2016 Postmortem

Really, the place that hears my screams is my car, on the 101.

I had an experience that is probably related, now that I think about it. I got a jury summons, and when I went last Tuesday it was for a rape. Well, 2 rapes, and I remembered it from the newspaper. Those who wanted to be let off were told to stay and those of us who didn't think we would be were told to return in a week, i.e. yesterday.

Women I had not though of in years came into my mind during that week. The 14 year old who told me (then also 14) that she had been raped at age 7. The woman in college who told me she got up at about 2 or 3 a.m. to let out the cat, and the next thing she knew she had a pillowcase over her head. The woman who told me, when our firstborns were still toddlers, that she had been raped at 16 or 17 (I don't remember which) and had gotten pregnant. That one really stuck with me because she had left home early because her father kept backing her into corners and grabbing her breasts. When she realized she was pregnant from a date-rape, she told me she'd gotten an abortion, but because they weren't available in Colorado she'd gotten on an airplane and to that day could not remember where she'd gone to get it. This year, my daughter's ex-roommate, who is a lesbian...

I think of myself as a rational person, good on a jury, but I felt utterly overwhelmed. The night before I could not sleep for thinking of those women.

When it came time to state whether I thought I could be objective, and whether any of the questions on the questionnaire indicated I could not, I asked for that private conference the judge had offered. In the waiting area I chatted with a neighbor but felt my stomach clench and clench and clench. Finally I was called in to speak. "Number 5," I said. "I was the victim of a crime myself: I was sexually abused as a child." Over the judge saying, "We don't need that detail," I was already saying, "I know 4 women who've been raped. I could not sleep last night." He dismissed me "for cause," and I left, thanking whatever gods and goddesses might be that I would not have to sit through the graphic details.

How does this relate to what happened on Election Day? It was not linked in my conscious mind, but the deep psyche knows.

It knows.