Court

The first question on my mind as I left my car in the parking garage was not if I had reached the courthouse correctly, but whether I had arrived in a different country altogether.

It started with the young couple in front of me walking downwards in the urine tainted concrete stairwell. They nervously exchanged Polish phrases through bitter shivers in the zero degree gray morning wind.

It continued as I neared the entrance and a blaring loudspeaker commanded us in Spanish to, as far as I could tell, not bring camera phones into the courthouse.

I had been warned solemnly by my lawyer's assistant that camera phones were strictly prohibited. Although I never use the camera function in my cell phone, it is difficult to get one nowadays without this feature and of course mine has one. I left it in the car after saying good-bye to My Love.

They really took this camera phone thing seriously, though. There were multiple signs with big red letters (in English, oddly enough) that read "No Camera Phones". It was evident somebody later added in smaller print "or cameras of any kind". That is the kind of small rose I like to stop and smell during an otherwise menial and meaningless meandering.

When I was told I needed to be in court, the first question I asked myself was, naturally, what should I wear? I discussed this with My Love and decided upon a suit and tie. Wintertime is an especially good time for formal dress, giving one opportunity to accessorize with gloves, scarves and (theoretically) hats (which I do not wear because there is no way I am messing up my hair just to stay warm up top. Stay warm outside, look dorky inside. No thank-you.).

As I stood in the security line removing my overcoat, suit coat and belt for the scanning machine, I realized I was better suited for what appeared to be the shorter "lawyer/judge line" than the ordinary citizen one. Apparently a visit to the court house for most of these people involved no more modification to their normal attire than, perhaps, not wearing the shirt in which they committed the crime lest the blood stains weaken their alibi.

The chubby guy in front of my removed his pullover sweatshirt (which doubled as a coat for him, so he obediently removed it for the scanner. I think he could have gotten away with wearing it, but I admired his thought process.) His shirt came with the sweatshirt so there I am stuck behind Mr. Harry Bareback in line with his jeans falling off his ample waist, empty belt loops bemoaning their useless existence.

Since I breezed through security (save for setting off the alarm with my "dress watch" I had forgotten I was wearing. Nowadays I normally wear my running watch just for convenience and comfort whenever I check the time I can think about my last workout or event. Plus I like to think it makes me look like a runner, which I admit is stupid.) I headed down to the cafe for a Starbucks I was happy to find served there (gee, do you think they can dilute their brand image any more? It's bad enough to have them at the Dominicks, but at the frickin' court house? Yeah, that says sippin' luxury). $2 for a small cup later I sat down in front of the filthy floor-to-ceiling window overlooking the frozen retention pond / waterscape amongst a throng of lawyer looking and sounding people.

I was comforting to sit & sip among similarly suited men and women. It was, however, a bit unsettling to overhear their conversations. (I am able to hear simultaneous conversations and keep track of their content, even if I don't really want to. It is very helpful in my job at meetings where several things are happening at once. It can be a bit challenging in public as there is basically a constant noise in my head. I have gotten better at sorting and somewhat silencing this cacophony, but it is difficult to "turn off".)

"You can't take a fucking day off, you know? He gets to take off for surgery, but oh no, I miss one fucking day, and he's pissed off. You know?"

I didn't know. I gulped down the rest of my coffee and went upstairs to anxiously await the arrival of my attorney outside my courtroom. She never showed up. But these people did:

An attractive young woman trotted by wearing a nice gray wool turtleneck sweater paired with "anti cruelty society" sweat pants and running shoes (shamelessly inflicting cruelty upon anybody with a halfway decent fashion sense and working eyeballs).

An older gentleman wearing suit pants tucked into his over sized cowboy boots which were themselves fitted with goulashes. (I appreciate the effort of protecting your dress shoes, but I think these steel-toed shit-kickers could have handled the snow and salt. Besides, I can never wear shoe coverings because my father always wore them and referred to them repeatedly as "rubbers". "Mother, where's my rubbers!?" He never understood why my brothers and I giggled at this, and yelled at us to settle down to no avail.)

Cowboy hat and Bluetooth headpiece guy walks by. Screams, "I'm a high tech hick." Yee haw.

Then I see an older gentleman with nicely slicked back silver hair sporting a solid silver tie to match. Very well done, talk about aging gracefully. He enters my courtroom, and I realize it is past my appointed time so I enter in case I missed my lawyer.

She is not in there and the cramped room is packed, the bailiff asks me to please have a seat (rather politely, I might add, which I appreciated since she was packing heat and could have easily been rude to me and I would have sat my ass right down nonetheless).

After awhile, I see a sign that reads, "This room is monitored by surveillance equipment sensitive enough to record any audible conversation in the room." I wish I would have read that before muttering "where the fuck is my lawyer?" to myself like one hundred times.

I find myself looking at the silver haired guy wishing he was my lawyer. He seems to know what he is doing, smiling at the other attorneys, getting his case scheduled with the judge with ease and, I might add, style.

But, I am left alone. I give her a half hour and then bail (pun intended). The last case I see involves a slick eastern European lawyer in a pin striped suit and hiking boots arguing custody for a bald headed, washed out jeans wearing, sunglasses tucked into his tight shirt father. He ex wife is "representing herself", and this piques my interest. Unfortunately, the judge doesn't have time to hear the details and instead tells them to schedule a time with another judge.

At this point I leave, and I see this unfortunate trio emerge from the room as well. The woman looks at her ex's lawyer, "Well thanks for that total waste of time!" They start to argue in English, but then switch to Polish (probably to really get nasty).

And so I walk in a circle, and my futile court date ends as it began.