Courting

It is seven o’ clock in the evening, and I am completely wiped out.

It has been a horrible day without any nice things like fresh air or exercise, and plenty of horrid things, like waiting around and anxiety.

I have been to court today.

Mark came too, but he has not yet given any evidence because the court ran out of daytime, and so he has got to go back in the morning.

The nice part of this is that we are staying in the camper van for the night.

The horrid part of it is that I am not allowed to tell him what I said, or what anybody asked me. It is a bit like a poker game, where you are not supposed to say what is happening so that people can’t cheat.

Obviously I have said some things. I have told him that the barrister is jolly scary, and the judge is about fifteen years old, but I am trying hard not to say anything about things that I have said, in case it confuses what he is going to say tomorrow.

I can tell you things, though.

It was all about things that happened years and years ago, and the lady barrister arguing that the things did not happen is so utterly brilliant that if ever I get in trouble I want her to defend me.

I was on the witness stand for two hours. That is a jolly long time to be trying to explain yourself.

There were several barristers in court and they all asked me questions. It is a peculiar sort of feeling, when somebody asks: why did you do this thing twenty years ago? you simply can’t explain. You have got to try and find words to explain as well as you can and hope that you are telling the truth.

It goes like: well, I think that this is why I did it, or said it. Certainly if I did it now that would be the reason. I do not know if I am different these days.

One barrister asked me about some pictures I painted on a wall once. I had absolutely no recollection of having painted them, and indeed still don’t, but Number Two Daughter assured me afterwards that I had painted them, so I must have been fibbing.

I can’t even envisage what they looked like.

I was entirely struck by this, and astonished that my memory was so rubbish, maybe I am senile.

The memory is a curious thing.

In all, it was a very difficult day. We woke up in the camper van, and made our way in to the court, wearing the most respectable clothes we could manage whilst still being comfortable enough to sit down.

We have become portly in the last couple of years.

Court is not a nice place in the days of bat flu.

If you imagine what it might feel like to be a diseased criminal in a room full of sanitised saints then you will have an idea.

You have got to wear a mask, and empty your pockets, and your bag is searched. Then you go through a scanner and then you are scanned all over by another scanner, all the while not going anywhere near anybody, and not being able to see their faces because they are wearing masks. They are not smiling anyway, because it is a court, and also presumably because it is dull to stand all day in a doorway rooting around the dirty handkerchiefs and sanitary equipment in people’s bags.

After that we went upstairs and a voluntary chap explained to us what court was like. He said that we should not get upset or take it personally, which we thought we would not do anyway.

After that we waited for ages. Eventually  it was time for lunch, so we went back to the camper van. I had thought when I packed the camper van that we might be upset by then, despite what the volunteer said, so I had brought smoked trout and blue stilton for lunch. This turned out to be a perfect thing to eat when you are waiting and anxious, and lacked only wine to wash it down properly.

I am making up for that now, I can tell you.

After lunch I had got to go in first, and it took almost the whole afternoon.

I was not nervous until I went in, and then suddenly my mouth was dry and the words stuck in it and would not come out.

I poured water into a paper cup and looked round. There were a very lot of people, and the dock was behind a glass wall.

I was glad that I was  not in the dock.

I did not look at any of the people except the barristers I was talking to, because I did not want to distract myself by trying to guess what everybody was thinking.

I was shaking when I came out.

We had got to wait around even then, because one barrister thought they might want me for something else, but they didn’t in the end.

We rushed back to the camper van in torrential rain.

I was glad I had chosen the comfortable shoes instead of the smart ones.

Poor Mark has got to do it tomorrow.

We put Roger Poopy’s bandage back on but when we came back today he had eaten it. He was not supposed to do this because it had a nasty taste but he is nothing if not persistent.

I am impressed by his commitment.

Have a picture of this evening’s diary being written. Mark took it when I started worrying about not having a photograph.