Life Breaks Out

I’ve always separated different aspects of my life. I’ve tried to keep my police work away from my family. More recently it has been a challenge to keep my life as an author separate from my day job in police work. What I’ve discovered is trying to maintain strictly separate worlds is a losing proposition.

Over the years my family has come into contact with my other world a number of different ways. A story on the TV, a photo in the newspaper and, several times, unplanned contact with someone I’ve arrested. For years we attended the Boynton Beach Christmas parade, a simple, almost hokey display of local holiday spirit. One year, while I held a two-year-old in my arms and my son was six and standing next to me a man walked by and said, “Hey man, how’re you?”
I responded, “Pretty good. When’d you get out?” A simple question I ask people who I know were in prison, in this case for cocaine smuggling. My wife figured out our relationship immediately and it freaked her out. It also taught her just how well I kept her and the kids insulated from my daily life.

About six years later I was coaching my son’s soccer team and had to get a roster together the first day. Each of the boys told me their names, about half of which I knew from coaching or the neighborhood. One kid told me his somewhat unusual last name and I froze. One of the few serious threats I had received as a cop came from a guy with the same last name. I calmly asked what his dad’s first name was.

Whew, no match.

Then I asked if he had any uncles and he nodded, “Oh yeah!” He named four men, none of which was the man I had arrested, then, at the last second threw in one more name.

Bingo!

He was late with the name because he had never met that uncle. He had been in prison most the boy’s life. And I was the reason. This time, even though I was the only one who knew the story on the field I told another coach in case something happened. I waited to tell my wife until the end of the season. A season, I might add, where I was alert every game and really didn’t look forward to practices like I usually did.

Now my problem is my life as an author barging in on police work. On any scene I have to go to there is always a cop asking how the books are going or if I have a book coming out soon. The other thing I get, almost every day, is a cop telling they have a great idea for a story or some case that should be a book. They want me to write it, oh joy, and they’ll split the profits. Great career plan. I have to find tactful ways to politely decline and go back to focus on my own ideas.

If I had a choice, I’d much rather deal with too many cops knowing about my writing than too many criminals knowing about my family. It’s funny how life changes no matter what you do to contain it.

What about you? Do you ever try to keep parts of your life separate? Maybe a boyfriend from your husband or a bank account from your spouse. How has that worked out for you?