Ruthi Postow Birch's Blog, page 12

The Day Mattie’s Daddy Brought a Shotgun to School

At least it wasn’t cold or raining the day Mattie had to walk seven miles home from school. Still, she had to take the long walk on desolate country roads and didn’t get home till after dark. When she told her daddy, a sharecropper, she was late because the teacher had made her stay after school, he grabbed his shotgun and headed for the school to find “that sorry teacher who kept my girl from getting home on the bus and made her walk home in the dark.” 

I was that teacher and was lucky to have gone home just in time to miss getting shot. But Mattie’s daddy didn’t know the whole story.  

This is how it started….

At one of the teachers’ meetings, Mr. Abernathy, the principal, announced a new school policy. “We are having far too many unexcused absences.  Children are not bringing in notes from the parents, so we have no way of knowing if they were really sick or playing hooky. So, I’ve set a new policy. Any child who doesn’t bring a note will be sent to detention after school. Send an announcement of the policy home with the children tomorrow because this is starting next week.” 

To make the policy official, he passed out a paper detailing it. 

School policy regarding absences: 

A written excuse from the parents must be handed in within three days of a child’s absence. If the excuse is not brought in by the third day, the student will be kept in the detention room after school for one hour. 


Teachers are to send the written notice of this policy home with the students.  
If the child does not bring the note the second day, the teacher will send a letter home explaining that the child will be kept after school the following day if he or she doesn’t bring the  required excuse. 
When a child doesn’t bring in the excuse on the third day, send the child’s name to the office with your morning attendance reports. 
Have the child report to the cafeteria at 3 p.m. for detention. Teachers will rotate after-school detention duty. 

 The school secretary passed out the announcements we were to send to parents. 

         Parents:  

             To ensure the safety of the students, when a child is absent, a  written excuse from a parent or guardian must be handed in within three days of the absence. If the excuse is not brought in by the third day, the student will be kept in the detention room after school for one hour. 

I didn’t see how detaining the kid was fair punishment for the parent’s failure to send a note, but I was new and the other teachers seemed okay with the rule. So I sent the notices home.

The next week, Mattie was out with the flu. I knew she had the flu. The other kids knew she had the flu. Every teacher in our section knew she had the flu. The principal probably knew it too. Even when Mattie came back to school, you could see she still looked like she had the flu. So, although it was a known fact that Mattie had the flu, she broke the rule because she didn’t have a written excuse to prove it.

There was one big problem with this school policy that was made to cover every kid alike. They weren’t all alike. The school was in a rural area. Many of the fathers were sharecroppers like their daddies and granddaddies had been. They had no education. Families lived at the poverty level, subsisting on the money from their crops that was left over after they paid the landowners.

Mattie’s parents couldn’t read or write. A lot of the parents couldn’t read or write. I knew that and couldn’t imagine how Mr. Abernathy didn’t know it too. I didn’t send in her name to the office after the third day, or the fourth, or the fifth day. I figured I couldn’t keep it up forever, and begged Mattie to “Please bring a note. Don’t you have anybody who can write it for you? You’ll have to stay after school if you don’t.”

Two more days went by, before Mr. Abernathy cornered me. “I haven’t seen an excuse from the Jones girl. If you don’t have it tomorrow, she has detention.” I told Mattie one more time, and sent another note. But the next morning, no note, so at three o’clock, Mattie went to detention. It wasn’t my day to have duty, so I left.

The next morning Mr. Abernathy was waiting for me. “It’s a good thing you weren’t here after school yesterday. Mattie’s daddy came up here—with his shotgun—looking for you. But don’t worry about it. I covered for you. I explained that this is your first year as a teacher.”

I couldn’t believe him. “What? What are you talking about? You ‘covered’ for me? I had nothing to do with it. I never wanted to keep her in at all.” Mattie’s daddy’s measures were drastic, but he had accomplished one thing. It was the last we ever heard of the new school policy.

When it comes to making rules to fit everybody, schools, like other bureaucracies, fail when they don’t see the trees for the forest. But Mr. Abernathy and his policy taught me a lesson I’ve followed ever since.

When common sense tells me a rule is crazy, I break it.

