Missouri

Life or Death

/ Missy Goodnight / Leave a comment

Both Jerimiah and I have been called to jury duty. Both times it was in the State of Missouri, and both times neither of us had to serve. It wasn’t that we didn’t want to. We understand the value of this particular civic duty, and would normally welcome the chance. It was just that, umm, well yeah, it was that we didn’t want to. For two very different reasons.

I was asked to serve first. On August 9th, 2011 I was served with a Federal Court summons to appear for jury duty for the State of Missouri. It was exactly five days after I found out that my daughter, the one I was carrying inside of me, had a chromosomal disorder called Trisomy 18. When I pulled the jury notice from my mailbox that evening, I had just came home from spending the afternoon crying in my doctor’s office while she explained that what I was about to go through was considered a “late-term abortion,” but insisting that she supported my decision. Until this point, it was the worst day of my life and I thought it couldn’t get any worse, then I opened the mailbox. I walked into the house, slammed my jury summons onto the counter and yelled to no one in particular, “Are you fucking kidding me?!”

It felt like the world was conspiring against me. Later that night while Jerimiah and I sat on the couch, a two-year-old Jackson taking his evening nap between us, we laughed for the first time in weeks. We laughed at how absurd it was that in this middle of this shit storm that we found ourselves in, that I was served with a jury summons. I don’t remember who started laughing first, but I know it felt really good.

The next day I called the State of Missouri and a curt woman on the phone informed me that it was a grand jury trial that I had been summoned to, and that I needed to be in Jeff City for the pre-trial hearings. That was the state capital, over two hours away. I asked the date, and the woman said the exact date I was expected to be in the hospital delivering my baby, who was the size of an avocado. I laughed. The State of Missouri did not. Rather, she told me that short of a “life or death situation” I was expected to be there. I told her that I was having a late-term abortion that day, did that count as life or death? Then the State of Missouri and I sat silently on the phone for several moments until she said, “A doctor’s note will do.”

Jerimiah’s summons came from Taney County, Missouri several months later, a coincidence we’ve always wondered about. Taney County was the place we had lived for nearly five years. The place our son was born. Where our daughter had died. The place, up until those last few months, that we thought we would always call home. He didn’t try to get out of it, couldn’t even if he wanted to. He didn’t have a “Get Out of Jury Duty Free” Card. He wasn’t an only parent. His job allowed him to be away. He wasn’t having a late-term abortion. So Jerimiah had to show up to for the jury selection, but he didn’t mind because he was actually a little intrigued by the whole process.

The day he had to show up for jury selection, we met that evening at the local McDonalds (the really clean one with the awesome playground) because Jackson had a playdate with his best buddy in the ball pit. While my friend and I discussed what our toddlers had been up to that week (they had both simultaneously, unbeknownst to each other, tried to eat dog poop the day before) we watched Jerimiah saunter into the play place, and I immediately knew something was wrong.

He sat down in the seat next to me and I asked what happened. I was afraid he’d been picked to serve and that he really didn’t want to. Too much going on at work, our new-ish desire to relocate, the very fresh loss of our daughter, there were a millions reasons why his mind or his heart probably wasn’t in a felony burglary trial or whatever it was.

Thats’ when he told us that he had been relieved of jury duty upon the defendant’s attorney telling the judge that Jerimiah, potential juror #8, had “made a face” when the account was read aloud. What kind of face did you make? I pressed, laughing a little, because he does show his emotions, even when he tries hard not to.

“I guess it was shock, or disgust, or…” he trailed off. He didn’t know what the face was, but at some point he was taken into the courtroom with 11 other people, placed in the jury box and told details of the case with the judge, the prosecuting attorney, and the defending attorney present. What was the case, my friend and I wanted to know. Jerimiah explained that the case was over an accusation that a 12-year-old girl made. I sucked in my breath. The girl was accusing her stepfather of repeatedly raping her over numerous years. And there it was, the face back on him. It was shock, and disgust, and well, it was anger. He had already made his mind up about the case. He was going to sentence the step-father to prison. To death, if possible.

We all sighed a long sigh. I put my hand on his arm in a comforting way, and he tried to smile, but hearing about that little girl, well that stung. It stayed with him for some time too, and obviously it has stayed with me, because here I am sharing it with you nine years later. The sadness. The cruelty. The insanity in this world. Sometimes it all feels like too much, even for the strongest of us.

