Jeneration X: One Reluctant Adult's Attempt to Unarrest Her Arrested Development; Or, Why It's Never Too Late for Her Dumb Ass to Learn Why Froot Loops Are Not for Dinner (34 page)

“Up to you,” he replies. “You’ve waited this long and you want a resolution, so maybe we should stay. Besides, I don’t have anything else on the docket [
Sign. SIGN. BIG FAT LANGUAGE USE SIGN.
] for the afternoon.”

“Reason enough,” I agree.

Not long after this, another woman comes out, takes one look at the line, and immediately jumps in to help. “Hi, please come in. I’m Lana, and I’m a volunteer victim’s advocate.”

At no point yet does it occur to me that the court might consider me a “victim” and not just Bothered.

I brief Lana on the situation while Fletch wanders over to help himself to coffee. When I show her my paperwork, she says, “You don’t want an Order of No Contact—you need an Order of Protection.”

“I disagree. I’m in no danger; I need to be
very
clear on that. I’m just annoyed and I need to protect myself against having my events disrupted,” I explain.

From the other desk, the woman who’s employed by the courthouse barks, “Order of Protection!”

Fletch meanders back over, blowing on his hot Styrofoam cup. “That doesn’t sound right.”

“Order of Protection!” she calls again.

The whole staff seems to agree that this could affect my business, so I begin detailing various annoyances for my Protection Order and I have to fill in all kinds of paperwork. I don’t understand why they can’t use the forms I already filled in, but whatever.

SIGN.

I’m trying to pay attention to what Lana’s saying, but there’s a woman next to me who keeps talking about safe houses and being thrown down the stairs and, frankly, it’s hard to concentrate. All my instincts say to grab this woman and bring her home to live in my guest room.

After we finish, Lana tells me, “We’ll get you your court date now, so follow me.”

Um… what?

Fletch and I flash each other confused looks while we pass
down a long hallway. We enter a room that looks a lot like a courtroom.

That’s because it IS a courtroom.

I’m placed in a row with a number of women, many of whom seem to be bruised or missing teeth. Fletch is ferried off to the seats in the back and I notice that he’s the only man in the room who isn’t the judge, the bailiff, or the defendant.

Woo-hoo-hoo, chh-chh-chh, hah-hah-hah.

I don’t understand what’s happening with the pregnant lady with the black eye currently standing in front of the judge because everything she’s saying is going through an interpreter. However, I get the gist of it when her
esposo
comes shuffling out in an orange jumpsuit, shackled at the hands and feet.

Oh, dear.

I’m now fully convinced that my victim’s advocate had absolutely no idea what she was doing and that I
should not be here
. Yet I have no idea how to extricate myself.

The judge confers with the translator and then bangs his gavel, saying that a two-year order of protection has been granted. The translator tells the woman this, but instead of being happy, she starts to cry slow, fat tears down her face and all I want to do is hug her. I feel sick about this poor woman being stuck in a country where she can’t speak the language, watching her only form of support being hauled back off in chains because he’s a fisty douche bag.

Kind of puts that whole Bothered thing into perspective. The minute I get out of here, I’m finding a battered women’s shelter and writing them a check.

While this is happening, the woman who’d been in the other room with me sits down next to me. In her lap she holds five sheets
of paper, each line filled with details on how her husband beat her and threatened her life.

Suddenly Fletch’s expensive woodworking habit seems charming and endearing, not annoying.

Okay, universe, message received.

I’ve gotten plenty of perspective. Now
please get me out of here
.

The next case is called and a woman approaches the judge and says she’s mad at her husband because, “He be drinking all the time.”

“Has he physically harmed you in any way? Does he threaten you? Has he threatened to harm your children?” the judge prompts.

She considers this for a moment. “No. But he be drinking all the time and I don’t like.”

Her husband interjects, “I don’t be drinking all the time. I go to work all day, six days a week. When I get off work, I like to drink because I be working all the time.”

The expression on the judge’s face hovers somewhere between aggravation and resignation. If the past five minutes is any indication of what he has to listen to on a daily basis, then I’m totally voting for judges to get a pay raise during the next election. “So what you’re telling me is you’re not in any physical danger and there have been no threats. Ma’am, I have to ask—what is it you’d like for me to do?”

The wife replies, “Make him stop drinking all the time.”

And that’s when Fletch lets out a bark of laughter that’s so loud that every single person in the courtroom turns around to look at him. He tries to cover it up with a coughing fit, but no one’s fooled. [
Hey, Bravo? Bet you wished you’d approached me for a reality show right about now, eh?
]

The judge decrees a two-week Order of Protection, yet when they’re done, the couple walks out holding hands.

I weep for their children.

Then, it’s my turn. Lana accompanies me to the bench and gives me a couple of reassuring pats on the arm, sensing that I’d like to die right now, but probably not for the reasons she thinks.

The first words out of my mouth are, “I’m in the wrong place.” I explain how I’m here only upon the advice of counsel and that maybe I should have consulted someone other than a real estate attorney.

The judge assures me I’m in the right place, but it seems more like a technicality he’s obligated to honor, rather than any sort of tacit approval. I briefly touch on My Mailer and why I’m exasperated, stressing again and again that I’m not in any danger, except possibly from having a stress-induced stroke, and, really, it’s not like my butter and heavy cream intake are helping my whole artery situation.

The judge removes his glasses and rubs his eyes. I can’t say for sure, but I’d guess if it were allowed that he’d like to punch me in the face even more than Mr. and Mrs. Be Drinking All the Time.

“Ms. Lancaster, I’m not going to grant your order and I’m not going to deny it. What I will do is give you a court date so that you and Your Mailer can give your sides of the story.”

Um, wait, no.