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Eleanor’s Fantastic Job Interview with a Billionaire

It was the kind of Spring morning where the world seemed overflowing with possibilities, but Eleanor wasn’t feeling it. She was on her way to a job interview with

one of the world’s wealthiest women, a woman whose face Eleanor had seen on magazines and society pages dining with royalty and movie stars.

With every step she took on the brick walk across the perfect lawn and toward the imposing mansion, she grew more nervous.

Even the heavy, carved front door was intimidating, but Eleanor took a deep breath, and at the stroke of 10, she rang the bell. A uniformed maid opened the door to allow Eleanor into the stunning foyer.

“People actually live like this? This is more like a ballroom,” she thought, as she gazed up the marble staircases with gold railings to the crystal and gold chandelier.

 

 

They sat in silk brocade wing chairs that Eleanor thought probably cost more than her house. The maid brought in a silver platter with water for Eleanor and what looked to be a martini which she placed the on a gilt table beside the elegant lady’s chair. Then the interview began. As they talked about Eleanor’s experience and the responsibilities of the job, the woman sipped her drink. When her glass was empty, the maid arrived with a crystal decanter and poured another drink.

 

Eleanor had expected the interview to last an hour, but when the gold clock on the mantle chimed 11, the woman didn’t seem to notice or be interested in winding up. She became a little less elegant, and a lot more talkative as she sipped her martinis. She told Eleanor about her charities and fundraisers she would host in Morocco and London.

A few more drinks took her from talkative to exuberant and her stories got better. She talked about spicy adventures she’d had with other famous people, and laughed till tears formed in her eyes and dribbled out, carrying a streak of mascara down her cheek. As she became more animated she ran her hands through her hair, that had previously been styled to perfection, until it was a tousled mess.

 

By the time the clock chimed noon, the woman’s speech had gotten slower, and slower, and slower. Eleanor was certain she wasn’t getting the job but she didn’t know how to conclude the interview. The woman had slipped lower and lower in her chair until she was laying across the arm, starting to doze. At that moment the maid, with perfect timing, came in with Eleanor’s coat and showed her out.

 

 

As she went back down the brick walk, Eleanor was practically skipping. She was certain she didn’t have a new job, but the experience had been priceless. She’d seen behind the massive front door and into the life of the one of the most beautiful people.

Everybody needs one great story and this was hers.

 

 

 

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When Mr. Cunningham’s House Burned Down

Until the fire, nobody knew how many dogs lived with Mr. Cunningham in the old shotgun house by the ditch.

There were always skinny dogs flopping on the snaggletooth steps, lazing around in the shade under the house, or sleeping with Mr. Cunningham on the old feather bed on the porch.

When Delilah and I walked past his house going to school, we’d make a game of counting them. One day I counted nine. She said she counted the most — seventeen — but I didn’t think so.

Aside from his dogs, Mr. Cunningham stayed to himself. He never visited with the other grown ups.

When he walked by, they talked about him. They said he drank a lot and was probably going off to buy whiskey. Grandma said she didn’t understand how he earned money for whiskey because he never did a day’s work in his life. Mr. Wells complained, “He can live like that if he wants to, but it’s a crime the way he keeps those dogs.”

We’d never had a fire on Petain Street before. Firetrucks came, clanging and wailing, and the whole street came out. Folks stood closer to that house than they ever did before.

After the firemen sprayed the fire away, what was left of the house was ugly, with gray and black holes. But Mr. Wells said, “Truth is, that old house doesn’t look much worse than it did before.” Some of the men laughed.

Once the flames were gone, the Firemen went into the burnt house. They brought out Mr. Cunningham, wrapped in a gray blanket and put him in an ambulance that roared away.

They went in again, carrying more blankets. They came out carrying gray bundles, two and three at a time, till there were more than a dozen bundles stacked in the yard.

Not much exciting ever happened on Petain Street. The fire was the most interesting thing all year and it was what folks talked about for months. Some talked about Mr. Cunningham being burned almost to death and said what a sad and horrible thing a fire was. Some said it was likely caused by the wire Mr. Cunningham strung from the pole to steel electricity. But Grandma said Mr. Cunningham probably got drunk and set himself on fire.

Mr. Wells said their ought to be a law against what happened to those dogs.

