Feeling Like a Deer in the Headlights...

I thought the amount of profile views I had (most recently 850) was the amount of readers I had ever had in the past year... In the past 5 days since I finally figured out how to add a statcounter (thanks Ron!) I have gotten almost 200 hits. Wow. Here I was typing along, from time to time, imagining I was talking to, my mom, some fellow dispatchers, a couple of cops and just a few others. Now I feel all exposed, all nervous, all shy. I can employ the method I used to use in speech class---I can imagine all of you alls in your underwears.... Tee hee. It's not working! I can't do this! OK, I am going to have to pretend that I am just writing an email to my mom. She is my biggest fan, and I don't just mean on my various blogs. You can hear me dispatch live; there is a link on my police department's home page and my mom tunes in regularly. [I will not disclose the website, as I guard my annomintiy ferociously.] She and I email back and forth all day, and she will tell me how good I sound, or want to know what the disposition from various calls were. I always hate to let her down when we get a call that sounds all exciting and then it turns out to be nothing. From her side, listening, there were just 4 masked suspects seeming to case a bank. Next thing you know she hears, "Code 4" and then "Clearing." Soon after I will get an email: "Well, what happened????" "Nothing Mom, they were gardeners, covering their faces while they did yard work, so they wouldn't inhale dirt." But she gets to hear the good stuff too, like last week when I said, "Clinton street, like our former president." or when I screwed up the radio traffic so bad I ended up saying, "Standby, operator malfunction." So, Mom, it is with out further ado, I will share my most recent deer tail. Er, tale.....


Me: 911 emergency

Deer Lover: Hello, please send an officer immediately! There is a deer...IN THE BUSHES!


[Let me just stop right here and make a comment. Wonderful City is chock full of deer. Now, I like deer as much as the next guy; hey, I saw Bambi too, but sometimes it gets ridiculous. One time I got SEVEN 911 calls that a deer was running parallel to traffic when at the exact same time I got exactly ONE call that a man had collapsed on a very public sidewalk. So forgive me if I roll my eyes every time a concerned citizen whines about a deer.]

Me: Ma'am are there any humans in danger?

Deer Lover: No, the deer is!

Me: Please call back on the non-emergency line, and they will help you.

[Let me stop here again. When I tell people that---the "they" I am speaking of, is actually me. They are still going to get me on the non-emergency line. I realize that it is more work for me, not to just take the info on the 911 line, but gosh darn it, it's the principle of it all. 911 IS FOR LIFE THREATENING EMERGENCIES. I refuse to take calls about deer, noise complaints or unruly 10 year olds on 911. Continuing...]


Me: Wonderful PD, how can I help you?

Deer Lover: You need to send an officer to the intersection of R and E immediately. There is a deer. It is in the bushes here. I am standing just mere inches from her. Hello deer, it's OK, I am here. I am going to get you help.

Me: Ma'am? Are you....talking to.... the deer?

DL: Yes, I just want her to know she is not alone. It's OK, you're going to be fine.

[At this point I realized, this was not the standard there-is-a-deer-running-in-traffic-I-am-afraid-the-poor-widdle-thing-is-going-to-get-hit-by-a-car call. This required and expert. As I did not have a psychiatrist, on call, to send her, I did the next best thing. I passed her off to animal control. 2 minutes after that...]


Me: Wonderful PD

DL: Hello, it's me again. Animal control is unable to help the deer! They said there was nothing they could do. But she is still here! You must said an officer now!

ME: [How do I phrase this delicately....] Well...if they can't help you.... [usually when I say this and then kind of taper off my voice off at the end, it finally dawns on even the slowest citizen that we don't have "deer whispering" in our vast bag o'cop tricks.]


DL: You have to help. I will be standing here waiting for the officer.

ME: Well, you are going to have to get over it. We are not the deer patrol and though I cannot stop you from frolicking with a deer at 3:30 in the morning, I wouldn't advise it. Go home and go to bed!

[That was actually what I wish I could say but here is what I actually said:]


ME: Ma'am, um, well, what is it that you think a police officer can do exactly?

DL: Well can't you lead it to safety? Can't they take it somewhere?

ME: How? With our Pied Piper? Speaking of pipes, what on earth have you been smoking, lady, and where can I get some???

[Sorry, I was daydreaming again. Reality:]

ME: Ma'am, the police are here to help if you are in danger, or some other person is in danger, but the deer is OK, right? It's not rabid, or vicious? It is not creating a traffic hazard? Am I understanding correctly that it is just hanging out in the bushes? That the two of you are just hanging out, in the middle of the night, but that you are both OK?

DL: So are you going to send someone right away?

ME: Wow. No, I'm not. I am sorry, but there is nothing an officer can do. I'll tell you what I will do though. I will let the beat officer know. That way he can be aware of the situation, and keep an eye out for the deer, OK?

DL: Well, I'm really not comfortable with that. OK, goodbye deer, good luck. I am saying good bye to her. Now I am getting in the car. Oh, I am so uncomfortable with this. OK, I am leaving now.

ME: All right. Have a good night.

I then sent the officer a MDT message:

THERE IS A DEER AT R AND E. IN THE BUSHES. JUST HANGING OUT. A CITIZEN WANTED YOU TO KNOW.

And he wrote back:

UM. OK. THANKS...

Shortly after that officer went out on a traffic stop. Apparently some crazy lady, waved at him, squealing her tires, as she did an insane U-turn and almost ran into him. She was screaming at him, that there was a deer. In the bushes! That needed help! He told me later, that it was a good thing I sent him the message because, then he knew more of what he was dealing with. Turns out she was high as a kite, big surprise. The officer said her pupils were enormous. Sooooo, the moral of the story is if you are going to get high, frolic with a deer at 3 in the morning and harass your local dispatcher... Don't then flag down an officer. Just commune with nature, and go on your merry way. Other wise, the deer won't end up, safely in a cage, but you will!