One time I was in a station at 51st Street and Seventh Avenue on the 1 train and a cop came up behind me. By this time I had learned how to respond when a cop catches you. The first few times I got caught, I made the mistake of trying to reason with the cop by saying. “Look, it’s only chalk, it’s only an empty space, they’re not using the space anyway.” As soon as you try to explain, it’s as if you’re contradicting them. The first time I ever got a ticket, instead of being let go, was when I tried to explain things to a cop. So I had already learned to just quietly accept it, but this cop was really determined to make a bigger deal about it. This was the first time that I was officially arrested and handcuffed. There were a lot of people watching who were appalled that I was getting arrested for doing a drawing.
The precinct office that we were going to was in this station a few stops away on 66th Street and Lincoln Center. He couldn’t take me on the train with the handcuffs, so he had to call a patrol car, even though it was only three more stops on the train. And for whatever reason, he couldn’t get a car, so he locked me in a bathroom. They had these unused bathrooms that they were starting to lock to keep people from having sex in them. The cop got the keys to the bathroom from the person in the token booth. He tells me, “I’m putting you in here and I’m going to get a car and l’ll be back.” In the meantime, I’m completely petrified, thinking, “What if this guy sees someone that’s robbing an old lady and he’s got to chase her? What if he runs after someone and gets shot? Or what if—?” and I’m here locked in this bathroom and they find me ten years from now just this skeleton with handcuffs on and little wire-rimmed glasses and have no idea who it was. But he’s gone maybe fifteen minutes and then he comes back and says, “Okay, we can go.” He takes me upstairs to a waiting patrol car, and then I’m being led out in the street in handcuffs and into the precinct. There was one cop at the desk and several other guys milling around. Even though they all had other people they were booking, they were all curious as to what this sort of nerdy-looking white boy has possibly done, because it’s like, “What did he do?” The cop that arrested me started explaining, “He was drawing, I caught him drawing on the subway. He was drawing on those black papers.” And then the other cops started going, “You’re the guy who does this?” They were telling this other guy, “Joe, this is the guy you were talking about, that blah blah blah,” and they all know the drawings and they’re all coming out and they want to meet me. They take off the handcuffs so that they can shake my hand and I can do autographs in their books because at this point, it’s been a year almost, and I’m a celebrity to them. The cop that took me in felt like a total fool. He thought he was bringing in a criminal. I was still given a summons.
The precinct office that we were going to was in this station a few stops away on 66th Street and Lincoln Center. He couldn’t take me on the train with the handcuffs, so he had to call a patrol car, even though it was only three more stops on the train. And for whatever reason, he couldn’t get a car, so he locked me in a bathroom. They had these unused bathrooms that they were starting to lock to keep people from having sex in them. The cop got the keys to the bathroom from the person in the token booth. He tells me, “I’m putting you in here and I’m going to get a car and l’ll be back.” In the meantime, I’m completely petrified, thinking, “What if this guy sees someone that’s robbing an old lady and he’s got to chase her? What if he runs after someone and gets shot? Or what if—?” and I’m here locked in this bathroom and they find me ten years from now just this skeleton with handcuffs on and little wire-rimmed glasses and have no idea who it was. But he’s gone maybe fifteen minutes and then he comes back and says, “Okay, we can go.” He takes me upstairs to a waiting patrol car, and then I’m being led out in the street in handcuffs and into the precinct. There was one cop at the desk and several other guys milling around. Even though they all had other people they were booking, they were all curious as to what this sort of nerdy-looking white boy has possibly done, because it’s like, “What did he do?” The cop that arrested me started explaining, “He was drawing, I caught him drawing on the subway. He was drawing on those black papers.” And then the other cops started going, “You’re the guy who does this?” They were telling this other guy, “Joe, this is the guy you were talking about, that blah blah blah,” and they all know the drawings and they’re all coming out and they want to meet me. They take off the handcuffs so that they can shake my hand and I can do autographs in their books because at this point, it’s been a year almost, and I’m a celebrity to them. The cop that took me in felt like a total fool. He thought he was bringing in a criminal. I was still given a summons.