Barbarella Sweeps the Beats with the Highway Patrol
pg.4

"My adrenaline keeps me going. When I first arrive at an accident, my actions are automatic." But afterward, when the work is done, she starts to wonder: who is the mother who just lost a child? Who is the child who just lost a mother or father? "The worst part is when I put myself in the situation and I think, what if that was someone I loved? What if my children lost me?"

Sometimes the tragedies do touch painfully close to home. We had pulled over to talk, and turning toward me Jenny sniffled as she wedged a finger beneath her sunglasses to wipe away a hidden tear. Two years ago, she had just finished making lunch plans with her husband when she heard the dispatcher say there was a motorcycle down on the 163. She initially assumed it was a civilian. Scott was on a motorcycle, but she didn't think he could have reached the location the dispatcher had mentioned, given where he had been when they spoke. When the dispatcher announced it was a CHP officer that was down, Jenny raced to the scene. Frantic, she racked her brain wondering who it could be as the dispatcher ran through a roll call of all the officers on duty.

"I remember pulling up on the southbound side -- the accident was on the northbound -- and stopping in the center divide. I couldn't get over the wall, couldn't bring myself to do it." Jenny no longer bothered to wipe away her tears now. "Scott walked over to me and I asked who it was. When he told me it was Dean, the first thing I thought of was his family, his kids, who's going to tell his wife?" Officer Dean Beattie had been on the verge of retiring. "He talked about his family constantly, and then just like that -- gone.... He was so close to spending the rest of his life not worrying."

At the funeral, "sturdy and strong" men who rarely show emotion, men Jenny spent most of her time with, cried when the bagpipes played. "Death is something you're never prepared to deal with," she said again. Jenny pulled a uniformed sleeve across her cheek. "The reality of life and how fast it can come and go really hits you when you realize that you're not invincible."

B Watch

By one in the afternoon, when we headed back to the ranch, this diva was withering away from hunger. At headquarters Jenny introduced me to Officer John Nevarez, who I'd be riding with that afternoon. While John was busy finishing a memo, I gulped down a cold Lipton Brisk, enjoying the lighthearted banter that officers indulge in as they go about their business. Schedules were posted on a wall next to a tall stack of internal mailboxes. I wrote an obscenity-filled note on my flower-stamped stationery and dropped it in Brad's box.

John stood up when he was ready to go. He had brought his lunch (why didn't I think of that?), but he offered to save his sandwich and dine with me instead, so we headed for Panda Express. An hour later, with food and caffeine working their magic on my weary body, I was ready to hit the road again. We climbed into the patrol car and were immediately summoned to an accident on the ramp leading to Interstate 8 from 15 South. That wasn't on our beat -- at the afternoon briefing John had chosen Beat 11, covering the 805 freeway from the 94 to the 163 -- but when there's an accident, officers from all beats come to help.

It was after 2:00 p.m. and southbound traffic was crawling. Stuck heading north on the 15, we made an unorthodox U-turn across the center divide, a narrow dirt strip between two cement curbs. As we headed back southbound, I nervously waited to get pulled over for our stunt before I remembered where I was. We weaved insouciantly through the traffic, John tapping the siren on and off while I smiled at all the drivers who stopped to let us by. (I'm gonna need one of those noisemakers for the Barbmobile. They're so much more effective than my horn!)

At the scene of the accident, officers had already closed off the ramp and were directing traffic down the 15. I stepped out of the car to get a better look at a crushed truck whose bed was folded like an accordion. The afternoon heat, mixed with the exhaust from the idling engines of patrol cars, was oppressive. Caltrans workers were cleaning up the rubble, and officers were directing the congested traffic to a detour, jotting down information and speaking with each other. "Do you have a camera?" John asked me. He thought the truck would make for an interesting picture. Unfortunately the only camera I had on me was the one on my Treo 600 -- not the best quality. Both drivers involved in the collision were being taken away in ambulances when we arrived, and I was relieved to hear they sustained only minor injuries. I got back in the cool car, wondering how the officers could stand there fully dressed and wearing bulletproof vests in that thick blanket of hot, turgid air. John finished assisting the other units and returned to the driver's seat.

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