pameladean

So I rushed downtown today, got confused in the hugeness of the Government Center, was late to the courtroom, and was addressed by the clerk in charge of us thusly, "I assume you're Pamela Dyer-Bennet? I'll go tell them we're ready." It finally came to me in that moment that the reason the clerk looks so familar is that he reminds me of the character Dave on News Radio.

We were ready, but "they" weren't. We sat around in the uncomfortable and boring corridor for two hours. I realized that I had forgotten to drink my tea. I was too jumpy to read, and found myself assuming a completely false personality, with diction unlike mine, in order to talk with the people around me. Finally we were called in, and all twenty-eight of us filed in and sat down. There were the judge, the attorneys, the defendant. The judge apologized very courteously for keeping us waiting, and even said that we had waited patiently, which in fact we had not; we had groused almost continuously after the first hour. Then he said something so vague that I can't recall the terminology, but the basic idea was that they were having a problem that would not be resolved today (it seemed human rather than administrative, but really I have no idea). So we could go home at eleven, and come back tomorrow at nine a.m. There is a story behind all this that we will never know.

It was Thursday, and though the weather was cold and windy, I could have stopped by the Farmer's Market. I didn't, though. I made a beeline for home. I had no idea how much I hated being away from home until I was made to be so against my will and with no reward.

Two of the people going through the security line ahead of me, whom I recognized from the jury room though not from my panel, were talking about how they had been unable to sleep after watching the lawyers grill other people and then being sent home just before their own turns. Gosh. I can hardly wait.

Maybe they really hated my questionnaire.

P.