TGIF?

After a long week of school, students, parents, grading, and staff meetings, it is finally Friday, a teacher's favorite time of the week. Time to relax, right? Well, I was fooled too. Yesterday morning, I made the mistake of sleeping in an extra 15 minutes and had to rush out the door to make it to school at a reasonable time. It usually takes me about 20 minutes to get to school...10 minutes actually getting to the freeway from my house, and then 10 minutes on the freeway (my school is about 30 seconds away from the American Fork offramp, fortunately). Since BYU school has started, getting to the freeway has been that much more difficult. Students are walking all over the place so you have to stop every 5 yards to let someone cross the street, and the roads are packed with students trying to get a somewhat close spot in the overcrowded parking lots. So after about 10 minutes, I'm almost to the freeway, having endured the never-ending student pedestrians and million-bazillion cars. The onramp is in sight, and I exhale a sigh of relief: I'll make it to school 10 minutes before classes start...not ideal, but hey, it's enough time to get the essentials taken care of before class.

I'm watching in the distance the final stoplight before the onramp, seeing that it's red...perfect. By the time I get there, it will be green and I can cruise on through and onto the freeway. As I drive on, I notice a man walking on the ill-marked crosswalk. I quickly judge that this man far enough away that my car is in no danger of hitting this pedestrian. I remember the rule that I learned in traffic school a year ago: the "halfway rule." This rule, provided by the police officer running the traffic school, states that regarding one's obligation to yield to pedestrians, one may pass through if the pedestrian has not yet walked halfway across the street and onto your side of the road. In this instance, the man using the crosswalk had not yet passed the halfway point. There were five lanes to intersect, from his point of view: two lanes heading east, then a turning lane, and finally two other lanes heading west. At the time I crossed over the crosswalk, the man was just beginning to pass in front of the turning lane. I was in the far right lane...meaning, the man was three whole lanes away from me. I had no sooner driven across the crosswalk that Provo police sirens went off and pulled not just me, but two vehicles. The woman in the car behind me also drove through the crosswalk.

Well, to make a long story short, this extremely rude cop issued a citation (I don't know if a citation and ticket are the same thing...we'll see, I guess) to both me and the other driver. I had no time to present an argument to the officer because I was busy trying to call my school and let them know I'd be late and would need a substitute to cover my first class that day, as well as keep myself from crying (unsuccessfully...I'm not a baby, but the stresses of the week and the utter unfairness of the situation were too much for me to take). The officer didn't take the time to ask why I was in such a hurry, or where I was headed, or what my point of view was as the driver. He simply instructed me to sign a sheet of paper saying that I will appear in court, and then left me with "have a nice day." Thanks.