For the first time in my life, I was inside a federal court building on Monday. The public entrance is astonishingly unimpressive. (On the back side of the building, along the street where we lucked into a free parking spot, are several grand old doors, one set of which I think is for prisoners.) A few steps sidle up to a single set of glass doors, which open into a bootroom-sized entry. Another set of glass doors led us to a small security desk and its accoutrements.
K- and I were cleared for entry--we were asked to show ID; I had considered leaving mine in the car, for the very reason that I wanted to be able to protest if I were asked to show it, but I didn't really think we'd be asked; I was then glad I had it with me, since we were running late and I didn't want to waste time with a production. A short older man in a wilting uniform gave us directions to Judge S-'s courtroom, third floor.
It was a silent hallway. The dark-wood-of-course-paneled walls and wine-colored carpet might have had a soporific effect, had I not been so focused on the events about to unfold in the courtroom we aimed toward. No one sat, morose, on the few benches; no suited lawyers strode by with 14-inch legal pads; no fervent voices and shadowy figures haunted the grainy glass windows of all the doors we passed.
The windows of the doors to Judge S-'s courtroom were of clear glass, and K- and I could immediately see M- sitting beside his lawyer at the table on the left. This was the day of his sentencing, and we brought equal parts curiousity and desire to be supportive. He is, after all, our employer.
The judge arrived soon after we did. Before M-'s case, a prisoner in a gray and black striped uniform was led into the courtroom from the rear. He was cuffed at the feet and hands. It took one minute to grant him a continuance--through the lawyer, of course; he didn't speak at all--then he was led back out.
As he moved down the carpet, he glanced past me to some family members or friends farther down the bench--a long moment of something: sorrow? apology? request for understanding? His forehead was not wrinkled, there was no tightness in his face. His eyes were dark hazel, but seemed lighter in contrast to his skin. He had another month of being somehow a hole in the lives of those people.
M-, unshackled, in a suit of his own choosing with a lawyer and letters from doctors, received 5 months in prison, 150 days of monitored house arrest and 3 years of probation. K- and I tried to console his lady friend in the hallway afterward. Some man was handing her a business card as she began to cry. M- and his lawyer sat down in a little room, made for the purpose of lawyer and client deliberation. We left quickly. Behind us, in Judge S-'s courtroom, another man in black and grey shuffled down the aisle.
Showing posts with label people. Show all posts
Showing posts with label people. Show all posts
Wednesday, September 26, 2007
Monday, August 6, 2007
Why Crosswords are Superior to Sudoku
1. Sudoku is too much like a jigsaw puzzle. It just requires plodding through. In the trickier ones, you may try this and then that, or you may try this, try this, try that, but there's never anything to discover, only something to be fittted together. Crosswords, on the other hand, require knowledge, epiphany, luck, stunted humor, and crawling in through the window backwards.
2. Sudoku is solitary. And if you pick up a stranger's half-finished puzzle from the pocket in front of you on an airplane, you learn nothing about her. Crosswords can be a communal experience, a true entrepreneurial democracy of puzzledom.
That is to say, I suck at TV shows and you don't understand homophone jokes, so together we can mash out a most of crossword in an hour or so, along with R-, at a table in a Kansas truck stop. We're scanning for the easy stuff as the waitress brings water and coffee and orange juice (it's always late on a Sunday morning; liquid rehabilitates), then dig into the hard clues over biscuits and gravy (M-), homemade chicken soup (R-) and omelet (me). The paper is folded so just the puzzle shows, and we pass it around, as if holding the actual thing will prompt brilliance. The comics take their turns on stage, for relief, naturally, then get shoved under the toast plate, where Billy, Dolly and the Not Me ghost get jam on their hands. There's buckets of wretched coffee, musings on the meaning of "Lat." in clues, and a cameo by Dear Abby. Then we retire to R-'s tiny apartment where we battle each other on an ancient game of Tetris, occasionally jumping up to fill in another entry on the crossword puzzle as the brain sublimates caffiene into knowledge. Usually we finish the puzzle but sometimes we don't, and sometimes, at the poker game later in the week, dear, greying, reclusive R- will slide the folded newspaper from behind some sheet music on his piano and show me, under the din of pennies and beer-can-holding boys, the last strokes of insight, the final letters, the right answer.
2. Sudoku is solitary. And if you pick up a stranger's half-finished puzzle from the pocket in front of you on an airplane, you learn nothing about her. Crosswords can be a communal experience, a true entrepreneurial democracy of puzzledom.