I want to AVOID her. I want to be NOT NEAR HER. I want to SWIM THE FUCK AWAY FROM HER. I do not want to have a day in court with her.

Crap, crap, crap. How do I get out of this?

The judge pages through his calendar. “I’m going to have you back here on April eighth.”

I shift in my loafers and twist my pearls and I start making statements in the form of questions. “Ooh, that’s kind of a problem? You see, Your Honor, there’s a banquet for me that day? My alma mater has named me one of their Distinguished Alumni for 2011, so I’ve got to be there? I’m the keynote speaker?”

That’s when the judge basically kicks me in the ’nads with his eyes. He says, “Well.
Congratulations on your award.
Might there be another date that would work when you’re not being honored?”

And then I die.

We figure out a time and I pretty much run out of the courtroom once I receive my paperwork.

“What THE HELL was THAT?” Fletch shout-whispers as soon as we’re out the door.

I turn to Lana, who’s still next to me, rubbing my arm.

REALLY NOT USEFUL RIGHT NOW, LANA.

I blurt, “This needs to
not happen
. How do we make this
not happen
? Can we withdraw the complaint?”

Cheerily, Lana replies, “Gosh, no. Now that you’ve seen the judge, it’s an official action of the court and a public record.” When she realizes
I’m
kicking her in the ’nads with my eyes, she adds, “If you choose not to pursue the matter, just don’t show up for your court date. Your case won’t be heard and the case will be dropped.”

So then it’s settled.

Denial it is.

I wish I had some snappy resolution to share about My Mailer, but I don’t. The situation is impossible with no chance of improvement and she did nothing to endear herself after her (solo) day in court where she later gloated how she “won my case against you.” It wasn’t worth the effort to respond that as the defendant, she didn’t
have
a fucking case. Also, I guarantee the judge didn’t say, “I was going to rule for you even if she did show up,” because admitting a preconceived bias towards one of the litigants is the kind of statement that gets you removed from the bench.

Regardless, because my professional events are on private property, we’re able to prevent her from causing another scene and that’s resolution enough, so basically, the show’s over. [
Apparently she’s been trying to contact Oprah to settle our dispute. As this is Oprah’s final month of filming, perhaps she’ll bump her interview with President Obama and Tom Cruise to accommodate us.
]

My big takeaway has been a newfound respect for other people’s privacy. The idea of strangers sorting through my dirty laundry (metaphorical or otherwise) makes me super-squirmy. With Karma being the bitch that she is, I’ve learned that if I have the expectation of privacy, I can’t keep invading that of others.

No longer being Gladys Kravitz isn’t easy because temptation (and information) exists everywhere. Some days all I want to do is Google stalk the new family on the corner with the expensive house and the cheap, cheap, seriously-what-were-they-thinking plywood fence they just built, but their business is none of mine.

I keep telling myself to snoop not, lest I be snooped and so far, I’ve kept those compulsions under control. And that makes me feel like I’ve taken another positive step towards full-blown adulthood.

But if I ever do meet those people with the amateur fence, I might mention that Fletch does woodworking.

Just because I’m a nice neighbor.

W
hen I told Fletch nothing could be more simultaneously boring and terrifying than meeting with the tax attorney, I was wrong.

That’s because we hadn’t yet met with the estate-planning law firm.

At least with the tax guy there was some raucous laughter, although it primarily emanated from him once he saw the mess our discount ex-accounting firm created.

I’ve said it before and I’ll say it one final time:

Never economize on handbags, parachutes, or CPAs.

Fortunately, there’s little a healthy retainer fee can’t fix, so all’s well in that department.

Anyway, today we’re in this white-shoe law firm discussing
what’s going to happen when we die. I hate that we’re here, I hate what we’re talking about, I hate how much it’s going to cost, but it’s got to be done. At this juncture in our lives, we need an estate plan more elaborate than the cocktail napkin where I drunkenly scribbled “I leave everything to Maisy!!” before doodling a bunch of bananas and a sheep. After canceling and postponing this appointment more times than I care to mention, here we are.

The tenor of the conversation has my palms sweating, but they’re not visible because I’m currently sitting on my hands. See, last week I discovered that OPI makes nail polish called Jade Is the New Black. I normally have an aversion to any color polish that couldn’t double as lipstick, but come on, with a name like that I couldn’t not buy it! I brought the bottle to my manicure yesterday and now my nails are an exceptionally festive shade of green.

Considering I spend ninety-nine percent of my time either in the pool, at my desk, or going to the grocery store, I figured I could get away with a goofy color for once. That is, until I shake the estate planning attorney’s hand and feel exactly like the kind of asshole who thinks green nails are a fine idea.

Perhaps when we’re done here, I’ll have my name tattooed on my neck and paint a rebel flag on the hood of my car before allowing my children of dubious, multiple parentage to wrestle free-range in the back of my pickup truck while we head to the minimart to procure the ingredients for tonight’s dinner—Wonder Bread sopped in meat grease.

Fortunately, I’m not sure the lawyer notices the polish color because of my outfit. I wanted to be dressier than my usual khaki shorts and alligator shirt, so I went to put on one of the sweater-set/sundress items I normally wear on book tour. That’s when I realized that every piece of appropriate clothing I owned had not only
been sitting at the bottom of the dry-cleaning basket since I finished touring three months ago, but at some point had been used as a litter box, likely when I accidentally shut Chuck Norris inside the closet.

I panicked and began to paw through the rest of my wardrobe, quoting Cher Horowitz as I made a vain attempt to find my “most responsible outfit.” I settled on a white pair of Capri pants, a flowered pastel tunic sweater, and a pair of silver sandals topped with a big silver cabbage rose, all of which I’ve previously worn separately without issue.