Jury Duty

I got the questionnaire sometime this past summer, so when I got a letter from the court, I wasn't really surprised. Jury duty - call the message line the night before to confirm which groups need to report. I called, yep, gotta show up.

The jury pool is told to report by 8:15 a.m. Check-in is the scanning of the bar code on the letter. We validated our parking receipts and waited for the 9:00 orientation video. We waited with novels, textbooks, laptops, crosswords, Sudoku. We watched the video, we were called to a courtroom upstairs.

While we waited outside the courtroom, some people walked by talking loudly. Turns out they were talking about the case we were to hear. So, back we went to the jury holding area. After being reassigned to a different case, we went back upstairs to the courtrooms. By this time it was 11:00.

Anyone familiar with Law and Order knows that weeding the jury down to the proper number is the next step. Voir dire is the term for questioning the jury. Questions had to do with issues like personal connections to law enforcement officials or people with alcohol problems. I was among the 12 people actually seated on the jury. The remainder of the jury pool left the courtroom and the lawyers began to present their information. The defendant was represented by a public defender, the state was represented by a single prosecutor.

Throughout the remainder of Tuesday, the jury listened, went back to the deliberation room while the lawyers spoke with the judge about various motions, had lunch, listened a little more, waited in the deliberation room for another hour and eventually was told to return Wednesday morning for closing statements and deliberation. Wednesday's activities started at 10:15 with the closing statements, instructions to the jury and the election of a foreman. Then... the power went out at the courthouse! After another hour of waiting, we were told to return on Thursday morning.

My last day of jury duty was the most difficult. Not only were we to decide guilty or not, we were to decide the penalty. The twelve of us actually worked very well together. There was a mutual sense of respect in that windowless room. And, there was an overwhelming sense of respect for the judicial system. We did find the defendant guilty. The penalty phase was a bit more difficult. I was amazed that as much as we all wanted to get back to our "normal" lives, we all wanted to carefully consider our decision and were willing to take the amount of time we needed to reach a unanimous decision. Not one person left that room unchanged by the experience of sending a person to prison for a year.

I really don't want to be on a jury again. But neither will I avoid serving if I'm called. I sure hope any other jury I serve on will be as good a working group as this one was.

Have You Missed Me?

Seems like a long time since I've put up a post! Since we last "spoke," I've been on jury duty and gone to Disney World. I hadn't thought of my life as boring but I sure have nothing to complain about for a looooong time!

So, check this space... I'll share some stories soon.

Yup, Circle Game!

Not quite 26 years ago, I flew from Puerto Rico to Virginia and introduced an almost crawling baby to the guy you see here. That's my brother Dave. He was a senior in high school at the time. We watched that baby revel in her new-found ability to rock on hands and knees. We called it "revving up!"

At the time, I remembered watching my brother "revving up" his toy cars when he was a little kid. It was a poignant moment, realizing that the boy had grown to a young man who was enjoying the sight of my first-born on the brink of self-locomotion.

The other day, my brother flew to Virginia from Arizona. I watched while my first-born introduced her first-born to her Uncle Dave. Together, the mom, grandma and great-uncle watched daughter, granddaughter and great-niece "revving up."

"Remember?" I asked. "Yup," he replied. Oh, we laughed! Hear the circle, that carousel of time?

I Love My Church

Today was our first day back on the fall schedule. That meant the 9:00 service was in full swing. Sunday school for 5th graders and younger happens during the first part of the service and the families reunite for the eucharist.

Today was about as much fun as a church full of people who appreciate children can have. In one service we had:

• a baptism - really cute little guy
• about a million kids parade in from Sunday school
• the kid who cried loudly because his brother hit him - NOT because it hurt
• the kid who picked his nose the whole time he was up front talking to the priest
• the kid who pounded on the window of the "cry room" when all the other kids were loose in the sanctuary - you could almost hear the shout of LET ME OUT!
  
• the little girl who danced ballet all the way down the aisle to communion
• the kids who "read" the service out of the hymnal until they decided all the black dots meant it was the singing book, not the reading book

This morning's service was testament to the fact that we love our kids. They bring an energy and innocence to our worship. Thank God.

Remembering

This morning I put on my flag pin and headed out the door to work. I sat at a traffic light and pondered the license plate in front of me: 940AM.

Suppose they really like that radio station?

No, it was on the Fight Terrorism plate.
I remembered all day.

School's In!

It was the Friday before school starts - open house day. Families come to find classrooms and meet teachers. Once in a while they stop by the office.

This family lives next door to me. Aren't they cute?

My church leases space to a day care center. The center has a tight budget and could not replace the aging van they use to transport kids to the local schools.

Our outreach committee voted to give the center a substantial grant toward a new bus.
Here it comes now!

On Friday, the director of the center drove kids to school in the new bus. She said she was tempted to drive it past all the other day care centers in town and HONK just to show it off.

As the bus pulls away, here's the message.
What a pleasure to be part of this gift!

What I Like About September

Peaches, apples, tomatoes and corn available on the same day at the farmers market

College football

Boxes and boxes of new crayons

Little kids wearing backpacks that are longer than their backs

School shoes

College football

Lunch boxes with cool features like nifty containers and blue ice pockets

Cool nights, warm days

Thinking about wearing sweaters again but not needing them yet

Did I mention college football?

Dahlias, zinnias and sunflowers

High school marching bands

Kids dressed in new back-to-school outfits that will feel better when the temperature is 20 degrees cooler - "But, Mom! It's my new school outfit, I don't care if it's made of wool and the high will be 80 today!"

How about you?