It’s Not About What it’s About

I was pissed. No two ways about it, I was flat out pissed.

My shift supervisor called to tell me that a student had just tried driving his car with one of our immobilizers on it. The immobilizer, or “boot”, is a clamp that locks on the tire of a vehicle so the vehicle can’t be driven. We use boots for parking enforcement; when a car has gotten too many tickets, or when we don’t know who owns the car and we need to talk with the owner. Trying to drive with the boot will cause damage to the car and the boot. The officer on scene confirmed, the boot was damaged and probably ruined because the student, despite knowing the boot was clamped to his front driver’s side tire, had tried to drive away.

26 tickets and several tow bills hadn’t gotten the message about where to park across to this kid. We’d booted him several times before and it was time to bring him in for another conversation, again. But instead, he tried to drive away and ruined the boot, and my mood.

I called over to the office of student conduct and told one of the staff members to get that kid into their office immediately. I was on my way and I was going to give him a piece of my mind. As soon as I hung up the phone, I stalked out the door.

While storming across campus I asked myself, “Why would anyone do that?” When I first asked the question I asked it angrily, incredulously. How could anyone be so stupid, or arrogant or whatever the hell he was?

As I continued to walk, I asked myself the same question again, but noticed that the more I asked the question, the more I actually meant it as a question. What would cause a person to do this? He was in college, so he was smart and teachable. He knew the boot was on his car and he’d complied with the process before. He knew where he was supposed to park, he’d had that conversation with my staff many times. So, “why would he do this?” The more I asked the question, the more curious I became. As I became more curious, I became less angry. I felt my temper and my adrenaline settle down. I felt my body unclench and I felt my mind open up. Why would he do this?

By the time I was sitting in the student conduct office and the student walked in, I was genuinely curious. How had parking on campus gotten to this point? How had parking gotten the two of us to this point? We were reasonable people and had each chosen to be at the school based on our values, how did things go this far sideways about parking?

When I had left my office I planned to start the meeting with something like, “Who the hell do you think you are?” Instead, as the student sat down, I started with something like, “How are you today?” A far cry from the thunderclap I had originally planned, but I remember being told once, “you get more flies with honey than vinegar.”

When we had a little bit of rapport built up I said, “Tell about what happened with the boot today.”

Then I saw a visceral, emotional reaction rise in the person in front of me. Not a reaction of anger, or arrogance or defiance, but of fear. The student told me about the severity of his food allergies and how even with being careful and telling the dining hall staff of his allergies, he had still been served food that caused severe and potentially life threatening reactions. He told me about having to drive himself to his dorm to get his medication, or to the emergency room to get treated. He told me about wanting autonomy and control of his body and why he didn’t want the student run rescue squad on campus, where he had several friends, to have to respond to him every time he had an allergic reaction. He told me how having his car nearby was, for him, a lifeline and a measure of control for when his body got out of his control. He told me about the fear he felt when he saw that control had been blocked by the boot on his wheel, and how powerless he felt because he had been unable to get a parking permit for the area near the dining hall that would have alleviated many of his concerns. His face was redder than mine had been 20 minutes before. His neck veins stood out even more than mine had. His hands shook more than mine had as he told me how close he had come to losing control of his body and how his car had been the thing that saved him.

Until I took the time to ask, I had thought the issue was anger, defiance or laziness. Until I took the time to listen, he thought the issue was that we cared more about parking spaces than students. It wasn’t about him being entitled or arrogant. It wasn’t about me being a robot or authoritarian. It turned out that once we had a dialogue and each listened to the other, it wasn’t about what we thought it was about at all.

And that is true most of the time. It’s not about what it’s about. We may think we are dealing with an issue of parking, or speeding, politics or chores, but that is often not the issue at all. When we take the time to listen we may find that fear, communication, loneliness, personal history or any number of things may be an underlying cause or factor in what is being expressed. We may find that the person that was frustrating us so badly was actually much like ourselves.

So we talked, this student and I. We reframed what the issues were and what our priorities were. We found common ground that we could agree on and made a new agreement. I ended up making an offer that I never would have considered 30 minutes prior. He made, and honored, an agreement to change behavior he had been intentionally engaging in for the past 4 months. We both left that meeting lighter and freer than we had entered and the mission, my mission, of public safety was better served for it. That is what it was really supposed to be about.