My parents raised me to trust the police.
They raised me this way despite my daddy’s extended family, who are from Rowan County, having more of a love-hate relationship with law enforcement.
Even with my parents instilling an early foundation of trust for the uniform in me, faithful readers of my column know in the past I could not trust the police to protect me from my abusive, stalker ex.
While there are more serious reasons for my fear, I will say there is just something about having a police officer make direct eye contact with you while you are repeatedly getting your head bashed into the side of your car and do nothing about it, that can color a gal’s opinion.
It took moving to New York to start changing my outlook on law enforcement.
The police force of Redbud, the fictional name I use for where my husband and I lived in New York, consisted of two truly kind deputies. In fact, one of the deputies and I even had our own routine. Every so often he would stop my car as I entered town to tell me, “You came in a little bit hot again tonight Mrs. Monica.” We would laugh and I would agree he could be right before promising to make an earnest effort to slow down.
During our time in Redbud, I experienced many positive moments with law enforcement while working in healthcare, so when I had a problem with a stalker who was not my ex after we moved back to North Carolina, I did not hesitate to go to Rowan County law enforcement. I quite literally flagged an officer down after work and made him deal with me after one harrowing day.
Is the RCSO perfect? No. Has my family had issues with the RCSO? Absolutely.
But I would add my family has not always found itself on the right side of the law either.
For instance, my branch of the family would never have left the hills of Virginia for Rowan had it not been for a difference of opinion my great-grandfather had with the VSP regarding his “entrepreneurial” beverage making activities.
In another example of my family’s alleged law breaking, a past sheriff who was a friend of my uncle, came to visit him one afternoon to ask him some questions about a recent traffic incident. Not a social call, the sheriff claimed to suspect my sixty-something-year-old, dialysis patient uncle of climbing into the trunk of his vehicle, armed with a gun, and lying in wait for my aunt, the alleged driver, to open the trunk of their car as it sped down the road.
All in an effort, the sheriff reasoned, for my uncle to then allegedly pop up from the inside of the trunk and open fire on the car of a man stalking his wife — Geriatric Rambo style down the highway.
Another time, a cousin of mine needed Rowan County law enforcement assistance when she accidentally ran over her no good, cheating, other-woman-impregnating spouse in the driveway. It is my opinion in both of these instances law enforcement eventually came to see the facts correctly. I feel had I been behind the wheel for this accident my clumsy feet may have run him over more thoroughly, I mean, accidentally.
One could say my maiden name’s reputation proceeds itself in certain circles, but in my family’s defense, they always give law enforcement a chance to react first. My uncle would not have fallen under suspicion with his buddy the sheriff if he had not first reported the guy stalking his wife to him.
Despite my family’s propensity for handling justice on their own, I put my trust in the RCSO and reported my stalker. I gave them a chance and they in turn fully restored my faith in the police.
I am aware of issues faced by the RCSO. I have spent nearly every weekend of my childhood there, as well as countless summers. My family and I lived in Granite Quarry when we moved back to North Carolina from New York. When it comes to knowing about what is going on in Rowan, and the people who may be from there, it only takes making a few phone calls for me to find out all I need to know — maybe even from their neighbor.
As certainly as I know my “Rowan Red” family is not perfect, I know bad apples exist in every occupational field.
Feeling I owe a debt of gratitude, I will never be found speaking blanketly ill of the Rowan County Sheriff’s Office or the deputies who restored my broken faith in law enforcement. If I could unilaterally qualify all the Rowan County officers who kept me safe and protected for sainthood — I would.