That is to say, I suck at TV shows and you don't understand homophone jokes, so together we can mash out a most of crossword in an hour or so, along with R-, at a table in a Kansas truck stop. We're scanning for the easy stuff as the waitress brings water and coffee and orange juice (it's always late on a Sunday morning; liquid rehabilitates), then dig into the hard clues over biscuits and gravy (M-), homemade chicken soup (R-) and omelet (me). The paper is folded so just the puzzle shows, and we pass it around, as if holding the actual thing will prompt brilliance. The comics take their turns on stage, for relief, naturally, then get shoved under the toast plate, where Billy, Dolly and the Not Me ghost get jam on their hands. There's buckets of wretched coffee, musings on the meaning of "Lat." in clues, and a cameo by Dear Abby. Then we retire to R-'s tiny apartment where we battle each other on an ancient game of Tetris, occasionally jumping up to fill in another entry on the crossword puzzle as the brain sublimates caffiene into knowledge. Usually we finish the puzzle but sometimes we don't, and sometimes, at the poker game later in the week, dear, greying, reclusive R- will slide the folded newspaper from behind some sheet music on his piano and show me, under the din of pennies and beer-can-holding boys, the last strokes of insight, the final letters, the right answer.
Thursday, March 29, 2007
The Sheriff
As usual at our monthly staff meeting, two or three people were talking at once. A man walked in the door, smiled affably and passed our conference table in the front room to head down the hallway. He wore a modest, unwrinkled dress shirt and had neatly trimmed, greying hair. He spoke no greeting, but gestured toward the back of the offices, as if he had business there.
Conversation dwindled, and the eight of us stared at each other, raising eyebrows and puzzling over which one of us was expecting this visitor. Was he inspecting the HVAC system? Did someone call for a courier? Eyes turned toward our boss, who arose: "Can I help you?... Excuse me, can I help you?"
The man, whose eyes had seemed focused and sharp, began to explain that he was running for sheriff of the United States, that everyone wanted him to be sheriff and that he had a watch to prove it. His voice was clear, but he never quite finished any of his sentences.
I wanted desperately to hear everything, but he was on my periphery and N- began to talk to me directly, unnecessarily loudly, about something, a nonsequitur. I realized later that she may have been trying to protect the man from our undivided, baffled attention.
M- engaged him in conversation briefly, then managed to steer him toward the door. Some people wished him good luck on his campaign. He left the building and we could see him through the windows, walking toward the street.
The meeting went on. I still wonder why I didn't insist that we call the police. I still worry that someone was missing this man, or that someone nearly wrecked a car trying to avoid hitting him as he crossed the street (I imagined) oblivious to traffic signals. I wish I had not sat back in my chair, waiting for him to leave.
Conversation dwindled, and the eight of us stared at each other, raising eyebrows and puzzling over which one of us was expecting this visitor. Was he inspecting the HVAC system? Did someone call for a courier? Eyes turned toward our boss, who arose: "Can I help you?... Excuse me, can I help you?"
The man, whose eyes had seemed focused and sharp, began to explain that he was running for sheriff of the United States, that everyone wanted him to be sheriff and that he had a watch to prove it. His voice was clear, but he never quite finished any of his sentences.
I wanted desperately to hear everything, but he was on my periphery and N- began to talk to me directly, unnecessarily loudly, about something, a nonsequitur. I realized later that she may have been trying to protect the man from our undivided, baffled attention.
M- engaged him in conversation briefly, then managed to steer him toward the door. Some people wished him good luck on his campaign. He left the building and we could see him through the windows, walking toward the street.
The meeting went on. I still wonder why I didn't insist that we call the police. I still worry that someone was missing this man, or that someone nearly wrecked a car trying to avoid hitting him as he crossed the street (I imagined) oblivious to traffic signals. I wish I had not sat back in my chair, waiting for him to leave.
Tuesday, March 13, 2007
Walking without the cart
I tried to go to a weekly writing group for a while, but I never caught on to the performance aspect of it: everybody writes in each other's presence for 20 or 30 minutes, then reads aloud and... then things are said.
Here's something I wrote then. It's loosely based on reality.
----
Jimmy had a shopping cart. He kept it in the empty yard beside his house, and no one ever took it. Mostly he carried aluminum cans in it, sometimes glass bottles if they were pretty blue, then he’d take them to his sister-in-law over on Pine Street.
