(Note to the reader: this post was originally written on April 22nd, 2008.  I had forgotten about it until it was found a few days ago on an old jump drive. I should be able to finish it sometime in the next 3 years.)

How the NYPD knew it was my birthday I’ll never know, but they did and they were nice enough to give me a present. Today! – My birthday! – My car was towed! Towed not because I was blocking a fire hydrant and endangering the lives of my neighbors, not because I had a number of outstanding parking tickets (depriving the city of much needed revenue), and not for any reason that even the most bureaucratic bureaucrat would agree with. My car was towed for double parking 5 minutes past the posted alternate side of the street deadline. Double parking on my block, a side street, a lane, a  rarely used alleyway where everyone double parks from 9:30AM to 11:00AM every single Monday, Tuesday, Thursday, and Friday. Happy Birthday to me.

When I arrived at the Brooklyn Navy Yard Tow Pound, two undercover police officers were standing outside the main structure. I took my place in line behind them. One of them told me to go ahead in, that they were standing here waiting for their patrol car. “Your car was towed?” I asked. “Yup, can you believe it?” he said obviously very pissed. I didn’t know what to say so I walked through the swinging doors, that are the main entrance – Then I thought of something and went back. “At least you can get angry,” I said.  The partner just laughed but the cop who spoke before snarled, “We don’t get angry, we get even,” like he’d said a thousand times before.

Inside was pretty close to what I expected: the DMV on Lunesta. There were the florescent overhead lights, the ugly mint blue walls, and the scuffed 8X8 tile flooring. In the middle of the floor was taped a large white letter T. The top of the T faced five very dirty teller-style Plexiglas windows. Two men-I guess it was there birthday too- were standing in line over the white T, and a third, who’s posture indicated that he had already given up on being impatient, was in front of the only Plexiglas window that was staffed. The lone worker was unhurried, she was sluggish,..,she was slow. But to be fair she was also holding a conversation on her cell phone. Even more egregious, (apologies non-geeks), she was typing on a teletype style keyboard and looking at what appeared to be an old IBM 3270 style monitor. 1970′s technology at best! There were aging notices taped everywhere.

WELCOME TO REDEMPTION PLEASE START THE LINE BETWEEN THE POLES AND WAIT UNTIL YOU ARE CALL THANK YOU

DO NOT POST ADVERTISEMENTS BY ORDER OF NYPD.

I took my place in line. There were three of us now and it was quiet. Quiet like it was quiet waiting outside the principals office. Quiet like it was at your uncle’s on New Years Eve and you don’t want your parents to notice that it’s seven hours past your bedtime. Quiet like someone had something of yours locked away and you couldn’t get it. Something that would cost ten, twenty, or fifty thousand dollars to replace and you weren’t going to get it back if you didn’t behave yourself. It was real quiet until a uniform police officer walked in talking on his cell phone.

“I don’t know… I’m going to see. OK bye.” He dialed another number. “Hello… Yeah, this is officer So And So…. Yeah, I’m gonna be late today… My car was towed… I was parked in a bus stop…Yeah, I was dropping my kid off. Can anyone there help me with this?…I don’t know. OK”

The uniform officer didn’t take his place in line behind me, but stood on the side, ignoring the big white T taped to the floor. Still it was quiet. The three of us would occasionally eye him and glance at each other, but we said nothing. And still the same guy was up at the Plexiglas window.  The lone worker was no where in sight.

Overall, I want to thank the NYPD and Mayor Bloomberg, in particular, for my birthday and though it will be much harder to surprise me next year, I hope you try.

Thanks for reading, Jim.