AncienTrails

Summer                                                   Healing Moon

With the waning healing moon 13% full I have been healed.

Here’s an analogy. One April day when the air is a bit cool and daffodils have broken through, yellow against the gray, a stranger comes up to you, perhaps at home or at a bus stop, in the grocery store.

“I have something to tell you. You have been chosen at random to be put on trial for a terrible crime. The maximum penalty for this crime is death.”

“Wait,” you say, “What do you mean? How is that possible?”

“You’ll know more after an initial hearing before the judge. Until then keep yourself available. Don’t leave town.”

A month later, in a Gothic courthouse, you visit a judge who opens your file.

“Hmm. Well. This is all in order. Yes. Sorry you had to be chosen, but these things happen all the time, you know. I’ll call with the results of the trial in about a week. Don’t leave town.”

Shaken even more than when you met the stranger, you go home. You don’t leave town.

“This is the clerk of court calling. Is this X?”

“Yes.”

“You have been found guilty and the sentence is death. You’ll be under house arrest since the execution date is not certain. Sometime in the future. Don’t leave town.”

Stunned, you fall back in your recliner. In every way you feel the same as you did before the stranger came except for your various reactions to his news. Anger, fear, courage, hopelessness, resistance, frayed anxiety. Now this.

“Hello, X?”

“Yes.”

“The judge has decided to hold another hearing on your case. Please come back to the courthouse on this date. Thank you.”

On a day almost 3 months from the stranger’s visit, you climb in your car in the dark. They’ve set the hearing for a very early hour. On the way you realize this might be your last chance. You consider the suddenness, the arbitrary nature of your guilt. And you feel afraid. Again.

The hearing is long and you are present, but can neither hear nor see. Hours later you awake in a prison cell, disoriented. You don’t remember why you are there. Slowly, it comes back. The trial, the sentencing, the final hearing.

A jailer in blue prison garb says, “You’re free to go. The report of your hearing will be available in three to five days. Don’t leave town.”

Unbalanced and unsteady from the hearing process your wife drives you home, this time through dense rush hour traffic. At home you gradually put the hearing behind you.

On a quiet afternoon three days later the phone rings. You pick it up. It’s the judge.

“X. How are you feeling? I see. Well, let’s get right to it. The panel looked over your case and decided to set you free. No capital punishment. You may leave town whenever you wish.”