Every morning he’d shake the fog from his eyes and eat a bit of bread and peanut butter, then head over to Pine Street for some coffee with his brother, pushing his cart. Roger had a nice house and a clean old car; he was a deacon at the church. But Jimmy just somehow couldn’t do those same things Roger did, have a job, get married. He knew he wasn’t smart, he just didn’t know why. Things were harder for him. And recently his insides were hurting a whole lot. Roger’d taken him to the doctor once, but the medicine cost so much.
This old cart was getting pretty stiff and squeaky. Roger let him put some grease on it any time he wanted, but something gets so old, grease doesn’t help. But Jimmy never had to be anywhere fast, so he just walked slower. When he had a load of cans, they rattled around anyway, so it didn’t matter about the squeaks.
People all around the neighborhood would put their cans in a bag for him, tied onto their front gate or looped over a picket of a fence. Mike Wilton’s boys just threw their coke cans out in the yard. They just didn’t know it was getting harder for Jimmy to reach down and get them.
It wasn’t a big neighborhood, but it took Jimmy a couple days to get through the whole thing. In the summer, he also went down to the playground where kids hung out at night. Usually they just left 40 ounces, but sometimes he found a pile of cans. When his cart was full, Roger would haul him over to South-Central where they paid 42 cents a pound for aluminum.
One morning, early fall, Jimmy hurt worse that usual and he didn’t feel like eating breakfast. He left his cart in the yard and walked over to Roger's house. It took him longer than usual. He didn’t walk so much without the shopping cart anymore and he wasn’t so steady on his feet, first thing in the morning like this.
The dark criss-crossing of moss between bricks in the sidewalk looked like letters on a big sign, Jimmy thought. He didn’t usually see the sidewalk straight on like this. What would the sign say? Jimmy, you old man. Jimmy, what will they say about you when you’re gone?
He saw a Dr. Pepper can up ahead, but he figured he could leave it be until later, when he was feeling better. Or maybe someone else would get it, those other guys who came into the neighborhood with their big bags, picking up cans.
Just beyond the can, the sidewalk hit a new patch. The moss left off its scrawl. But Jimmy was still thinking about letters, and he was thinking that he wanted to write something. He thought he’d ask Roger to write down a few things for him, about how he appreciated people saving their cans for him. About how he still thought about his mother and the day she put her hand on the top of his head and told him he was God’s child. About his idea for a new shopping cart chassis that made it easier to get over curbs. Yes, he should get Roger to write that down.
Here's something I wrote then. It's loosely based on reality.
----
Jimmy had a shopping cart. He kept it in the empty yard beside his house, and no one ever took it. Mostly he carried aluminum cans in it, sometimes glass bottles if they were pretty blue, then he’d take them to his sister-in-law over on Pine Street.
Every morning he’d shake the fog from his eyes and eat a bit of bread and peanut butter, then head over to Pine Street for some coffee with his brother, pushing his cart. Roger had a nice house and a clean old car; he was a deacon at the church. But Jimmy just somehow couldn’t do those same things Roger did, have a job, get married. He knew he wasn’t smart, he just didn’t know why. Things were harder for him. And recently his insides were hurting a whole lot. Roger’d taken him to the doctor once, but the medicine cost so much.
This old cart was getting pretty stiff and squeaky. Roger let him put some grease on it any time he wanted, but something gets so old, grease doesn’t help. But Jimmy never had to be anywhere fast, so he just walked slower. When he had a load of cans, they rattled around anyway, so it didn’t matter about the squeaks.
People all around the neighborhood would put their cans in a bag for him, tied onto their front gate or looped over a picket of a fence. Mike Wilton’s boys just threw their coke cans out in the yard. They just didn’t know it was getting harder for Jimmy to reach down and get them.
It wasn’t a big neighborhood, but it took Jimmy a couple days to get through the whole thing. In the summer, he also went down to the playground where kids hung out at night. Usually they just left 40 ounces, but sometimes he found a pile of cans. When his cart was full, Roger would haul him over to South-Central where they paid 42 cents a pound for aluminum.
One morning, early fall, Jimmy hurt worse that usual and he didn’t feel like eating breakfast. He left his cart in the yard and walked over to Roger's house. It took him longer than usual. He didn’t walk so much without the shopping cart anymore and he wasn’t so steady on his feet, first thing in the morning like this.
The dark criss-crossing of moss between bricks in the sidewalk looked like letters on a big sign, Jimmy thought. He didn’t usually see the sidewalk straight on like this. What would the sign say? Jimmy, you old man. Jimmy, what will they say about you when you’re gone?
