Because, in California, when they slap you on the wrist for drunk driving, you stay slapped!

LA Times reported on Oct. 6, 2009 that actor Mel Gibson went before a judge to have his infamous drunk driving conviction expunged from his record after completing the terms of his plea deal.

Think what you like about Mr. Gibson’s anti-Semitic leanings, his adulterous affairs, or his drain-circling acting career — The man paid his dues. His penalties for first-offense driving under the influence (called DUI in most places, OWI here in Wisconsin) included:

• Mandatory 48 hours jail time
• Loss of license for six months
• Drunk driving school (Fate worse than death for some people)
• Attending Alcoholics Anonymous meetings (Not the usual penalty, but some judges can impose this)
• Perform in public service announcements (for free, yet. What actor wants to work for free?)
• $1,300 in fines (plus $1800 court costs)The going rate in California — not jacked up because he’s rich)
• Three years of “supervised probation”

Legal experts called the resolution fairly routine for a first-time DUI case in California that caused no injuries according the LA Times.

Compare that with a first-time DUI/OWI under current Wisconsin law

• First offenders are still handled in traffic court with the jaywalkers and the speeders. Wisconsin is still the only state that fails to treat drunken driving as a misdemeanor crime from the start. (All Business, Green Bay Press-Gazette (Wisconsin) Tuesday, September 1 2009
• First offense OWI / DUI with a BAC of .08 or more, but less than .10, there is no surcharge or other additional fees. (Mr. Gibson was reported to have a BAC of .11)
• Over .10 is subject to a fine of $150 to $300, plus an OWI surcharge of $355, and license revocation from 6 to 9 months.
• But wait! If you really want to keep driving, no problems, Mate: On a first OWI / DUI offense, a person is immediately eligible to apply for an occupational license. There is no waiting period. Just go down to the DMV and fill out a form.

I’ve been a mom. I’ve been a manager. I’ve been a conniver, a manipulator, a planner, queen bee, doormat. But never— since my mom turned me out when I was 17—have I been just a daughter.

I’m so freakin’ old, I was a “Beatle Booster”, which makes my eighyish parents really, really old. They’re both tough as seal-skin boots, but I see the spark starting to flicker. Turns out, they need me here right now. Who knew?

The thing is , I dragged all my stuff here from New Jersey,all boohoo-ing and morally conflicted—obstensibly because I needed to be cared for. Me, get it. It’s ALL ABOUT ME. They cut my leg off, stuck a piece of metal down the bone, and sewed it back together. Then they took my ankle joint apart and reconstructed it like a bloody jigsaw puzzle (heh, bloody. Get it?).

Yeah, yeah. Save your tears. My father has heart stents and beat lymphomic cancer. My Mombo fell down and broke her friggin’ neck, then drove herself to the hospital, has had a hip replacement, shoulder replacement, AND quadruple bypass.

Ooh. sounds bad, huh? Ha! Read on.

The day before my knee surgery, my everlovin’ Mombo fell down in a parking lot. She broke her leg. She broke her arm. She broke her glasses, lost a tooth and broke her face. She and I were in adjoining wings in the hospital. (Upside: She still worked in that hospital as a housekeeper, so the nurses were really, really nice to us.)

Now, when you’re lying in bed with a morphine drip and a physical therapist comes in three hours after surgery to make you move your knee around, and you want to whine and tell her to come back later . . . well, you just can’t. The snowy image of your aged mother lying in bed—without even her glasses—fills the TV screen in your head. You stuff the hospital blanket between your teeth to stifle the screams, and you move your bloody knee!.

Here’s what it’s like to be a grown woman living back with her parents:

Mombo asks me if it I’ve taken any of the dust rags from the bag hanging on the doorknob in the computer room. They are used paper cleaning cloths she rescued from the trash at her (former) housekeeping job at Community Memorial Hospital in Menominee Falls. She hoards stuff like that—also empty cardboard boxes. I MUST NOT throw things away just because they look like trash.

“No,” I reply truthfully. “In fact I wouldn’t touch them because I’m really phobic about dust and they’re dusty.”

She looks at me like I’ve just announced conversion to Islam. “They’re still good. I get them from work. And what’s this now? You have a problem with dust? Seems like you have a problem with everything.”

Show no fear. Keep it light. Do not take the bait. “Oh, ever since I saw pictures of dust mites, I get creepy just thinking about what’s in dust.” I make a dust-mitey face with my fingers as claws, trying to be winsome. “It’s a phobia. I just hate them.”

“And I (dramatic pause) hate people with phobias.” she says, and the conversation is over.

And it’s true. She does. Not even personal—She comes from a place where you don’t share your inner demons. They should be kept secret lest the rest of the wolves smell your fear and take you down because you are the weakest member of the pack. I understand that.

Standard Disclaimer
My kind, generous, wonderful parents worked hard all their lives. They saved their money. They have a house and are still married. They are ants. Their oldest daughter, however, is a grasshopper. She married a good-for-nothing son-of-a-bitch. She spent money on fancy stuff like take-out food and real leather purses. She is one a them Liberals. They took me in anyways and hardly ever said “We told you so”, and I’m very, very, really terrifically grateful.