the law: police

When I first became familiar as a child with the phrase "calling the law", which actually meant calling the police. I got the idea that "the law" referred to one particular government official.

When I was younger I would always put my seat belt on way before my mom would start the car. I thought the reason police officers had laptops in their cars was because they had a special software that could track cars with kids who didn't have their seatbelts on!

I used to think that you were supposed to wear your seatbelt so that if a policeman pulled over the car and tried to take you out, he wouldn't be able to because you'd be strapped in.

I used to believe that police men were evil people that loved to pull people over and send them to jail just for the heck of it. I think i got the idea from watching "cops" and I thought the theme song "bad boys" was referring to the fact that policemen are criminals. One time I was in the car and my mom got pulled over for speeding, I thought the cop was going to take us all to jail or shoot us with his gun!

My parents used to say that the police were "giving someone directions" when they had a car pulled over on the side of the road. I wondered how the police knew that person needed directions until i was around 15 when I finally figured out that they were just kidding.

When i was little, i was so scared of going to prison for some weird reason, that i wanted to become a policeman when i grew up, cuz you know, policemen never go to prison, they are the good guys, the ones that noone suspects, and that never do anything wrong (since they know the rules).

When I was young I was in the car with my Grandma and Great Grandma (her mother). To avoid confusion I asked if I could call one Grandma F and the other Grandma R (the initials of their last names). Well Grandma told me no because it was illegal and I believed her for years!

When i was little, I saw a sign in a store that said "shoplifters will be prosecuted."

I somehow got it into my little head that if you tried to steal your hands would be chopped off.

When I was about 6 I thought it was the funniest thing in the world to prank call 411. One day I called them and spoke in a French accent. When the man answered the phone, I asked, in French, if he spoke French, and was (unpleasantly) surprised to hear him say "oui," considering I myself knew no French beyond "Do you speak French?" He proceeded to ask me something in French. Not knowing what to do, I assumed that he was saying, "city and state please," seeing as that was what they usually said when you called 411. I replied, after a long pause, "Uh...Paris, France" and the guy immediately sighed and said, "Alright, for impersonating a Frenchman, that's a fine of $250 dollars..." Terrified, I hung up before he could even finish his sentence, and for at least two years after that, I lived in genuine fear of receiving a massive bill from the 411 people or being hunted down by the FBI. I never prank called 411 again.

In kindergarten, it was really cool to ride the school bus without a seatbelt on. Naturally I never wore a seatbelt, unless we happened to pass a police officer, in which case I put it on as fast as possible. It took me YEARS to realize that even if five-year-olds could be thrown in jail for not wearing a seatbelt, there was no possible way he could see my lap from outside the bus.

Oddly enough, almost all the kids in my neighborhood thought the same thing.

I used to believe that cops' radar could see through your car... how else could they know that you aren't wearing your seatbelt? And sometimes when I would lay down in the back seat I would be afraid that they could see me and my mom would get pulled over. I even thought they would be able to see me picking my nose and laugh at me.

I used to believe that there was a huge book called "The Rules" that listed everything you weren't allowed to do, and it was written by the Government, and the Police could check it from time to time

I used to think that semi truck drivers could pull you over and give you a speeding ticket.

When I was a kid I thought that when a cop drove by you were supposed to call them a pig and oink at them and they didn't mind. One time a cop threatened to give me and my brother each a really big fine and we felt so bad that we didn't tell anyone for years.

When I was little I used to throw fits in Wal-Mart if I didn't get what I wanted and my mom told me that the Wal-Mart police would take me away if I didnt stop and from then on I was always good in Wal-Mart until I realized there were no Wal-Mart police around age 7

When I was little I used to believe that I was smarter than police because i thought that you could give a criminal a lie detector test and then you would know if they were the criminals or not I thought i was gona go up to police one day and tell them about lie detector tests and they would pay me and i`d become famous later i found out how these tests work and theyre not just a red button lighting up when you lie and a green one lighting up when you tell the truth