Vanity Plates by Nancy L. Eady

When I was a young attorney, one of my mentors told me that a good question to put on every juror questionnaire (in those courts where they’re allowed) is “Does the juror have a bumper sticker on the car and if so, what is it about?” The reason, he told me, was that someone had to believe strongly in something to be willing to slap a bumper sticker about it on their car. I suspect that’s even truer about vanity license plates (some of you may call them personalized plates.) 

I have a love/hate relationship with them. I’ve never understood the attraction; why pick a license plate that will make it easy for the police or other drivers you might irritate to remember who you are? On the other hand, I’m always intrigued to figure out the hidden message the owner wants to convey in seven symbols at seventy miles an hour. 

Mark had his third surgery on his knee last week. This time it was a “complete revision.” That means they took out the new knee from December and replaced it with a different one less prone to infection. He spent four days in the hospital, and I wound up spending more time than usual either in the parking garage at the hospital or on the road, so I started writing down some of the vanity plates that caught my eye. 

SOROR is an old friend. She (I think of the owner as “she” because I think SOROR stands for sorority) parks on the parking row ahead of me, which is on a hill above my car, so I see SOROR almost every day. The plate hangs out on a nifty white two-door Mercedes Benz convertible. 

Some plates are easy to figure out. CMEFLY probably wasn’t the smartest choice if you don’t want the police to notice you if you’re speeding. I did wonder who VNGNCE has it in for, and whether JCB IV stands for JCB’s fourth car, or whether JCB is the fourth JCB. Football fans have their fair share of plates, too; those of us familiar with the SEC can figure out GODOGS on the special Georgia license plates that State of Alabama offers for purchase, and MES4UA on the compatible University of Alabama plates is self-explanatory. 

TIPP RN was halfway hard – I guessed that TIPP is a nurse, but I can’t figure out what TIPP might stand for. All I can think of is “Tippecanoe and Tyler too” and I’m 99.99% sure that’s NOT what the real TIPP is thinking about. 4DABOYS is enigmatic; I get that it means “for the boys,” but is the car for the boys of the family to use, and if so, what do the girls get to drive? Or does it mean something else?

Others were more obscure, including 58ANUMY, JILARU, GPS865, A1HDHM and RYBKA3. I’d appreciate any thoughts on those you care to share.  

Have you ever thought about using a vanity plate as a tool to help paint the portrait of a character? I don’t think I’ve ever seen it done, but like a bumper sticker — only more expensive—the vanity plates tell the viewer what the owner of the plate cares about.