He saw a Dr. Pepper can up ahead, but he figured he could leave it be until later, when he was feeling better. Or maybe someone else would get it, those other guys who came into the neighborhood with their big bags, picking up cans.
Just beyond the can, the sidewalk hit a new patch. The moss left off its scrawl. But Jimmy was still thinking about letters, and he was thinking that he wanted to write something. He thought he’d ask Roger to write down a few things for him, about how he appreciated people saving their cans for him. About how he still thought about his mother and the day she put her hand on the top of his head and told him he was God’s child. About his idea for a new shopping cart chassis that made it easier to get over curbs. Yes, he should get Roger to write that down.
Thursday, December 14, 2006
The Quiet Dentist
My dentist works in half of a small brick building that looks like it has always been in that spot, trembling close to the ground while other buildings pop up around it. The waiting room has four wicker-seated chairs that could be new, or very old and scarcely used.
K-, the secretary, is also in charge of clipping the bib around patients' necks and handing them two tissues. She has a slight speech impediment and sounds as if she's chewing on her tongue when she talks. I am sure that the circa 1985 Toyota Camry wagon with the "Have you hugged your cat today?" sticker always in the parking lot is hers. However, it's possible that she came with the building and the car is the dentist's.
We found Dr. S- S- back when we had dental insurance but only one car. He was the only dentist in the Yellow Pages who was on our plan and on a bus line. Actually, he is listed after a Dr. I- S- at the same address, who I presumed was his father, perhaps dead.
Dr. S- is not a friendly man, although he can make sincere small talk for a few minutes. He doesn't smile much, which also means that he doesn't fake-smile. 1 has seen him several times and seems to like his quiet, earnest manner.
K-, the secretary, is also in charge of clipping the bib around patients' necks and handing them two tissues. She has a slight speech impediment and sounds as if she's chewing on her tongue when she talks. I am sure that the circa 1985 Toyota Camry wagon with the "Have you hugged your cat today?" sticker always in the parking lot is hers. However, it's possible that she came with the building and the car is the dentist's.
We found Dr. S- S- back when we had dental insurance but only one car. He was the only dentist in the Yellow Pages who was on our plan and on a bus line. Actually, he is listed after a Dr. I- S- at the same address, who I presumed was his father, perhaps dead.
Dr. S- is not a friendly man, although he can make sincere small talk for a few minutes. He doesn't smile much, which also means that he doesn't fake-smile. 1 has seen him several times and seems to like his quiet, earnest manner.
I used to wonder if Dr. S- became a dentist only because his father was one. His room is so small and so unchanging, though not quite joyless. A photograph his son took in 3rd grade of a bright yellow tree beside a large tombstone hangs on the wall. A window looks out toward the road.
The pale grey-green reclining chair, like the waiting room chairs, seems both old and new at the same time. I have only twice encountered another patient before or after my visit.
Why does anyone become a dentist? Today as I sat in the chair, squinting up at the ceiling, I wondered if the profession attracts methodical, obsessive people. A mouth, a domain with precise and controllable limits. Thirty-two subjects to be washed, dressed, fed and patted on the head, right to left and top to bottom. Do people become dentists because they imagine they will like the job, or because they ask, "How hard could it be?" Or do they become dentists because they need to, because they must bring order to something in this world and the mouth is a logical place to start?
Dr. S- has become noticeably greyer over the past seven years. He is entirely medium in height and build, with grey eyes and a smooth, medium-sized face and nose. His two sons differ widely in ages, the products of different marriages. I know this from our first visit, when he seemed to be trying to make us feel comfortable about bringing 1 there. My husband has never returned, saying Dr. S- is too rough in his handling of the tooth-scraping tools. This is true, or at least Dr. S- never asks if one is "doing all right."
Last month, I took 1 and 2 for a visit. While 1 was in the chair, I had to take 2 to the bathroom. We passed a second exam room, just as narrow, one that I had never known was there. The door was open, and I could see the white hair and white dentists' jacket of a man sitting, his back to me, in the patient's chair, slightly reclined, reading the sports section of the daily paper.
Surely it was Dr. I- S-, the father. Maybe he sits there every day, reading the newspaper for a couple hours. Maybe he sees a patient or two, or maybe not. Just before lunch, maybe he gets up and stands at the doorway of his son's exam room and asks him if he's hungry. Maybe they look out the window together and consider the options.
