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A Mouse in the Court Room
I had jury duty today. It was not fun. Surprise surprise. But not for the reasons you’d think. You’d think I was hating it because I’m big and fat and eight months pregnant. What could be worse on a body than sitting around and waiting all day long? But actually that part wasn’t so bad. I am at peace with my inner zen self. I can finally sit for longer than an hour without going crazy. Plus, I had a good book with me.
The part I didn’t like was the jury elimination process.
I got called to serve on a jury for an insurance fraud case. They called 60 jurors into the court room. From those 60 people, they would whittle it down to 18. That’s a lot of whittling. And whittle they did. They whittled whittled whittled like only lawyers can whittle. They asked all kinds of weird questions that made you turn your head sideways and wonder what kind of mind games they were really playing.
At first it was interesting. It was fun to learn that the girl in the cute turtleneck, knitting, was actually a graphic designer at a direct mail marketing company (what can I say, graphic designers always dress cool). It was interesting to hear an older woman tell a story about falling over a back pack at the school she works at as a principal. It was even fun to hear Mahmood ramble on for thirty minutes in broken English about how he once bought a used car and it fell apart in every imaginable way. All these little anecdotes from the various jurors were fascinating. It was like people watching on steroids. You just never know what people are going to say when questioned by a lawyer.
Then they got to me and it wasn’t fun any more. I hate being grilled. Mostly, I hate it because I have a mouse voice that nobody can hear and they have to ask me to speak up five million times like I’m some kind of shy daisy who’s afraid of her own shadow. Never before have I hated my soft voice as much as I hated it today. Not even that time when I was in a play in high school and the director made me scream my lines for three hours straight until I learned how to “project”. I hate my mouse voice. I hate being soft spoken. It’s not who I really am, it’s just the way I come across.
The thing is: to me, inside my head, I sound strong and loud and competent. In fact if I speak up, my voice sounds aggressive and grating to myself. I don’t know why this is. I was born this way. It’s not like I hear everything more loudly than it is, just my own voice. Maybe my eardrums are located too close to my voice box. I have no idea. This is something that has plagued me my whole life.
You can imagine how stupid I felt when the judge had to admonish me twice to speak up. And then to make it even worse, he had to explain to me why it’s important to speak up as if I was a first grader. I hate feeling stupid. Hate it. Hate it. Hate it. I spoke as loudly as I could and made sure I was facing the court reporter as I mouthed every word as clearly as possible. It was a crappy experience. I could feel myself sweating from the stress of being the center of attention. I was so focused on speaking loudly and trying to be concise that I gave lame answers to their many questions. I really regretted that I even raised my hand to volunteer information in the first place. Why can’t I just play dumb?
The truth is, I didn’t think I could be unbiased in this insurance fraud case. They asked us to raise our hand if there was anything that might influence the way we would vote as a juror. I couldn’t lie. My brother has been involved in a workman’s comp case and I feel like he got screwed by the system. He lost his job, he lost his home and now he’s living at my mom’s house, barely making ends meet. I know zillions of dollars are lost every day because of insurance fraud, but I also know that a lot of people are down and out and suffering because everything is tied up in legal red tape. So the truth is, I’m biased.
I spoke up and it was horrible and eventually I got kicked off the jury. Which is actually a good thing but I’m still kind of smarting over it.
(I only took two pictures today. One of me in the bathroom, because the nice light surprised me and the other is the parking structure that I had to walk to once I got eliminated. The long shadows looked pretty to me.)
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Undercover Bikini Wax
Well, I listened to everybody’s advice and visited a spa for a bikini wax.
Wow. I had no idea.
Yes, the waxing hurt like a $#@! but I figure if I can’t handle a few hairs being plucked out, then I’ll never make it through labor and an episiotomy. What amazed me was the overall spa experience. It was pretty magical. I guess I just had never been to a real spa before. I didn’t realize how special they make you feel.
When I got there I was early and as I was perusing the many products that they have to sell in the lobby, a technician came up to me and touched my arm in that mothering way that some people have. It’s like they just ooze caring and love out of their pores or something. These kind of people make me cry. I once had a yoga instructor who could make me cry just by re-adjusting my body to help me get in a pose correctly. Maybe I’m starved for physical contact. I hate to admit that but maybe it’s the truth. And nobody better say anything about that being Toby’s job because I am officially declaring that subject off limits. No offense to anybody suggesting Toby put lotion on my legs. I got a good laugh out of that one.
After I checked in, another technician took me back to the “quiet room”. The “quiet room” is a smallish room with bronze colored gauzy curtains hung on the walls. The only light sources are some very dim wall lamps and a collection of electronic flickering candles in the faux fireplace. Except the faux fireplace doesn’t look very faux because the light it so low you don’t really notice that it’s just made out of a mantle and some fake tile. In fact the lighting is so low that you forget you are actually in a strip-mall box of a room that they have converted into this magical shrine to relaxation.
There is music playing from everywhere and birds sing quietly. On a counter nearby is a sweating pitcher of ice water with cucumber slices floating in it. Above the mantle is a painting of a woman sitting on a bench with her head bent over her lap and onto the seat beside her. She looks like she’s sleeping. There are flowers in her hand and petals falling to the ground. I must have stared at that painting for ten minutes or more trying to figure out how she could look so relaxed in such an awkward position. Whatever it was, it made me feel relaxed too. I took off my high heeled clogs and let my smelly feet air out on the soft ottoman in front of my chair. I even noticed a box of tissue beside me. What’s that for? Will there be a shrink session too and I’ll really have a good cry? And then I scolded myself for thinking such a silly thing. The tissue is probably for wiping wax off your various body parts or cleaning out your ears or something. I realized that I spend way too much time thinking about things and not relaxing. I mean, who notices that the faux fireplace is not a real fireplace? Sheesh. It must be my super stealth spying skills. Sometimes I just spend way too much time looking at things.
I closed my eyes and took in a few deep breaths.
And then it was time for my bikini wax. A tall woman with stubby blonde pigtails called my name and lead me into another dimly lit room with the same piped in bird music. She gave me some paper panties and told me not to be nervous. Of course her words were in vain and I was sweating like a pig because I was so nervous. All I can think is: this woman is going to wax me in my private parts and it’s going to hurt hurt hurt! I try to think of the quiet room and the birds and the very nice people and how all my other friends do this and they think it’s totally normal. It can’t be that bad, I tell myself.
In the end it didn’t take very long and it wasn’t all that awkward. Just a lot of flinching. The only awkward part was when she asked me if it looked okay and I couldn’t say because I can see zip because my gigantic belly is in the way. I guess she didn’t have a mirror. I told her I was sure it was fine. It was over, that’s all I cared. I got dressed, paid my thirty bucks and went home.
AND THEN I examined the merchandise in the privacy of my own bathroom. Oh my goodness! I look fabulous. I’m totally hooked. I am never going back to my jungle woman ways again. In fact, I’m so hooked on the whole spa experience that I’m already plotting to save up enough baby sitting money for a $90 “mother-to-be” pedicure. Imagine what that might be like… Just don’t tell Toby.
