. Next we decided to drive down Main Street (for probably the 5th time) and see what was going on. We saw a state trooper searching a car next to the Bistro and stopped to check it out. While the trooper searched the car and the couple, my officer made small talk with them, which I found kind of funny. They were given a fine for having a dime bag of marijuana and let go. At this point, some crazy townie named Hans walked up to the car and started talking to the officer I was with. They knew each other and the kid, who was drunk started rambling about the sad state of his life. He started talking about how a guy he put in jail for dealing coke was out of jail and how he was after him now. This sort of freaked me out because although I am aware of the drug culture that New Paltz has, it’s never in my face or really a reality. After our conversation with Hans we drove around some more and eventually found the same trooper arresting a guy for urinating on the street. We witnessed that and then I made a comment about how people do really dumb things and make poor choices that screw them up in the long run. To this the officer said sometimes it is the small arrests or small things that lead to bigger ones. A few years back he was called to go to a hotel and ask a suspicious man who was causing trouble to leave and what wound up happening was he arrested the guy and they later found out he was wanted for murder in New Jersey. He even had to go testify for the trial. Those few things were the most exciting during my two-hour ride, but I really enjoyed seeing New Paltz through a different light. The officer said he loves taking people on ride-alongs because it means they gain a better understanding of how the town works and what a police officer does. I definitely learned more and sort of sympathized with him. Even though New Paltz is relatively quiet on the crime front, I had a lot of fun with this. I had a witty chat going with the cop and he told me to invite him to my birthday party if I wanted to ensure it wouldn't get broken up. Haha.