Martin and His First Amendment

Martin Kellog was never much of a drinker but enjoyed an evening on the town with his friends. Most of the time he was the designated driver and when he was, he took his job very seriously and wouldn’t touch a drop of alcohol all night. He had gotten a DUI once and swore he would never drive drunk again.

This decision turned out to be a good thing. It seemed that almost every night that he was driving his friends around, he got pulled over. Someone would be doing something seemingly unsafe in the back seat or one of the guys drank too much and would blow chunks out of the window. Whatever the event, he would get pulled over and immediately feel relief that he hadn’t been drinking.

It was spring and all of his buddies were in the mood to go out for a fun night. He and his roommates jumped in the car and picked up two friends on the way to the bar. His roommates of course had started the night well before they left, as did the friends they picked up. And of course, the night wouldn’t begin until they had the traditional 40 ounce challenge behind the 7-eleven on the way downtown. With the pre-party complete, they were on their way to town.

Just before they got off the freeway Marin saw and ambulance coming and pulled to the side of the road. Once it had passed he began to merge, only to see a highway patrol car coming. So again he pulled over. But the cop car didn’t pass. Martin wasn’t too worried about this though.

One thing Marin had learned was that whether or not he had done anything wrong, cops usually decided if they were going to give you a ticket by the time they got out of their car, so he might as well have fun with it. As the cop sat in his car behind him, Martin popped in his favorite Ministry CD and cranked it as loud as he could. As the cop approached the car Martin put on his best smile and rolled the window down.

“Turn your music down!” the cop yelled

“What?” Martin replied.

“Turn your music down now sir!” The cop was obviously frustrated.

“Sorry sir, I can’t hear you. Let me turn the radio down!” At this, Martin was satisfied that he had successfully pissed the cop off.

The cop didn’t actually have anything to pull the guys over for, he just saw one of Martin’s friends “making room for the rest of the night” out the back window and wanted to make sure everything was all right. On they went.

For the most part it was a typical night at the bar. With the exception of running into a few friends they hadn’t seen in a while, things were uneventful. Before they called it a night, they wanted to stop off at the country bar on scenic route home, Monty’s Log Cabin.
Monty’s was one of those places that was buys from the time it opened in the morning until the state mandated closing time. If it wasn’t for the law that they had to close for a certain amount of time each day some of the neighborhood regulars would probably never go home.

Going into Monty’s was always a bit of a self-esteem boost. No matter what kind of day you were having, you knew for a fact that you were having a better day than at least half of the people in there.

After a few more rounds it was time to go. One of the guys had to visit the boys room, so Martin went out to pull the car around front. When he pulled up to the front door all but one guy got in the car. The other one was holding on to a light poll. Every few seconds he’d take his hands off the pole, take a step or two, then retreat to the pole like it was a lifeboat. When Martin went to help him in, one of his roommates jumped in the front seat pretending that he was going to take off with the car, hoping to give Martin a little scare. With perfect composure, Martin walked up to the driver’s door and threw his cell phone down in the joker’s lap. Doubled over in man pain, he moved to the back seat.

He got in the car, put it in gear and before he could pull on to the road a cop was pulling him over. Now, he was frustrated. Twice in one night was just ridiculous.

“License and registration please.” Without protest Martin handed it over. “Sir, have you been drinking tonight?”

The first thing that popped into Martin’s head was a comment his dad used to say when he was younger. The phrase that he was thinking of was something his father used to describe Martin as; “boy, you’re as dumb as a day old nigger.” You must take a second to understand Martin. In no way was he racist. In fact, he once lived with a guy for two months before he even noticed the guy was black. Of course he understood what kind of meaning a comment like that carried, but to him it was an ambivalent phrase.

For this case, he was changing ‘dumb’ to ‘sober’. So he began, “No officer, I’m as sober as…” Right then he realized something. It didn’t matter how he viewed the comment he was about to use, what mattered what how the half black cop standing outside his window might view it.

The internal monologue began. He was trying to think of things that are sober when first born. Geese, babies, kangaroos, Irish people…nope, not Irish people. Ah! He had it! Muslims are supposed to be sober their whole lives!

“…a day old Muslim,” he finished the sentence with a nervous grin.

“Excuse me son? A day old Muslim? Are you making a comment about my color? Do you assume that all people with dark skin are Muslims? Do I look like Muhammad Ali to you?”

“Actually, I don’t think Muhammad A…”

“You shut your mouth right now! Get out of the car and put your hands on the hood.”

The cop took a full hour to call for backup and led Martin through a rigorous drunk test before letting him go on his way. As he re-played the night over in his head, Martin found it funny that even though he tried to make sure not to offend the cop, his plan managed to backfire. It reminded him of the time when radio host Don Imus made an ignorant comment and a bunch of people, mainly the news media and Al Sharpton completely over reacted and got the poor guy fired.

THE END!!