Donut Tread on Me

It was a balmy spring eve. The Mariners were tied for second in the AL West. Spirits were high. I’d announced my candidacy for public office just a month before and was on the trail, getting my name out and raising funds. Krispy Kreme had recently come to town, and it was still all the rage. They even had a program for fundraising. Ten dozen boxes at half price. Still a little wet behind the ears with the wide-eyed optimism that comes with youth and an early-season Mariners game, I set out for Safeco Field, 120 glazed pastries and a stack of campaign fliers in hand. I wasn’t promising a chicken in every pot, but a donut in every hand I could manage. Transportation, Education, and Taxes could come later.

The crowd made slow but steady work of the donuts—I really thought they’d be more popular, but I was contending with Ichiro Choo-Choo Collector Train Night. But if I could maintain his .350 batting average, I’d come out all right.

“Excuse me, son. Do you have a permit for those?” It sounded like a joke, even in Seattle, even in 2004. If they remained in the box, was it considered concealed carry? I turned around. It had to be a joke. Where were the cameras? A traffic cop sauntered over. I looked at his nametag. Officer Baker.

“Hi, officer, would you like to support my campaign by buying a tasty Krispy Kreme donut? They’re not fresh out of the oven at this point, but they’re still quite good.”

“You trying to be funny, kid?”

“No, are you?”

“How would you like to spend the night in jail?”

“On what charge?”

“Peddling pastries without a permit.”

No, this had to be a joke. But Baker wasn’t laughing. Was he playing it deadpan or did he actually have me dead to rights?

I’d actually called the city that morning just to make sure furnishing frosting wasn’t forbidden. As long as it wasn’t for-profit, I was free. I thought back to a time when I was ten, selling peanuts outside my dad’s shop in Pioneer Square to a similar crowd. A cop had tried to intimidate me with similar words back then. My dad had stepped in. That cop had left. Officer Baker stood his ground. He wasn’t kidding. I weighed my options.

I could be prudent, pack up the remaining three boxes and head off into the sunset, but an arrest for donut dealing? That kind of earned media could really make things rise. Maybe even bring in a better kind of dough than what I was hustling now.

I was reminded of others who had stood against seemingly minor overreach in the past. Had not Socrates been charged with corrupting the youth in ancient Athens? And he didn’t even have highly processed trans fats resting in a ten-by-fourteen-inch cardboard box to tempt them with, just the Socratic Method, the idea of the examined life and questioning what we think we know. Hemlock-flavored pastry?

Then there was Henry David Thoreau. He’d failed to pay a poll tax and spent a night in jail. Even Gandhi’s initial offense was making salt without a permit.

“Well, are you going to move along or am I going to have to take you to the station?” Baker barked, interrupting my historical ruminations.

“I’m thinking about it.”

“Thinking about moving along?”

“No, thinking about having you take me in.” I imagined what Gadsden might have done.

Donut tread on me?

“You trying to be funny again?”

“No, not in the least. Think about it, Officer Baker. The story could really boost my campaign. ‘COP ARRESTS STATE HOUSE CANDIDATE FOR SELLING DONUTS.’ The headline writes itself.”

“You making some kind of donut-and-cop joke?”

“No, are you? Seriously though, it’ll all be forgotten in a few days, but for that brief time, it will be epic. It will be a story we can tell our grandkids years from now when even Krispy Kreme is a thing of the past. The question is, what—or who—will be the punchline? Oh, and by-the-by, I did call the city this morning and confirmed I don’t need a permit. You see, it’s all in the name of public service. ‘Elect Griswold. Take a vacation from high taxes.’ And so on and so forth.”

Officer Baker began to fidget from side to side. He was beginning to do some thinking of his own, but I could tell his pride wasn’t going to let some smart-mouthed college kid get the best of him. He might also have been reviewing city ordinances in his mind, wondering if selling donuts really was an arrestable offense.

