Open and Closed

And so this evening, I'm on the phone with the Venerable Mother, and we're talking about jury duty. Which she has tomorrow. Here in St. Louis, it's done pretty efficiently. I actually served in September of 2002 on a two-day trial.

So we're discussing the particulars of our different Missouri counties, and somehow I mentioned the voir dire process and what they asked me. One of the questions was "Do you believe that a person can be in chronic pain?"

The answer is yes. And I believe that my answer of "yes" is the only thing that kept me on the jury panel. And the reason for the yes is that my father had some pretty bad back problems stemming from multiple things including a back surgery around 1981. He was diganosed with arachnoiditis, retired early, and had to complete a daily regimen of exercises just to slow the increase in symptoms. But this is actually a digression. My mother asked me about me and TMJ, which is a byproduct of the parotid surgery (only on the right side). "Naaaa," I said. I've really only had about one month or so where it was anywhere near chronic. Strangely, that was in 1994 - a couple of years after the surgery, so I'm not sure it makes any sense.

The point of all this, you ask? Well, I said to the Venerable Mother, "It really only hurts to the point of being excruciating when I'm at the dentist and have to keep my mouth open for an hour or more."

And she said, "Well, it hurts when I have to keep my mouth closed for an hour or more." For, you see, folks, my mother is QUITE the talker.

Much laughter ensued, and I said, "Can I quote you on that?" And she said, "sure."

And there you have it. Immortalized.

hln

Posted by hln at January 4, 2004 11:08 PM | Anecdote | TrackBack