Jerimiah and I were never called for jury duty in Missouri again. Likewise we were not called in North Carolina, and have yet to be called in Georgia, but I’m sure our time is coming again. And when it does we will answer our civic call. Until then, we will reflect on the other two times, and do our best to stay positive in a world that just makes it so damn hard sometimes.

M.

KC to STL

/ Missy Goodnight / Leave a comment

There is a stretch of I-70 that takes you across Missouri, from Kansas City to St Louis, in less than three hours. Well, Siri told me it takes three-and-a-half hours, but you know how I do. I have traveled this stretch of highway more times than I can count, starting with the first time I recall making the trip, when I was invited to a weekend away with my friend Amanda and her parents in middle school. Or maybe it was high school? I don’t exactly remember, but I do recall that we were young enough to be entertained by both the glass elevators at The Embassy Suites and choosing which flavor of Ben and Jerry’s to buy for a night of movies and ice cream in our hotel room. I’m a Phish Food girl, pretty sure Amanda was a Chunky Monkey or maybe a Cherry Garcia.

Speaking of Chunky Monkey, on a spur of the moment weekend getaway with my friend Rachel on this same stretch of highway, we were walking back to our hotel room from visiting the Arch and having dinner, and it was dark, and we noticed a crack of light coming from a window. We were walking and laughing, and I was in front of Rachel on the small sidewalk, so I looked inside the window, as one does, as I passed by. Then for a split second I froze. I wasn’t sure at first what I was looking at, then it hit me. There was a porn playing on the television in the room, and sitting on the edge of the bed was a naked, middle-aged man, and he was masturbating. A couple full seconds later, I sped past the window and motioned to Rachel to look inside. She stopped in her tracks for a moment, a little scared at what she might see. I should add here that Rachel and I we were young, 17 and 18, respectively. This was the absolute first time we had ever seen this before. Rachel crept up and peeked in, and her jaw hit the ground, then we ran to our room laughing. We talked until we fell asleep about how dumb that “old” man was to have accidentally left the curtain open. Oh how dumb we were to think that a middle-aged man would “accidentally” leave a curtain open…

So yeah, I’ve had some fun on this particular stretch of highway between Kansas City and St. Louis. A lot of people have. Because this stretch of interstate connects Kansas City, Columbia, St. Louis, and it’s estimated that almost 20,000 cars drive on it daily. Not across the state, but somewhere on this “radical, socialist” highway. 🙂 This is the easiest and fastest way to transverse the entire state of Missouri, though it isn’t the prettiest. It’s actually really, really boring. Not to mention the fact that you pass MU (University of Missouri) and eww. Be careful there. #TigersSuck They are also kinda rude and a little snotty. Like wannabe New Yorkers, but without the actual street cred.

All I’m saying is, if you wanna see the real beauty of the state of Missouri (and yes, there is beauty in the state of Missouri) just don’t take I-70 from Kansas City to St. Louis. But if you’re forced to, head toward Kansas City, not away from it, as Kansas City is the better of the two places. Unless you haven’t been inside the Arch, well then do that, but just once. Know that it’s awkward, and claustrophobic, and when you get to the top, and if the wind is blowing strong that day, you can feel it. But the views are pretty cool! If you’re into views.

Anyway, this particular stretch of Highway has been around, so it does have some problems. A lot of construction a lot of the time, but it was the first installment of President Eisenhower’s “radical, socialist-propaganda” called the Interstate System. Missouri was actually an early adopter of this system, probably because they knew they’d have to play a major role in any cross country trip. They were already home to historic Route 66 (and the first ones to lay the road) and they knew what an interstate could do to their economy. In fact, the state was awarded a contract for work on US 40 (I-70) on August 2, 1956, and became the first project to be awarded and work initiated after the signing of Eisenhower’s act. So the state of Missouri has a claim on “two firsts,” both the first to build Route 66 and the first to build Interstate 70. Pretty cool, Missouri, pretty cool.

So there she sits. A long, stretch of Highway that crosses Missouri at its least interesting points. It’s rolling hills are pleasant enough, but, and there’s a big but, if you ever find yourself transversing the old “Show Me” state on I-70, take a couple of those detours. Not the forced ones due to construction, rather the “backroads,” of the area. Get lost. Go off the grid. Missouri is bound to surprise you. It’s always surprised me.

