Jury Duty

A day after jury duty.

I had the privilege of serving as a juror yesterday. I spent my morning and early afternoon sitting amongst 50+ people in a large room surrounded by a couple microwaves, several types of seating, dozens of books (no one would ever think to read), and a judge tell me the history and importance of trial by jury.

Just hours before I was slumped over in a chair in the juror room, I was doing my best to meet that 8am required time to check in. Just as I was ready to leave my home, I was at the moment of truth - Should I take something with me? Then I did what I would regret for the rest of the afternoon; I looked at the small notepad in the kitchen just sitting there, staring at me right in the face. Next to the note pad was a pen. I, for whatever reason (I know now), chose to ignore that moment of truth and leave without a piece of paper to write on. For a writer, choosing not to have the ability to write (or type) words, is hard.

Have you ever been in a situation where any choice, no matter how small it may seem at the time, ends up effecting your whole day? Magnify that for writers.

That choice I made frustrated me to a point where I started to pace around the juror room. Characters were all around the room (what I mean by characters, is that I saw so many characterizations). Stories were there in that room. There was a ripe and foul (in a good way) odor of people that wanted a story written about them.

(Writers, no matter their level of success, spend every moment of their lives in public studying people and, not only how they act in certain situations, but how they dress and speak to others, especially their body movements.)

I fucking, and I repeat FUCKING, lost that moment to write. My day, amongst the dozens of people, was spent in exile. I was so disgusted in myself…. (and they didn’t even call my name)

Forward to a couple hours later. Relaxed, I pick up a book on screenwriting and then (after American Idol, of course) started to watch one of the DVR’d saved event of “Saving Grace”. Between reading a couple chapters of the book and watching a (Brilliant!) character driven TV drama series, I rejoiced in my choice this morning. I am so happy I didn’t pick up the small notepad as I left at home. The pacing in the jury room not being able to write that I endured this morning was worth it. I would have never realized the moment of picking up the book that night.

Characterization… format… structure… genre… character vs. story, structure in relationship with genre, scenes within story where scenes would mean more if paced somewhere else… should this scene be here or later in the screenplay… Is the relationship between the hour TV show and the screenplay the same? Why do characters become more important in certain scenes but not in others, even though the audience is more moved in scenes that doesn’t move plot? Did that scene need to take place in this setting? What if I moved it to another location…? Why do I continue to write questions and words when I should be sleeping?