my day in court

The biggest problem with looking up records at the courthouse isn’t the ban on camera phones, even if this means you have to dig up fifty cents to store yours in the line of lockers near the entrance. (This also means that the courthouse foyer rings and vibrates regularly.) Nor is the biggest problem the computer system, which is slow and furnishes records in all dialects of gibberish—everything, it seems is written in acronyms. Someone has taped a translation sheet above the computers, but the list is incomplete and I’m not sure what the terms stand for anyway.

It is a bit of a trial to fill out record requests—you must write your name, address, and phone number on every request, which means, presumably, that the people I am looking into could just as easily look into me. Fair is fair, although I don’t know about the rule that limits requests to five per person per hour. Left alone with the files, there is a moment of panic when the papers slip off the folder’s metal prongs, for the clerk has said that under no circumstances should you remove any items from the files. Furthermore, while looking at the files, you may only write with a pencil. Copies cost enough so that I’m sure they rarely have to make them. 

Spelling is worrisome. It is a testament to the severity of the file clerk’s lecture that I restrain myself from taking my pencil and correcting the errors. I think of the person who stacked the papers, of all the stamps and signatures and motions that have been plunked and flourished and filed and are now tucked onto the shelves of the Washtenaw County Courthouse.

But really, the worst part about looking up court records is that there is just too much going on. There are restraining orders and name changes and overdue fines. There are defendants coming in after court appearances, and lawyers clicking around in business shoes. There are, like yesterday, two gentlemen, baseball caps wound to 7 o’clock, entering their own names into the records system.   

“This isn’t no felony,” says the one.

His friend glances at the screen. “It is if you do it more than once,” he replies. He types in another name. “I’m gonna look at your dad’s file,” he tells his friend. Fourteen records—some of them minor traffic infractions, but he’s still astonished.

The son looks over. “He got another one in 1986?” he asks.  A 1987 charge involves possession of a short-barrel shotgun. “I wish I could bring this to my momma,” says the son. “I’d be like, ‘You remember this?’” 

“Oh, she remember it all,” says his friend. He skims his records. Of the twelve incidents on the list, three are for domestic violence.

lead, stick figures, and a bagel or two

The Fundred Dollar Bill Project hopes to clean up lead contamination in New Orleans. At the time I wrote this story, soil-based lead was the city's primary toxic waste concern. Of course, thanks to offshore drilling (and, by default, my commute to work), that is no longer the case.

Want to design your own fundred? The art advocacy project has only collected 10.6% of its goal, and could certainly benefit from a few more bills.

A few fundred ideas:

Stick figures. For those, like Brian Banks, who declared himself to be a "stick figures kind of guy." Banks is an academic advisor at the University of Michigan’s School of Art & Design. He's been working there for awhile, so he's not too concerned about the discrepancy.

Portraits. One student at the School of Art and Design drew a fundred in honor of Banks, entitled "The Fundred Man." (Banks orchestrated the Ann Arbor fundred pick up, which included both the university and area schools.) Banks showed me the drawing, confessing that he thought the ears and neck were too big. "That looks like Will Smith!" he said, proving that artistic talent does not necessarily a critic make.

Peace signs. They are still as popular as they were during my tenure in elementary school. Overall, though, the fifth grade class I visited while working on this story was ambivalent about the project's success. One ten-year-old told me he was pretty pessimistic about the whole affair--the government, the environment, collective responsbility. He also told me that "lead is a metal and comes in three different forms."

Coincidentally, it was "wacky hair day" at Thurston Elementary. One girl was wearing bagels at the base of her pigtails. When I saw her at lunchtime, one bagel was missing. "It fell on the floor," she said. "I didn't eat it."