“Hey, can I have a Krispy Kreme?!” a perky blonde sidled up, her shoulder-length hair covered by a dark blue M’s cap. I opened the box and she smiled at Officer Baker as she took one. “Thanks!”

“I’m running for state representative, by the way. Here’s some campaign literature,” I said, handing her a flier.

“Cool! You’re famous! Hey, Annette! This guy is running for office! Come over here! Let’s get a photo. You know, just in case he becomes president one day.” She laughed, then fished a camera out of her bag and handed it to a flustered and bewildered Officer Baker. “Do you mind? Thanks!” she said, not waiting for an answer before she and her friend posed on both sides of me, donuts in hand.

Officer Baker fiddled with the camera, not knowing what else to do, raised it to his eye, and snapped the photo. The blonde grabbed it back from him and skipped off with her friend, both hoping to be one of the lucky ones to snag a coveted Ichiro Choo-Choo before they ran out.

“Come on, Officer Baker, whatd’ya say? I think there might be a crème-filled in here.”

“Trying to bribe me, are you?” I could tell he was softening a bit. Perhaps a crème-filled donut was more than he could resist or perhaps even he was beginning to see the ridiculousness of the situation he’d gotten himself into.

“Hey, Griswold!”

I looked left. It was the State House Minority Leader, a jovial, middle-aged man from the southern part of the state. He had another representative in tow, and they were both dressed in white baseball jersey-shirts, MARINERS blazoned across the front.

“Ted, this is the kid I was telling you about. See, this is what we need. He knows he doesn’t stand a snowball’s chance in hell of unseating the Speaker—just his own dumb luck that that’s the district he happened to find himself in—but here he is hustling donuts at a Mariners game. This is the sort of unbridled passion bordering on naïveté that we need in our candidates.”

“Hey, Rich! Fancy meeting you here!” I replied. What a stroke of luck. I had no idea he was going to be there and since this had been a last-minute idea of mine, he couldn’t have known I was going to be there either. The campaign gods were definitely smiling down on me that night, even if Rich was right and I didn’t have a snowball’s chance in hell of winning.

Ted reached out his hand. “Griswold, put ‘er there. I’m going to call up H-ROC and make sure you get some funds. Anyone crazy enough to take on Chopp is my kind of kid. And now you’re out here handing out Krispy Kremes?! That’s something else!” He let out a light-hearted laugh, then noticed Officer Baker, standing there with a bit of a glazed look on his face.

“The kid’s something, isn’t he?! Come to get a donut, officer?!” Ted let out an even bigger laugh, amused at his own donut and cop joke. Officer Baker let out an uneasy laugh.

“As a matter of fact, Ted, Officer Baker came over to arrest me. What was it you said, officer? ‘Peddling pastries without a permit?’”

Rich and Ted just about doubled over. “What a card! That’s a good one! I love it!” Rich laughed, then continued after a breath. “Well, we got to get into the game. Hopefully we can still snag an Ichiro Choo-Choo. Griswold, keep up the good work. I’ll call you later. I have some folks you should meet.”

“Thanks, Rich. I look forward to it.”

As they headed off toward the entrance to the stadium, I looked back over toward Officer Baker. He’d gone. I searched the crowd and saw him walking away, shoulders a bit downcast. He’d been beat. I’d won. But somehow, I didn’t feel victorious. I had half a box left. I ran up alongside him.

“Hey, no hard feelings. I only have half a box left, but here you go. Maybe the guys down at the station could use some. No joke. We may have gotten off on the wrong foot, but I want you to know I appreciate all you guys do, day in and day out. It’s gotta be stressful, so thank you.”

“Thanks, kid,” he said, taking the box. “What district did you say you were running in?” A glint crossed his eye and his mouth curled into a crooked grin. I handed him a flier and walked off toward my car. And in the background, rising up out of the stadium, the crack of a bat followed by the familiar call of announcer Dave Niehaus. “My, oh my!”