One of the most wonderful moments I have ever witnessed I witnessed unknowingly, just as all wonderful moments are seen. It was sometime in the fall of my junior year of high school and I was shadowing a journalist from the Gettysburg Times for my high school graduation project. The day started off saturated and cold. Vanessa, the woman whom I was shadowing, had a normal beat of the Adams County courthouse which was, of course, located in the heart of Gettysburg. She started the morning with the presentation of a yellow folder containing a notepad (“just like the journalists in the movies!” thought my 16-year-old self) and a paper listing who and what we would be seeing on our day. Then we loaded into her perfectly messy, just-this-side-of-artistic-broke car and headed into inner Gettysburg. The sky was grey. For some reason that fact is very vivid in my head.
It was vividly grey.
She made small talk and I really didn’t want to ask too many questions for fear of bothering her, a quality not much appreciated in aspiring journalists. We parked a block or two away from the courthouse, where parking was by quarters and the congestion was limited. The walk was cold, but it made me feel powerful, I also remember that. I was walking beside a journalist, who in just a few seconds would flash her “press badge” (again, just like the movies) the the security guards she knew all too well from her everyday visits to her routine beat. Just another day on the job!
The first thing that we had to do was show a guard our phone and swipe two screens to show it was real and activated, and I remember feeling embarrassed because my lock screen picture was of me and my boyfriend kissing. What a stupid thing to be embarrassed of, in retrospect. Then we put our purses on the conveyor belt, Vanessa was bantering with the men who were all too bored with the contents of our purses, and introduced me as “the intern”. An inaccurate name, but an uplifting one. Then we crammed into the elevator and rose to the third floor, where the criminal proceedings were. People shuffled in the halls. Some there for family, some there for friends. All of them tired, like they knew these fluorescent halls better than any other. Another thing that was vivid: Vivid exhaustion. Vanessa compared the list on the wall that placed defendants in courtroom A or a or B to the list of people that she was assigned to report on.
We found our room (I can’t remember A or B, but we were in the room on the left) and entered as I was given a note of caution: the normal judge who’s in this room doesn’t tolerate a phone going off. Turn it off, because of she hears it, a bailiff will confiscate it. I complied and sat next to her on the bench in the back. I looked around and I remember thinking, This is not what I’ve seen on Law & Order. It was pale and short and was panelled with cold, light wood, a stark contrast to the warm mahogany I’ve seen on TV. Lawyers in suits shuffled with papers on desks and talked probably about their weekends in between cases.
I chewed my gum, that also felt like contraband, and waited for the gavel to bang. After about a half hour the judge entered, we stood, she sat, we sat. It began. Orange jumpsuits walked in, lawyers pleaded cases, futures were decided, translators translated. It was all very boring, really. And then a young man approached the bench. He was black and in his mid to late twenties. His case was vaguely this: He robbed a store. I don’t remember what kind of store, a voice in my head says it was a liquor store but I can’t verify that. His side was presented that he was a great kid who got mixed in with the wrong crowd. This crowd did drugs when he was supposed to be at Bible study and the poor kid got the directions mixed up. Every criminal’s sob story. My heart strings didn’t feel particularly tight and my cuticles pried for my attention. And then something happened. After some witnesses were called to attest to his character. His lawyer then said, “He has many supporters here for him today.” And the judge said, “Anyone who is here for this young man, please stand up.”
And they did.
About twenty people rose to the chorus of creaking wooden pews that I swear seemed to scream out in support for the man too. His mother, his father, cousins, aunts, uncles, his pastor, family friends, all rose in support of this man.
I got this sense that I was seeing something private. I didn’t belong there. I felt a real sense of another person’s vivid life occurring unwittingly parallel to mine. I felt small. I felt a sense of community and love that radiated from their faces. They said, silently but in unison, “We acknowledge this boy has made mistakes, but he is one of us, and we love him.” I gasped, Vanessa’s eyes grew wide. She cursed to me that she wished she could report on that. They sat back down and he got what I think was 9-12 months in prison for his crime.
Few more defendants shuffled in and out without parade, a woman’s phone was confiscated for going off (her ringtone was “Happy” which I found particularly ironic). When all was over, Vanessa chased the family of that man to get some quotes, and we were on our way. I remember that I didn’t think all too much about that man save for when she told her editor, Alex, and I told my parents in a recall of my day.
And the "Memory of the Day" was won over when there was a car chase on Route 15 that ended with gunfire (but no casualties) and we were rushed out there to get the scoop (which, yes, was very exciting because I met reporters and TV people and I got my name in the by-line, front page, above the fold, and it was a car chase for Pete’s sake!). But, I’ll never forget that man, or his family. I’ll never forget the love and support that flooded the room and what the power of family can do for a person. He changed my life. He is a secret that I’ve kept, and he is the most wonderful thing that I have ever seen.
