Living in Buffalo, part of growing up was Saturdays and Sundays at Crystal Beach, in Canada, barely a 40-minute drive. Frequenting another country is part of life around here. But I always remember my father in the driver’s seat issuing the stern warning to “just say United States when they ask where you were born and then SHUT UP!”

The next question they ask you when you’re driving across one of the 5 convenient bridges is “anything to declare?” (Which, for some reason always makes me want to launch into my best Blanche DuBois.) That was the scary one in case they thought you looked suspicious, (in those days, tie-dye was the height of subversiveness) pulled you over, and found the one-more-than-allowed carton of cigarettes.

So, the questions from the agents are the same these days, but it all seems so much more sinister and serious. Which, well it is. But your 11-year-old kid still says, “can I say I’m a (fill in the blank)? Only now the warnings from the driver’s seat are much louder and more stern.

I’ve never understood the question about “business or pleasure.” As if it had to be one or the other. Most often it is both, and sometimes it is neither. I did answer “no” once to this question (entering Japan) and the inspector went and got his supervisor.

But I am generally left alone at the border crossings. I’ve always “dressed”–even if this meant wearing a jacket over a T-shirt Miami Vice style–and I’m almost never searched.

The time I really wanted to mess with border guards was when I was communiting across the Orange County-San Diego crossing. I was always just pissed that they were there and half-hoping that they would mess with me, but they never did. At the time, I equated them with the Gestapo, but that was pre-9/11. Now it’s just normal.