The Day I Got Stuck in Court.

Have I ever told you about the day I got stuck in Court?


One of the hugely problematic areas in the professional female experience is that of being pregnant. Pregnancy is physically obvious and exclusively female. It is the most inescapable manifestation of  "female-ness" that cannot be mitigated while in the workplace. Despite all of the physical and behavioral modifications adopted by women to neutralize  their femininity and be perceived as equals in the workplace, pregnancy is gigantically uncomfortably and inescapably there.


The author has had the distinctly preposterous experience of being pregnant while on active duty in the United States military. In one of the last bastions of all things alpha-male, her experience was appropriately ridiculous. 


My pregnancy is recorded, for all posterity, on the record of the criminal conviction of Sgt X. We were in a motions hearing prior to trial, and had begun the preliminaries when the judge noticed that the outer door to the courtroom had not been closed prior to the start of proceedings. He asked the prosecutor (me) to close the door. There are a number of formalities that need to be gone through before entering the 'well' or the area in front of the judge, so it was simply easier to sidle to the side between the heavy, oak counsel table and the wall to reach the door. Well, easier for someone who is not seven-months pregnant. For someone who is seven months pregnant, the exercise sounds like this:

Judge:  "in the last hearing on the record, defense counsel for the accused stipulated that…<long awkward pause>...Trial Counsel, are you okay?"

Me: "Yes your.... <grunt> Honor, I ....<grunt> am..hmmpgrrr..:

It is, unfortunately, an appellate court requirement that all goings-on in the courtroom be verbalized on the record. It is called "protecting the record" and prevents a case being overturned on appeal because an Appellate Court judge doesn't know what is happening. On this day, protection of the record took the following form:

Judge: "Trial Counsel, ah…well…um, let the record reflect that trial counsel is currently stuck between counsel table and the wall. Trial Counsel is unable to move. Defense counsel, will you please enter the well and pull out the table to assist Trial Counsel?"

That was it. The day I got stuck in court. Recorded, transcribed, and kept for all time.