When I was growing up, I had a friend who's mom wouldn't let us scream. It was the foremost rule of their house. You were not allowed to scream inside. You were not allowed to scream outside. The ONLY reason to scream was if there was an emergency.

One time we were playing in their camper and somehow managed to get the door locked on ourselves. My friend and I looked at each other and said, "This is an emergency... we can scream!" And we milked it for all it was worth. We screamed our lungs out, until our throats hurt. But it was the most amazing fun, because we finally had an excuse to scream. When the mom heard us and let us out of the camper, we got praised for screaming at the correct time.

I don't remember specific anti-screaming rules at my house, so as a kid, I thought my friend's mom was super strict. I mean, a ban on screaming was highly restrictive to a child's playtime. The rule was so serious, the kids got time-out's for screaming, and if you were playing at their house and screamed (whether you were aware of the rule or not) you got a time out too.  What a mean mom!

But. Now I am a mom and I've come to realize something. That lady wasn't a shrew... she was just trying to preserve her sanity!

My son's favorite passtime is roaring: like a lion, like a dinosaur, like a monster... it doesn't really matter the animal/creature, as long as he can roar! My daughter loves to respond by screaming in terror. Sometimes this terror is happy terror and sometimes she's genuinely frightened, but either way it comes out as screams. And if roaring doesn't work to get his sister to scream, Isaiah resorts to screaming himself and Leah happily chimes in.

They love screaming so much, they use it like commercial breaks between playing. Isaiah plays Thomas Trains and Leah plays Little People Castle for awhile, and when they both get bored, they start screaming. Isaiah plays legos and Leah plays babies, and when they both get bored, they scream. They scream back and forth at each other during the previews on their movies. They scream while they sit at the table waiting for me to serve the food. They scream in the bathtub. They scream outside. They scream, scream, scream!

And I'm losing my sanity! By the end of they day (or sometimes at the beginning) I'm screaming too... screaming at them to stop. Why, oh why, did I not make a NO SCREAMING rule? While was busy judging my friend's mom, I should have been learning from her example. She was one smart lady!

So I had my first experience with Jury Duty yesterday, and all I can say is... Founding Fathers, what were you thinking?!

The first 5 minutes of orientation made it clear that they were going to keep me there all day, whether I ended up on a jury or not. But staying all day was vastly more appealing than getting on jury and being there all week (or more).

The basic concept was, after an indefinite amount of waiting, the defendant and the legal eagles on both sides of the case would march in and sit at a table in the front of the courtroom. The clerk would then begin calling out jurors names until they had selected about 3 times as many jurors as they would actually need. Next, the clerk would read the charges, swear everyone in and then the defendant's lawyers and the attorney(s) for the Commonwealth would begin to interview each juror individually. While this was going on, the rest of the jurors had the priviledge of sitting in their seats and waiting for their turn. This may sound like a bunch of laughs, but believe it or not, it was really, really dull.

It's a good thing I didn't get picked for the first jury. If I told you what the charges were, I could go to jail, but let's just say that after they got done reading the things the defendant was accused of, I'd have gladly walked over to the guy and given him a lethal injection on the spot. Yeah. Plus that trial was going to run for a week and a half. But they assured the jurors that they would not be sequestered, which I'm sure made them feel fabulous.

About 3 hours later, they started the whole process over with another trial. I was the 32nd name they called and since they only needed 12 jurors and 2 alternates, I figured this was a good thing. This time, when the clerk read the charges (which I can't tell you, due to the whole going to jail thing), they were only slightly less horrific than the previous case. But I didn't feel an overwhelming urge to do bodily harm to the defendant, so I figured I could in good conscience serve on that jury, if it came down to it. (Plus, this trial was only supposed to last 3 days, which was a much happier time frame)

But it never did come down to it. Just as it was getting close to my turn to be interviewed, they announced they were going to take a 5 minute break... and never came back. Seriously. After 2 hours of nothing, they said we could go home because the case wasn't going to come before a jury after all. So I guess justice prevailed some other way.

The odd thing is, even though I wasted my whole day just sitting, I felt lucky because it could have been so much worse. Which is what leads me back to my original question to the Founding Fathers, "Why?! Oh, why?!" Why must we punish the innocent jury members along with the guilty criminals? Shouldn't jurors be treated with honor; offered recliners to relax in, a nice buffet, back massages, etc? That would be more just.

Oh, what am I saying? I got some compensation! They paid me $13.25 for 8 hours, and gave me a coupon for %20 off at Quiznos!