My Civic Responsibility, and How It Shamed Me

After postponing jury duty several times (once for Noah's birth, once for the tour, and another time for the tour extension), my time was up. I had to go in.

Back in Boston, I was called into jury duty one day, and during the wait I wrote three songs ("Normal," "Starfish" and "I'm a Moron," which were later featured on my albums) and then all the prospective jurors were sent home. I knew I couldn't hope for such a productive and legally uneventful day this time. But whereas last time, I was ready to be put on a jury and miss school, this time I needed to go home right away, as it was Wednesday and we had our Kids' Choice Awards show on Friday.

Those sadistic government folks demanded I be there at 7:30am. They hate joy. And probably ponies and puppies as well.

After several hours of boredom and guilty feelings that I was far too tired to write a song, my number was called. I had to join a panel. This required a few more hours of boredom in a hallway people cluster:

Around 2pm, this motley bunch of about thirty grumbling panelists was finally escorted into the courtroom. Every single one of us had our fingers crossed under our seats that we wouldn't be called up to the jury. Twelve people who weren't me scuttled to the front.

The case was explained to us. The defendant was accused of domestic violence towards his wife and small child. He was also charged with telling his wife not to call the police, which I didn't realize was even a crime ("Honey, I shrunk the kids. Don't tell the police." -- CRIMINAL!). The details were gruesome and the outlook was bleak for everyone involved. The kind and elderly judge ran us through a questionnaire, which basically asked if we could all be objective and not be swayed by our emotions. The twelve in the box said yes.

I thought, hell no. Dude looked guilty. Supremely guilty. Like wife-and-child-beating guilty. His head was in his hands. And his attorney was a superslimeball, while the prosecuting attorney was a warm sweetheart. This does not help my brittle impartiality.

You don't have to tell me. I realize these are superficial things. I'm aware of that. But guess who makes emotion-based decisions? *hand raises*

For one reason or another, several people in the box were let go: one person used to be a cop, one person barely understood English, another just seemed really stupid.

As each new person was called from our panel to replace the nixed ones, I tensed up and prayed they wouldn't call me. Over and over they didn't.

This continued for hours until there were only five of us left in the panel. My number was called.

Boo.

I slunk up to the box and sat down. The judge asked me several questions about my background and then inquired if I had any objections that may prevent me from being impartial. I mentioned that I had a problem with the "innocent until proven guitly thing," as I had already made up my mind about who was guilty and I was going to have a very hard time being convinced otherwise. Fearing that I hadn't quite knocked it out of the park, I said that I have a real problem with domestic violence. (Of course, in retrospect, this is totally stupid. Who likes domestic violence? Who says, "I want a greek salad with red wine vinaigrette and a sprinkling of domestic violence?" or "Let's go out for dinner and a movie, and then we can come home and you can beat me?" Umm, no one. That's who. Dummy.)

The judge mercifully let me go. And while everything I said was completely true, as I walked out on my civic duty, I felt dirty.

Maybe one day I'll be called back in, when I don't have to work right away, and I can be a Righteous Crusader for Justice, slaying criminals with my brute lawfulness. Just not right now.

I avoided eye contact all the way out of the building.

I Do Not Have A Connective Tissue Disorder!

Easter Sunday was a complete blur, that began at church with my parents and ended watching an old high school friend in the national tour of Sweeney Todd. She was amazing.

Back in early October, my orthopedic diagnosed me as hypermobile with arachnodactly, which basically means that my joints are freakishly flexible and I have long fingers and toes. I also showed other symptoms that led him to believe I might have Marfans Syndrome. Marfans is mainly not that big a deal...except for the part where your joints basically fall apart due to looseness of connective tissue, and also your heart kinda explodes.

So this was something to look into.

I booked an appointment with a highly sought-after geneticist immediately after that diagnosis, and this geneticist was not available until today, March 25. That's a long wait to find out if you're gonna die soon.

After filling out an extremely thorough questionnaire (which I mailed in several months ago), with details on the history of my entire family, and another lengthy interview by a fellow today, the esteemed Dr. Rimoin entered the room, moved a couple of my joints around, listened to my heart, and basically gave me his blessing with a clean bill of health. That was quick.

He said he doesn't know what's going on with me, but it's not Marfans. And for that, I breathe a sigh of relief. Especially to know that I'm not passing it on to sweet little Noah.

And now, on to the next thing. At 7:45am tomorrow, I am to report for jury duty in the Los Angeles Superior Court. I really hope we don't go to trial, because I have to play the Kids' Choice Awards with Miley in a couple days. In order to avoid the jury, Ben says to be antisocial, creepy, and talk really slowly. Oh, also to glare at people like The Crow. I'm working on it. Something tells me "antisocial" won't be too hard at eight in the morning.