M.

Home is Where Your Shit Is

/ Missy Goodnight / 1 Comment

We were driving back to Atlanta last weekend, after being in Southern Missouri for a week, and my husband and I were talking about that word Home, and what it means to us. You see, Southern Missouri used to be our home. We lived there for 10 years. We graduated college there. We were married there. We started our little family there. We made everlasting friends there. His mother still lives in Southern Missouri, and we go back to visit from time to time. And when we go visit we say, as we do when we go to Kansas, that we are going home. But lately, I have started to feel different about Southern Missouri. About all the places I have lived before. And over the last few months when someone asks where we are from, I have caught myself saying that we are from Charlotte. And I have been trying to figure out why.

I mentioned this to my husband, while we shoved our mouths full of road trip food and tried to stay awake in the searing dusk. I told him that I think I give that word too much power. That the older I get the more I realize that I am lost and that I don’t really know what makes something, or someone, feel like home. I told him that we use our home too often as a way to define who we are and what we can accomplish. I told him that seems somewhat limiting. He told he wanted to sleep in his own bed. Truth be told, I did too, but I was more caught up in the places I have called home, and how even when I go back to those places, I yearn to be back to my current home.

Living in Atlanta isn’t so bad. In fact, I had built it up to be this monster of a place, and really it isn’t any different than any other city. It has its “good” parts and its “bad”. It has sweet, kind people. And it has people who scare you a little. It has great drivers, and crazy, aggressive drivers. It is just a lot of people, from a lot of different homes, mixed up together in a tiny area trying to get by. And honestly, it feels surprisingly good to be a part of the ebb and flow of the ATL. It, dare I say, feels like home?

So how can Southern Missouri, and Leavenworth, Kansas, and Charlotte, North Carolina, and Atlanta all feel like home to me? The closest I can come up with is the people I am doing this damn life with are my home, and while there are some constants, my husband, my son, my dog, there are other people too. There are the neighbors. The ones in our cul-de-sac now are not that different from the ones who were on our street in Charlotte. We have Mr. Charlie, and Mrs. Kim, and Chris and Christy, and yes even Ginger and Scooter. And they smile and they wave. They check on our house when we are gone, and they pull our trash cans up from the curb if we forget. There are whole communities and lovely people inside each of the places we have called home.

There is my favorite Target, and the one I will go to in a pinch. There is the good Dunkin and the bad one. The clean Kroger and the dirty one. There is that coffee shop at the corner where people sit for a spell and talk about their day. There is that game store that sells comic books and Magic cards. There is IKEA, and TJ Maxx, and Walmart. Dear Baby Jesus, there are the Walmarts.

There are the neighbors who wave and those who don’t. There are the moms in the PTO who are a little crazy, but manage to get it all done. There are the teachers who love your kid like crazy, and the ones you wonder about. There are the post office employees who keep smiling, even when they really want to hit that woman in front of the line who doesn’t know how stamps work. There are the pharmacists who tell the same thing to 100 different people every day. Yes, this pill might make you sick to your stomach. Take it with food, please.

There are the brainwashed Chick-fil-A employees, and the Jesus Saves guys on mopeds. There are the little women who ask which church you belong to and would you like to come to Sunday service? There are dads mowing lawns in New balance sneakers, yelling about gas prices, and how hard it is to start this damn weed-eater, I swear I’m going to buy a new one soon.

There are people asking for money with signs that say, Veteran and Anything Helps. There are the drug dealers who deal in dime bags and the ones who deal in cartel meth. There are the women who wear too much perfume and the ones who insist on make-up to workout. There are the teenagers sneaking a six-pack down to the river, so they can listen to music and make out with that red-headed girl.

And all of these people live in all of these places. And all of these places are home. Someone’s home. And in the end, it doesn’t matter so much which home was yours. Which one you wanted to belong to, which ones you never did. Because for as much as each of these homes is unique, they are also so very much alike. And sometimes we forget that. And sometimes we need a reminder.

“I think maybe home is where your shit is,” I told my husband somewhere between Tupelo and Birmingham.

He smiled. “I think you might be right.”

M.