It was thirty years ago today...

So, the fact that I worked as a police officer back in the eighties still seems to engage folks' imaginations. I still get a lot of questions about quasi-legal stuff, I still wind up on safety committees or in emergency planning, and people still attribute certain of my behaviors - my awareness or surroundings, for example - to "that's right, you used to be a cop."

Well, it's true, I did used to be a cop - patrol officer and detective - back in the day. And it's true, that experience has probably shaped me in some ways. But seriously, I quit the cops thirty years ago this month, and there has been a lot of water under the bridge since then. Neither police work nor I exist in the same form as we did back then.

I am not sure of my exact separation date, but today does mark the anniversary of my last big case. Take a look at the Issaquah Press from Wednesday, September 14, 1988:

Yep, that was thief-catcher me way back when the Holiday Inn had a salmon barbecue for $9.95, you could get a dozen roses for under twenty bucks, and it took a lot of tack to add up to ten grand. And I was off the force before the end of that month (and on my way to North Carolina, but that's a whole 'nother story).

And what kind of figure was that dashing detective who cracked this modern-day tack rustler? Why, take a look at him, captured here in the midst if another intense investigation earlier in 1988:

One look at the young fellow in that photo is all it takes for me to realize just how much time has passed since I was a commissioned law enforcement officer.

About nine years after this picture was taken I got my first job in one of the Washington State Community & Technical Colleges, and I have been in the system as an administrator or instructor ever since.

Yeah, I used to be cop. But I am an educator now.
 
(BTW, I did manage to reunite that grave marker  - actually a memorial bench - with its rightful owner. That reporter Peg Carver got a lot of ink outta me.)