Hitchhiker Graffiti
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FREEDOM AND EXPRESSIONS

September 8, 1996, on US Route 101 North on ramp in Redwood City, California, at the California Route 84/Woodside Road interchange:

     I parked down by the freeway entrance.  As I walked up the ramp toward the pole, a CHP officer pulled up in his black-and-white and questioned me through his passenger-side window.  He seemed to be in his mid twenties to early thirties with light crew-cropped hair.  

     “Is there a problem?” he asked in a two-toned can-I-help-you/what-are-you-up-to voice?  

     “No,” is all I could muster in my best matter-of-fact response.

     Not at all satisfied with my assessment that there indeed I had not “a problem,” he more precisely and impatiently asked me what I was doing out there, to which I quickly, and with equal precision told him just what I was doing--writing down the messages hitchhikers leave on light poles.  His reaction was instantaneous and communicated an entire range and series of thoughts and emotions in the half-second it took to mentally process me using his law enforcement training. Shooting his eyes to the sky, his expression conveyed:

     1) Well, I thought I'd heard them all, but that's a new one on me!
     2) There goes yet another nut case I've met on the job.
     3) This guy apparently is no threat to society or himself, and is harmless in his own peculiar                    way.
     4) He's not breaking any law, so there's no need to pursue any further lines of questioning.
     5) What the hell am I doing wasting my time with this weirdo when I've got a freeway                              system and community to patrol and protect?

     With that he said not another word.  And, as if I no longer existed, he turned his head forward, took his foot off brake pedal, pressed down on the gas, sped off and, piercing into The 101's traffic envelope, soon disappeared from view.

     All that was left was for to continue on with my business, as well.

The sole graffito I found at this on ramp was:

     This ramp sucks the big time   James Roberts 6/9/84
     SF Ca and the guy that dropped me off said it was a good ramp
          PS  Bull Shit
     Eat shit and bark at the moon!

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