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Nothing Personal
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Campers using a cellular phone called deputies to say that some animal was grunting and eating food outside their tent. They said they thought the animal was a bear, but a deputy determined it was only a raccoon.

Or:

A "terrified" driver from Fairfax, Virginia, at 2:30 p.m. used her cellular phone to call rangers from a turnout along Highway 1. She said that driving an Oldsmobile along the precipitous Shoreline Highway had left her "in tears" and "paralyzed with fear [to where] she could not continue to drive."

To the aching episodes of the desperate and sorrowful:

A woman notified deputies at 3:30 a.m. that she was so upset her boyfriend was leaving that she planned to drive over a cliff.

A[nother] woman living along Valley Ford-Franklin School Road reported at 2:15 a.m. having heard a man screaming, "Oh, my God!" for the past 10 minutes.

And others, like the following, that are somehow comforting:

A man rode his bicycle over the hill from East Marin but began "acting weird" once he reached town. Fire department medics examined him and concluded he was not insane.

Then there are the reports of unique medical emergencies:

A woman at 8 p.m. asked deputies to assist fire department medics, who had been summoned because someone "on acid" was having an asthma attack.

And those that highlight inappropriate sporting practice:

A man complained at 10:30 p.m. that a group in their late teens were on Valley Avenue being loud, drinking alcohol, and playing horseshoes.

And of course there are the complaints that, much to everyone's relief, are found to be without merit:

A woman on Wharf Road reported that human feces had been spread all over a bench. A deputy found "no merit" to her report but scheduled extra patrols in the area.

Finally, there are those that remind us, perhaps more acutely than we might like, that from the most exalted to the humblest, our sentence to this sphere of travail may end at any time, and in most impolite fashion:

A deputy at Laurel Canyon and Point Reyes-Petaluma roads shot a sick possum.

(You can scroll through months and years worth on the Light's Web site.)

All in all, a regular perusing of "Sheriff's Calls" affects one like the taking of a magic elixir: It doesn't make the world's problems vanish, but it does seem to shrink them, acting in just the opposite way from the "Drink Me" potion Alice downed. While they become no less serious, they do seem suddenly manageable. And that's a merciful thing, wouldn't you say?

In its unnecessary note about "Sheriff's Calls," the Light explains: "The column is compiled from the Sheriff's Department's Daily Recap of official actions, the sheriff's log of radio dispatches, and interviews with deputies. Inevitably, some calls -- even serious ones -- appear humorous. Much of the humor results from deputies' having to describe in formal language the unlikely occurrences they periodically encounter."

Ah ha! So that's the secret! But really now, has it come to that? What kind of a world are we living in that such a thing must be explained? Don't answer that -- it's a rhetorical question. In any case, let's hail the Light, editor Mitchell and the distinguished, ever-changing cast for the best weekly poetry column of any U.S. newspaper.
salon.com | Sept. 2, 1999

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