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Once There Was A Street Wild with Color

Once there was a street wild with color where people painted pictures with language. I grew up there, squishing my toes in the red-clay street that ran between rows of mustard-colored mill houses. In the summer, a wild patchwork of purple bachelor’s buttons, hollyhocks, and irises overran the front yard of Mrs. Summerall’s house and a tangle of sweet pea climbed up the tall sunflowers that grew down by the ditch. Even the old rusted-out red pickup splotched with green Rust-Oleum paint that sat in Mr. Farley’s yard had pink and yellow four o’clocks peeking out from around the tires.

Color spilled over from the street to fill the conversations of the old people who spoke an image-filled language peppered with sayings that were even older than the oldest person there. They painted bright pictures in my mind of places, people, and animals – chickens, ducks, geese, hogs, even snakes taught lessons.

When Grandma said, “Sunny runs around like a chicken with his head cut off,” I could see my ne’er-do-well distant cousin running around the yard, as our rooster, Old Thomas, had after Daddy rang his neck. We all watched as the bird flapped and squawked and ran amok, carrying the galvanized bucket Daddy had put over him all around the yard.

When Mr. Green tried to pass off an old carburetor as new for Daddy’s car, he said Mr. Green was, “crookeder than a barrel full of snakes.”

“Dealing with Green is like wrestling a greased pig.” Just when you think you have a deal, he wriggles out of it.” Another time Daddy said, “Honest words in Green’s mouth are scarcer than hen’s teeth.”

Another neighbor didn’t have the sense God gave a goose.

When Grandma and Mrs. Carpenter sat in the porch swing talking about our neighbors, I listened and fresh images came into my mind. “Bert came home drunk as a skunk Saturday night, and Suzie was, mad a wet hen.” But Grandma sympathized that, “Bert might have to liquor-up to live with Suzie. She’s meaner than a snake when things don’t go her way. She nags the poor man from sun-up till the cows come home.”

I pictured Bert, worn out, hurrying the cows along so they’d get home and she’d stop being mean to him.

When Mrs. Kilgore brought her new baby to church, everybody oohed and ahhed over him. Daddy said, “He cuter than a speckled pup.”

I looked at the wiggling baby. He was flabby, bald, and puffy-eyed, and his face was all slimy-wet from drool that bubbled out of his mouth and onto his blanket. I knew Daddy was just trying to be nice. I’d seen some really cute speckled puppies and no way was this baby even almost as cute.

The Armstrongs were one of the poorest families on the street, so everybody was happy for them when the oldest daughter married a man who owned three gas stations. Now, they thought, “she can have anything she wants because she’s in high cotton!”

I didn’t like Mrs. Anderson. She’d get all riled up about every little thing. When we drew chalk squares on the sidewalk to play hopscotch, she yelled at us. Grandma said not to pay her any mind, because she loved brewing up a tempest in a teapot.

Two of my favorite sayings from Petain Street teach two sides of a coin. Daddy said to you had to be prepared for any emergency so you wouldn’t, “get caught with your pants down.”

But folks should think about what they’re doing before scrapping plans when problems came up. If they jumped too soon, without considering the implications, they might throw out the baby with the bathwater.

There were times when Daddy was clear on the right answer and didn’t stand for any argument. “That’s it!” he said, “There are no if’s, ands, or buts about it.”

All debate was over when he said,

“That’s all she wrote. The end.”

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Funny Ways to Flop First Dates (Everything Starts with a 1st Date)

Have you ever come away from meeting someone for the first time – a date, a job interviewer, future in-laws – and thought you hit a home run, but then learned it was only a pop fly?

You came out saying,

“I was so comfortable. I found it so easy to talk to him”. You say, “Can I kick off my shoes? My feet are killing me.” You both just laugh. You have the same sense of humor.

“We just meshed.” 

(No you didn’t!)

Imagine you’re out on a first date.

You like her and think you might want a second date. You get comfortable – too comfortable- and suddenly you’re eating off of her plate, oblivious to her expression of yuck!

My friend, Sharon, told me about her too-memorable first date.

His name was Sam. They seemed to have good energy together. Both enjoyed the outdoors and sports.

But then Sam started raving about one of his favorite activities, frog gigging. He told her it was so much fun and they should make a date to frog-gig together.

