(Sigh)…Louisiana
Just three days in Louisiana and I’ve already been pushed to annoyance. It’s the climate that does it to you. No matter how hard urgency persists, the lackadaisical rains of complacency and their resulting dew of timelessness inevitably slow one’s efforts here from swift winds to soft whispers. Today, I longed for an umbrella.
I arrived at the parish prison at about 11:30. It was my second trip there in two days. I clenched my license, a twenty dollar bill, and my blank affidavit (asserting that I have no police record) all in hand. I approached the concrete box ornamenting the tall hurricane fences, laced with razor wire at the top. As I peered through the glass window, I waited for a man bulging out of his black uniform to set aside his cell phone.
“Ah rememba you from yestuhday. Background check, raight?” he asked.
“Yes,” I responded.
“Aight. No cellphones, pagers, backpacks, juhlry, any uh that. You got ya license and ten dollars exact change or money order?”
“I need exact change?” I asked.
“Yes, sir.”
“You take credit cards?”
“Nope.”
I sighed and turned back toward my truck. Who doesn’t take credit cards in 2009? I thought to myself. I mean, seriously.
I plopped down in the driver’s seat of the truck and cranked the engine. With four turns down the road, I was back in ten minutes with a half tank full of gas and a ten dollar bill. After clearing the rotund guard at the gate, I made my through the glass doors and inside of the main prison office. I created the line for background checks and waited about ten minutes before getting any service. As I tried to explain the affidavit, the woman attending to me slipped the ID from my hands, along with the ten dollar bill, and disappeared behind a tall wooden door for another fifteen minutes. As I waited, a young woman joined me in the waiting area.
“Has anyone tended to you or even greeted you yet?” she inquired after a few minutes.
“Yeah, but it took them a while. About ten minutes or so…” I said as another woman emerged from the wooden door with my empty criminal record in hand.
“Here you go,” she said, handing it to me.
“Thank you,” I said. “I also need to get this document signed by someone, stating that I don’t have a record.”
“We don’t sign any documents here. You’ll have to take that to the DA’s office.”
“Well, could you at least take a look at it?” I asked.
“No, I read very well,” she snapped. “You can take it to the DA’s office in city hall. “ I know this bitch didn’t just get smart with me…
“Are you sure they would qualify as…?” I continued. I asked the her for more clear directions before heading out. I made my way to the DA’s office in the city courthouse, where I handed the same form to a young paralegal, working the receptionist desk. I told her that I had been directed there from the sheriff’s office, as she looked quizzically at the page in front of her.
“I’ve never seen anything like this,” she said to me. You mean you never saw the word “affidavit” when you trained to do legal work? “I’ll have one of the attorneys on staff meet you in the lobby and have a look at it,” she said. I took a seat in one of the black, leather chairs lining the marble walls to the bronze elevators. I watched through the glass doors, as an man with frazzled, nickel hair walked towards me, lifting large brown frames to his face.
“What do we have here?” he asked, looking it over.
“Essentially, it’s an affidavit,” I explained. “This document is me stating that I have no criminal record in the U.S. until my FBI background check can be acquired.” His eyes narrowed. “I just need a signature and a seal,” I said.
“If you go down the Clerk of Court’s office on basement floor, they should be able to take care of you,” he said, smiling.
“Are you sure they’ll sign and seal this?” I asked.
“They should be able to,” he said, releasing the tension in his face.
As I exited the elevator onto level B-1, I turned toward the next round of glass doors. I walked in and pitched my situation to the fifth pair of ears for the day.
NJNious
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