Jury Duty

February has flown past and here it is almost the end of the month and so many of my monthly tasks remain undone. February is personally busy because of my husband’s birthday and our “date anniversary” of the 13th; on top of that we were busy with a charity wine tasting in San Francisco (for the Mission YMCA) and the usual round of new listings, photography for said listings and showings on those and other listings. And then yesterday I was called for jury duty in Ukiah.

We spent Van’s birthday in the Berkeley area; it is his mom’s birthday also, so we all stayed overnight down there. The big event was going to a Warriors game at what I can’t help but still call the Coliseum, but is now named Oracle Arena. The Warriors led for most of the game and it wasn’t very exciting, until the fourth quarter, when suddenly they were neck and neck and the game literally game down to the last second when the Warriors made a basket, broke the other team’s lead and won the game. Whew. I enjoyed myself thoroughly!

Our date anniversary is the 13th, when, for our first date, I met basically all of Van’s immediate family (son, daughter, soon to be son-in-law) and then attended a Valentine’s dance. For this anniversary, we simply had dinner at the MacCallum House in Mendocino.

My call for jury duty was more interesting than I had anticipated. I have served once on a jury in the mid-1990’s, a Superior Court trial in Oakland. This time I was one of probably 70-80 folks called; 45 were actually selected and sent to the courtroom. I had shared a ride with another Boonvillian, so once I was freed, I went up to the courtroom to watch/listen to the proceedings.

The first thing I noticed was the interesting people to be found in our County. So many different people with so many different livelihoods; single, married, with grown children or small children or grandchildren. At one point Judge Faulder made the comment that the hardest part of his job was not being able to ask more questions and get to know these folks better – and I have to agree as I wanted to know them more too!

The procedure of general questions followed by more specific ones from the attorney’s was interesting; it also brought about considerations of who would be released and who wouldn’t. There were no surprises in those that got released due to answers given but there were surprises for folks who seemed innocuous but that the attorney’s deemed a poor fit for this particular trial. My friend was called up for the second round but was released fairly soon and we were on our way home. I’m still curious to know the outcome of the trial, not that it was very “sexy” but that it was like a story with the ending left off.

So it has been a full month, with a couple of days to go. It’s going to be raining but spring is on it’s way.