Romance isn’t the only thing that starts with a first date. EVERYTHING starts with a first date.

 

Isabella spiced up her first interview with a potential new boss by sharing a juicy, personal detail.

Emma thought she would do a better interview if she made herself comfortable. So, she rearranged the furniture.

On first dates or interviews, too much truth can quash second chances.

Why do you want to work here?

• Why do I want it? It’s something I know I can do for a while before I pursue my career.

• The practical reason–

• I’m a single mother with three children and you are only 15 minutes from my home. I can get home quickly if one of my children needs me.

• Ambition…

• I don’t know what your company does, but I’ll find out if you hire me.

• I didn’t live up to my potential and become a doctor. That’s why I have to settle for a job like this.

Random, irrelevant, and unsolicited information keep first interviews interesting.

• What’s my greatest weakness? I don’t date enough.

• My mother says I was born sloppy. My desk may look disorganized, but I can usually find what I need.

• My old boss said I’m not cut out for sales – uh, this job isn’t sales – is it?

• I don’t walk my dog enough.

Some people make first meetings more fun with complaints and gossip about ex-husbands, lovers, or bosses.

• I was carrying the weight of the real work.

• My boss was always throwing curve balls at me. It was curve ball after curve ball.
• Pressure

 

• I wasn’t working to my potential. I have unlimited potential and it’s being hampered by my managers.

• They give me too much work. I get overwhelmed when there’s too much work. Yesterday, I was so overwhelmed I forgot to sign out.

Why did you leave your past job?

• They were too rigid on their rules. What did it matter if I was five minutes late if I got my job done?

• It’s a long story….When I took the job, they told me I would only be working for one boss, but when another assistant was out sick, they expected me to fill in – and keep supporting Mr. Jones as well. I’m not two people. Did they expect me to work 24 hours a day?

Questions. On first dates or first anything, there are winning questions and losing questions.


The first interview –

• Is there any flexibility in the hours. It took me an hour to get here today and I’m not a morning person.

 The first date –

• How many kids do you want?

• Why are you still single?

• Are you going to eat all of that?

 

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The Child Who Tricked God and Other Spells Against Scary Things

When I was three years old, I learned a terrifying fact. People who had always been there and loved you could just go away. Like when my sister and brother finished school and left home. For me, it was a terrible loss and a threat. Could other people go away?

What about Mama? Could Mama go away? I devised a mantra to comfort myself. Every time Mama left to go to the store or work, I’d jump on a trunk that stood beneath the window, watch her drive away, and chant, “My Mama go. My Mama come back. My Mama go. My Mama come back.” I gradually convinced myself my Mama would never go away.

But then I learned there was something worse. She could die! What if she died?

This was a whole new fear, more terrible than all the other fears a three-year-old could have. I knew there were all kinds of scary things that could happen to me.

• I knew bad things would happen if I stepped on a crack.
• I knew I’d get warts if I touched a frog.
• I knew I’d go blind if a daddy long legs spit in my eye.

But I had ways to defend myself from them – crossing my fingers, closing my eyes, making wishes…or by running away screaming.

But all of the threats of my childhood didn’t come close to this new one. This one was serious. Too serious for crossed fingers, wishes, or running away.

I was sure God could help me if I prayed to Him. But I didn’t pray to God to not let Mama die. I was afraid if I asked Him to not let Mama die, it might give Him the idea, so I tricked Him.

“Dear God, please let Mama wake up feeling good in the morning,”

I prayed every night before I could go to sleep. I don’t remember when I stopped, maybe in high school.

But, wait! I could die too! I needed to pray to God about that as well. But I didn’t need to make up a trick prayer for that. There was already a prayer. It didn’t quite serve to keep me alive, but it would have to do. All I had to do was pray as faithfully as I prayed for Mama.

I pray the Lord my soul to keep,

If I should die before I wake,

I pray the Lord my soul to take.

I kept praying and Mama and I both lived on. I still made wishes for other things. They sometimes worked and sometimes didn’t. But prayers weren’t for silly things. They were just for protection from the unthinkable.

Now I know I wasn’t the first person to depend on chants or prayer to ward off evil (but maybe the youngest). For centuries people have done made little targeted prayers.

 “It could rain and spoil the wedding, God forbid.”

