I thought I�d be able to drive home. I convinced myself it wasn�t that late; it wasn�t far to my house, and I certainly wasn�t that drunk. I�d be OK. I believed this alcohol-induced fairy tale right until a huge blue light filled my rear-view mirror. I pulled over to the shoulder and started to open the door when the cruisers� public-announcement system announced in God-like tones, Stay in the car.

The officer walked up to my car and, standing slightly behind the door, asked for my license and registration. He inspected the documents, shined his flashlight in my face, and asked me to get out of the car. He told me to close my eyes and touch my nose, walk 10 steps heel-to-toe, turn around and come back, and then to recite the alphabet.

I had been relatively calm, but now I started to get nervous. The officer read me my rights, cuffed me and unceremoniously parked me in the back of his cruiser. I half-sat, half-lay on the cold plastic seat for about a half hour, thinking how I could really use a bathroom right about then. After a tow truck showed up, my car went one way, and the officer and I went another.

He took me to a police station where another officer gave me two breath tests for alcohol. The news wasn�t good either time. According to the machine, I was drunk. The police photographed and fingerprinted me and confiscated all my personal belongings. What really humiliated me was taking away my shoelaces.

I was put in a holding cell with drug addicts, alcoholics and other assorted petty criminals-enough scary people to last me a lifetime. Several hours later, I was standing in front of a judge, who asked, �Do you know why you�re here?� I responded, �For driving drunk,� which, by the way, turned out to be the winning answer. (One of my cellmates told the judge that he had no idea why he was there. He stayed in jail.) The police gave my stuff back to me, plus a citation that said in a month, I�d be losing my license for four months, I had a court date in two weeks, and I would be issued a temporary license so I could drive for 30 days. I also got a receipt for my car. Then they let me go.

It was 0530 on Tuesday, the first day of my DUI. My troubles were just starting. I was late getting to work that morning and used the excuse that I had car trouble. I figured I would get my car from the impound lot during lunch, but it took more than two hours and cost me $187. My boss was really mad at me for taking such a long lunch. I told him I was sorry and sensed that from now on, I would be saying that a lot. I spent all day Saturday at the DMV, applying for a restricted license. It cost $100 and proof of insurance. Since the proof had to be a letter from my insurance company, there was no avoiding telling them about my DUI. My premiums immediately jumped from $1,400 a year to $4,100. My restricted license allowed me to drive to and from work and to my DUI classes. (An aside:if you are caught driving anywhere else, they immediately take your car.) The DUI classes lasted 15 weeks and cost $550. The classes consisted of group and individual counseling and culminated with several personal interviews with the people running the program to see if I had gotten the message. If I hadn�t, I would have even more counseling.

Then there was the trial-a criminal trial. This was my first DUI offense, and coupled with my guilty plea, it cost me $480 in fines, plus another $816 as a special assessment for the county court system. I was sentenced to 48 hours in jail, which was waived by the judge when I agreed to spend two Saturdays picking up trash along the highway. For the privilege of picking up trash, I had to pay $22 a day. I had to pay the court $156 for booking me, $100 for a slush fund for victims of drunk drivers, $50 for an alcohol-abuse-education fund, a dollar fee to support the night court, and another $20 for two nights of listening to the families of DUI drivers. Since I didn�t have the money to pay the entire fee, I arranged to pay in install-ments. That cost me an-other $35. Just when I thought I was through with the DMV, I got their bill for $10 to update my file. They also served me notice that my DUI had cost me two points on my driving record (points that would stay there for seven years), and oh, by the way, I was on probation for three years. After all this, my boss told me that he thought I should start looking for other career opportunities. I wanted to argue with him, but there wasn�t much point to it. How much did my DUI cost me? My job and fees, fines and assessments that added up to $5,249, not including the cost of my lawyer. Mine couldn�t do much, but she still charged me two thousand bucks.

Safety managers and DAPAs may want to copy this article and use it in their alcohol-awareness training. Or they may want to post it or give it to their people before they go on liberty to encourage them to use a designated driver. Tell them to choose that designated driver before they go out. When people get to a bar, it�s often too late to find who is not going to drink, and the desig-nated driver ends up being the person who is just a little bit loaded, like the person who told this story.