Saturday, September 23, 2006
Fool Service
This southern city has two indoor ice rinks, but this post is not about ice rinks. Maybe some other day I'll write about the absurdity of a building full of cold, or maybe that's plenty said already.
This post is about how I was driving 1 and 2 and a friend of 1 to the ice rink on the north side of town when I rashly decided to try to find my way to the ice rink on the south side of town.
I had never been to this rink before, but I could see from the address written on a coupon (burning a hole in my supremely middle-class Entertainment Book) that it was sort of close to something I might know the location of. Goaded on by protestations from the back seat--changed plans grate horribly on the nerves of my children--I pulled a u-turn and made a right onto a road that at least initially went in the direction I wanted.
After about 5 minutes, I lost my nerve and, seeing a highway number for something going north, I yanked the wheel right and sped up the ramp, hoping--trusting!--that I would soon see another sign telling me what road I was on. (Roads might be numbered, but everyone here calls them by their local names.)
Instead, I came upon a toll-booth and in the approach I realized that I had less than 50 cents in the entire car. What am I going to do? The girls are dithering in the back. What does anyone do? Will the attendant make me call home and have someone deliver 50 cents to me? Is there some sort of secret driveway that they'll let me slip down as long as I promise to return whence I came and never do this again? Do they take credit cards?
The hundredths of a mile are ticking by, the tollbooths are looming, I'm fumbling in my purse. I have 1 quarter and five pennies and my mind is counting off the words I should use as I pull up to the last slot on the right.
I began my apology and sensed right away that the attendant was fed up: "How much do you have," without even rolling her eyes, which might have been taken as a sign of commiseration. 1 called from the back, "Look on the ground!" and I made a show of peering over the edge of the door.
"There's nothing out there." She took my 30 cents without taking her eyes from mine. With some tollbooth-attendant sleight-of-hand magic, she pulled something from her back pocket, strained out the pennies and tossed two quarters into the basket. I knew it was two quarters because the only moment her eyes left mine to put the pennies in her till, I glanced over at the display as the coins tumbled in.
"Thank you," I said. Maybe I wasn't grateful enough--I admit the thought crossed my mind that the second quarter was a misguided one she herself had picked off the ground earlier--but I was truly relieved. She continued staring at me, never smiling, just a little flick of scorn? anger? at the side of her mouth. I drove away.
This post is about how I was driving 1 and 2 and a friend of 1 to the ice rink on the north side of town when I rashly decided to try to find my way to the ice rink on the south side of town.
I had never been to this rink before, but I could see from the address written on a coupon (burning a hole in my supremely middle-class Entertainment Book) that it was sort of close to something I might know the location of. Goaded on by protestations from the back seat--changed plans grate horribly on the nerves of my children--I pulled a u-turn and made a right onto a road that at least initially went in the direction I wanted.
After about 5 minutes, I lost my nerve and, seeing a highway number for something going north, I yanked the wheel right and sped up the ramp, hoping--trusting!--that I would soon see another sign telling me what road I was on. (Roads might be numbered, but everyone here calls them by their local names.)
Instead, I came upon a toll-booth and in the approach I realized that I had less than 50 cents in the entire car. What am I going to do? The girls are dithering in the back. What does anyone do? Will the attendant make me call home and have someone deliver 50 cents to me? Is there some sort of secret driveway that they'll let me slip down as long as I promise to return whence I came and never do this again? Do they take credit cards?
The hundredths of a mile are ticking by, the tollbooths are looming, I'm fumbling in my purse. I have 1 quarter and five pennies and my mind is counting off the words I should use as I pull up to the last slot on the right.
I began my apology and sensed right away that the attendant was fed up: "How much do you have," without even rolling her eyes, which might have been taken as a sign of commiseration. 1 called from the back, "Look on the ground!" and I made a show of peering over the edge of the door.
"There's nothing out there." She took my 30 cents without taking her eyes from mine. With some tollbooth-attendant sleight-of-hand magic, she pulled something from her back pocket, strained out the pennies and tossed two quarters into the basket. I knew it was two quarters because the only moment her eyes left mine to put the pennies in her till, I glanced over at the display as the coins tumbled in.
"Thank you," I said. Maybe I wasn't grateful enough--I admit the thought crossed my mind that the second quarter was a misguided one she herself had picked off the ground earlier--but I was truly relieved. She continued staring at me, never smiling, just a little flick of scorn? anger? at the side of her mouth. I drove away.
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