“Johnny could get hurt riding his bike, God forbid.”

“If you go out in this weather, you’ll get pneumonia, God forbid.”

Different groups have developed their own evil-avoiding rituals. Spitting seems to have been an important part of many of them.

My husband told me about the rituals that his Jewish grandmother used – mainly to avoid a keinahora, which was a curse disguised as a compliment, an evil eye. For example, if a neighbor looked at a newborn baby in his grandmother’s arms and said, “What a beautiful baby!” it was terrible. She had given the child a keinahora.

But Grandma Reuben would spring into action even before the words had completely left the woman’s lips.

“Tu, tu, tu,” she’d say, then spit.

 

Grandma Reuben was as steadfast in performing this rite as I was at my prayers. Whenever the family was in danger of a keinahora, she saved them. When Ronnie told her he got a perfect report card, “Tu, tu, tu,” and spit. When Sophie announced Joe had proposed and she was so happy. “Tu, tu, tu,” she said, and spit.

People tell me these rituals don’t work and that God doesn’t answer prayers. All I know is, for all the years I said my prayer and beyond, Mama woke up feeling pretty good in the morning.

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Paula: The Answer to a Humdrum Day in the Recruiting Office

It was a humdrum day in the recruiting office. The most exciting thing going on for HR recruiter Aaron was that he was trying to put life into an ad for a data entry job – until Paula came in to interview for a position as assistant to the Senior Vice President.

Aaron began asking questions, and everything seemed like it would be your average run-of-the-mill interview. Then he asked one question that changed everything: “I see you’ve been in your current job for only a few months. Why do you want to leave?”

Paula: I know. It’s bad to change jobs so soon, but I feel like it’s not meeting my needs.

Aaron: I’m not sure I understand why you want to change jobs. Is there a problem with your boss?

Paula: No! He’s a great boss.

Aaron: And you said the work is interesting?

Paula: It’s very interesting.

Aaron: Then why do you want to leave?

Paula: Because the building is too small.

Aaron: Do you mean you want a larger company?

Paula: No. I mean, a larger building.

Aaron: I don’t understand.

Paula took a deep breath.

“Okay. You see, I have some needs.

When I worked for Mr. Smith, the office was in a five-floor building. There were three partners with Smith and Jones, and the engineering firm on floor five was the nicest team you could want. So you can see, I had no problem.

I was taken care of in the morning, at lunch, and on my three o’clock break. I loved that building.

I would never have left that job if Mr. Smith’s wife hadn’t decided she wanted to come back and run the office.

I knew the building was small when I took this job, but I decided to give it a try. It just doesn’t work for me. As soon as I saw your office building, I knew this is a place where I can be happy!”

Aaron decided Paula was not the right candidate for the job. But he really wished he could have seen her face when she found out the EVP, G.B. Adams, would not be who Paula expected.

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The Principal’s Office – From a Third Grader’s Diary

It happened right after recess.

We were doing our multiplication worksheets when the door opened. It was Mrs. Spencer, who works in the principal’s office and I knew somebody was in trouble—she only ever comes when somebody’s in trouble.

We all thought she came for Billy Honeycutt. He’s always getting in trouble. But it wasn’t Billy.

It was me!

Everybody saw us and they knew I was in trouble.

I’d never been sent to the principal’s office before. None of my friends had, either.

The boys all laughed.

I cried even though I didn’t want to.

It was awful!

I had to sit in the main office and wait right by the door to the principal’s office—where everybody could see me! Mr. Thompson, the principal, was talking to some parents. So, I had to wait a long time, just sitting there in suspense.

Then it got worse! Billy Honeycutt came in.

He was caught sneaking out of class. Now he was in the office too, and in the very next chair! Some girls peeked in and giggled. The parents came out of Mr. Thompson’s office and saw me there–in trouble–and with Billy in the other chair. They made bad faces.

I wanted to cry again but I got mad instead because I figured out what happened –
Somebody told on me!

She’s so stuck up. She thinks she’s better than everybody else. She hardly ever speaks to me at all, even though she just lives two doors away and sees me practically every day.

Daddy said her whole family is stuck up! He said they act like they’re too good for the folks on Petain Street!

I think it’s because they have a brick house. Well, if they’re too good they ought to move away instead of staying here and telling on people and getting them in trouble.

