This is a little long but it's great advice.

[hunter]

8. I might not have survived my late teens and early twenties if I was black.

I never carried any identification with me, even when I was driving. I usually had a few hundred dollars stashed about and an ATM card from my bank that only had a number on it, no name. ( I don't know if banks still issue those on request. )

Paranoia is a frequent component of my own mental illness so I'd only give the police my name and my California Drivers License number whenever they decided to escalate. Usually they'd radio that in, chat with the dispatcher, and let me go.

Sometimes I was unwise and would say some smart-ass thing like "What are you going to do, shoot me?" which always led to further complications. I should have learned not to do that from my mom and her mom, they were very bad examples who would always argue with cops, but sometimes it would just bubble up inside me.