My Day in Court

About six weeks ago, I was driving on the looong stretch of one one lane country road I take every day to get into "town". I was enjoying some music and some non crying time from the baby in the back. All of a sudden I hear a siren. I look behind me and notice a policeman. I pulled over, expecting him to pass me and...he pulled in right behind me.
He was a handsome, young policeman. He came to my window. At this point I was so shocked, I didn't have time to cry or anything!
He said, "Ma'am? What's wrong with you?" -in a good country drawl.
Me, "Uhhhh nothing?"
blah blah blah all the ticket stuff.
He comes back with a ticket (notice that it is now too late to make any excuses).
He keeps shaking his head at me and says.
"Ma'am. I don't understand it. I know you're stressed with a baby and all. I've got two of them myself. But I clocked you at 62 in a 50 turned around, and put my lights on. I followed you for a mile and in that mile you sped up to 65! You had to have seen me!"
Blank stare and I'm starting to feel stupid.
I should have said that my rear view was positioned down so I could see the baby...but no I was too chicken to talk!

" Ma'am. I just want you to be safe, and to make the roads safe. Going that speed, you could kill a granny walking to get her mail, or hit a child coming off the bus...I just want you to be careful! You've got some precious cargo back there!

Waaaaaa....I started bawling. And saying, "Thank you so much for giving me a ticket! Thank you so much for giving me a ticket!"

I think he was scared! Ha!

Fast forward 6 weeks and it's finally come to my day in court. The dreaded day. In my head, I was going to have to go before a jury and take an oat and sit in the witness stand...


I went to lunch with my sweet friend Emily who is overdue and and over pregnancy. We had a sweet time (well, in between cleaning up epic messes from our boys:-). Somewhere in Chick fil a, I dropped a check that I needed to cash that day.

I get in the car (which gets messier by the day) and look for it everywhere. No where to be found. Go back in and check the garbage. No where. So I have to call this lady and ask her to put a hold on it. She informs me she has to go into town to the bank to do it and it cost $15:-( So I felt awful about that. Then I realize that my ticket, with all the info on it is gone too. I looked and looked. Tried to drive home to check there but didn't have enough time.

Right before getting out of the car, I scratch a scab on my face which was from Barclay scratching me to begin with. It bleeds everywhere! All over my face, on my eyes, on my clothes. Thankfully I had wart band aids in the glove compartment. Thankfully I was smart enough to remove the medicated part of the band aid.

I rushed to the courthouse, which was a MAZE! Thankful a toothless biker guy helped me. All this time I was carrying Barclay on my hip (WHAT was I thinking?!). I think I thought I could get sympathy or something? Instead I felt sorry for myself.

Went through security. It's hot, there are a lot of INTERESTING people around. If I had not been so trying to keep up with my toddler, I would have thoroughly enjoyed people watching. All around me little snippets of "my fourth DIU...I hope they don't throw me in jail..." It was weird being with a mass of people who were in trouble. And so was I.
I will say that Barclay brought a lot of JOY to everyone! It was sweet to see people who were mad and pissed off smiling at him.
Right before we go into the courtroom, Barclay exploded in his diaper. I had been just waiting all day for it. I then tried to find the bathroom (did I mention it was HOT in there?). The policeman told me to go there...and pointed to a wall. I must have looked so stupid because I was trying to get this wall to open. It had hinges, it had a bathroom sign. But no door knob. I tried and tried and got really frustrated. I asked the police again (and they weren't too patient), he freaked out and sent me AROUND the wall to the very obvious bathroom. I think it was a gun closet or something I was trying to open.

After cleaning B up I rushed outside and poured into the courtroom. We had to wait a while and it took everyone forever to figure out the flow of things. During this time, Barclay was fussing and trying to run away and screaming and laughing. I'm tyring to keep him quiet with my poorly prepared diaper bag.
"Barclay, look how cool this hand sanitizer bottle is! You can put it in your cup, you can roll it on the floor..."
Finally he learned that sucking on the top of his sippy cup without the bottom on it, resulted in funny noises. And...everyone kept looking at me.

Then we stand in line and Barclay is freaking out. So what do I do? I flip his sippy cup over and start playing the drum on it and I started dancing in front of 300 people. Whatever it took.
Got my ticket and I feel really ready for a nap at this point. Go to pay it, and I had to have cash (who carries $160 of cash around? Smart people, that's who). Had to go put B in the car seat and he is maaad. Go the bank where I take out the cash then go back and get out of thec ar with the sleeping baby (basically it was a power nap wasted!), go pay it.

Long ordeal and I'm glad it's over.

Moral of the story...don't speed.