Yeah. It was Shirley McCracken who told, all right. I remember!
It had to be because she was the only one who saw me when…

I wrote my name in the wet cement
on the new sidewalk beside the girl’s bathroom.

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I TRIED TO PUT MY BEST FOOT FORWARD BUT STUCK IT IN MY MOUTH INSTEAD

I’ve learned it on dates, in job interviews, in sales meetings, and at parties. I’d go in wanting to make a good impression and say the right thing, but instead, I’d stick my foot—smack—in my mouth.

The times when I was in new territory and didn’t know what to say were particularly hazardous. I was likely to say whatever came into my head. Mistake!

Lesson: When you don’t know what to say, nothing is the probably right answer.

When I was in high school, the captain of the football team asked me for a date. Wow! But if you’re not into sports, what can you say when there’s a lull in the conversation? Not what I said!

We were in his car after going to a movie. After chatting about our thoughts on the movie, the car became quiet. Silence was my enemy, so I filled it. I started quoting poetry. Did the guy like poetry? I didn’t ask. I just said, “I love poetry,” and launched into a poem by E. E. Cummings.

  

I couldn’t stop myself.  I spouted poems, one after another.

“the little lame balloon man whistles far and wee and eddie and bill come running from marbles and piracies, and it’s spring….”

My football hero didn’t try for lover’s lane, or even stop for a root beer float. We pulled in front of my house at 10:12 p.m. Instead of a kiss, he said, “Ruthi, I don’t think reciting poems is something you should do on a first date.”

Calamity loves company, so I have to admit I was a little bit happy when my friend, Sally, had a similar problem. It comforted me to know I’m not the only person who has ever stuck theier foot in their mouth and whooshed a relationship out the window.

Sally couldn’t understand why she wasn’t connecting with men. She wanted a comfortable relationship. She wanted to get married. But it was another Saturday night and she didn’t have a date.

Over lunch the next week, Sally lamented her situation to her friend, Joan. “I’m tired of being single. I want to get married!” 

Joan put her fork down. “Don’t you have to date first?” 

Sally dropped her chin onto her hands. “Yeah.”

“Got any dates lined up?”

“No. I meet men, but it’s always the same story. We meet, laugh, have lively conversations, and seem to hit it off, but then no dates happen.”

Sally sighed and said, What’s wrong with men?”

Joan said, “Are you sure it’s the men?”

“I don’t know. Maybe I’m doing something wrong – but I can’t imagine what. I’m going to try speed dating this Saturday. Will you come with me and see what I’m doing wrong?”

They went and Joan listened.

Sally’s  first speed-date seemed eager to meet her. He introduced himself and asked, “What are your interests?”

Sally jumped into her answer with enthusiasm,

“Dreams! Dreams predict the future. I build dream boards to guide my dreams towards the things I want to happen. My new board guides them toward sharing my life with a wonderful man who loves travel and wants a family. I pasted love poems on it, along with pictures of happy couples, traveling, dancing, and taking long walks on the beach. I found some little plastic babies and added them to the board – one in a pink blanket and one in a blue blanket.”

Leaving Sally with her foot still in her mouth, her date ran from the building.

Luckily Joan was there to help. “Don’t talk!” she explained.

Then there was Robbie, who stuck his foot in his mouth not by saying too much…but by forgetting what he said.

He learned: You have to have a great memory if you’re gonna lie to your girlfriend — or your foot can end up in your mouth.

Robbie was getting serious about his girlfriend, Sharon. But he had one more weekend fling he felt he needed to get out of his system. Friday, he called Sharon to say, “I’ve been planning to spend this weekend with you, but I have the chance to do something I’ve never done before. Some of the guys from work are going deep sea fishing and invited me to come along. Would you be very disappointed if I went?”

She said, “Of course, not. Have a good time.”

So off he went to have his deep-sea-fling.

On Monday, he called his Sharon to report: “It was great. I almost caught a king mackerel, but it got away. I had a terrific time — just us guys. I’m so glad I went.”

From that point, Robbie focused on his relationship with Sharon, and it grew.

Six months later…

Robbie and Sharon were taking a romantic drive along the river. Sharon said, “I saw a documentary last night about deep sea fishing in Florida. It looked exciting.”

Robbie opened his mouth and stuck in the foot, shoe and all.

“Deep sea fishing? That’s something I’ve never done but always wanted to try.”

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Held Against my Will – They Call it Jury Duty

9:07  I’m being held against my will. Freedom ended, for me, seven minutes ago, when a court summons brought me out of the sunshine and into the gray halls of the courthouse. Guards x-rayed my belongings and me. Now, I’m in a large gray room full of rows and rows of metal chairs and unhappy people. They call it the “lounge”.

I look at the faces around me. Most are heavy-eyed, their minds numbed by the monotony of imposed inactivity.

9:32 ANNOUNCEMENT. Those of us who are lucky enough to have laptop or iPad can leave the lounge and move to the business center. I go. It’s actually a smaller room – like a cell, and the chairs are worse, like adaptations of the medieval rack.

There are only a handful of us. We don’t complain. We don’t even speak. The quiet in our cell is interrupted by the slight clicking of nails tapping keyboards and the rustling of a newspaper. The man with the paper seems to study every line, every word, making the diversion last.

9:40 A new man comes in. He has a folder of what looks like contracts with miles of small print. He attacks it hungrily.

Speaking of which, there’s no food here and there’s no telling how long we’ll be here. I worry about the possibility of starvation, scurvy, my hair falling out from malnutrition – even though it’s been only an hour since breakfast. I touch my pocket where I hid a smuggled-in biscotti.

The minutes crawl into more minutes.

9:55  I can’t take this! Maybe I’ll make a break for it. I’ll go on the lam. I can hide out with distant relatives I don’t even like.

10:12  ANNOUNCEMENT. Return to the lounge for a roll call. The lounge is stuffed now. I notice a man who looks like Allen Ginsberg. He’s standing apart, scanning the room, as though searching for whatever truth might be found there.

Will I be called, I wonder. With every name called that’s not mine, I breathe a little prayer of thanks.

Suddenly it’s over. I’m spared. I watch the chosen march, single-file, to their fates. Is that relief on their faces? Maybe. Their not-knowing is over.

Mine is not. I’m back in my cell.

10:30 ANNOUNCEMENT. And I’m back in the lounge for another rollcall. Again, my name is not called. The tension is becoming unbearable.

10:44 ANNOUNCEMENT. Another rollcall. Name after name. Will I dodge it again? No. I hear my – it, because they replace it with a number.Number 063 – That’s me now.

#4 063

I follow the crowd out to the hall where a guard tells us to line up. near the lineAllenbreaks

I follow the crowd out to the hall where a guard tells us to line up. near the line Allen breaks

When the guard leaves, people move around. The old lady in front walks away. Wow! She’s brave.

11:05  The guard returns.

11:12 At last! The door is opening. It’s the jury room.  FINALLY, there are chairs!

We march in, and a different guard gives us forms.

I sit. But will there be permanent damage?

11:15 , maybe the warden,

and a pen  

, 063,start writing answers to the,

Up front, something’s happening?The new guard

11:22 The wardenstands and tells us

aaget out I’m free.

No. I’m not free. I jumped too soon. The warden said we can go, “back to the lounge.”

“Wait,” the guard commands“Wait,” she says again, “before you go, the forms and my”

I’d already dropped my pen by my chair, so I keep going until I hear a shout.

46 back in my cell, bored, depressed, and I search my pocket for crumbs from the log-ago eaten biscotti.

Uh, oh. I find the questionnaire that I wasn’t supposed to keep.

I’m Googling things that may disqualify me for jury duty.

Nice idea, but no.
Not so good.
I’d?

11:59 ANNOUNCEMENT. Return to the lounge. Another roll call? No. The guard says we’re finished for the day. So I can leave?  No.

“Before you leave form a line to get a voucher for your wages .”

It’s 15 DOLLARS.  Do I obey? No! I’m going to run.

I’m still holding the questionnaire. I remember what happened to the man who tried to make off with a pen. I make sure the guard isn’t looking, act like I’m picking up something from the floor, and stuff the paper into my shoe. Then I stand and walk toward the exit as quickly as I can without drawing attention to myself.

I’m nearly there. Don’t look back, I tell myself. I’m at the door, then …

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