A Story and a Song
Monday, July 7th, 2008
A comedian buddy of mine recently launched a monthly themed storytelling event at Le Cagibi.
The inaugural storytelling theme was “the law” and I got on board both because I’ve been I’ve been buried for a long time in solitary writing and because the topic hit a nerve. The extent to which modern conservative governments are flagrantly breaking the law really upsets me.
I originally wanted to do a bunch of short stories about the scandals that are linked to up above, but time got the better of me. I only managed to bang out one before the June 26th reading.
The event was, I think, a big success. There was some comedy, some drama and some dramedy.
I thought it’d be fun to post up the story that I read that night along with a song that I think works well with the theme.
Hope you like it…
Six Four Two One Short Stories About The Law
Once upon a time a young woman fell in love. The woman’s name was America and she was smart and beautiful and practically virginal. She graduated near the top of her high school class and went away to college to study biology.
America had an easy lyrical laugh and a sprinkling of adorable freckles. Her hair was long and healthy and as golden as the sun-drenched wheat belt that stretched from Siskiyou County in the north all the way to Imperial County in the south in her home state of California.
On the first day of her undergraduate Molecular Embryology class, America met a young man named Vigor. Vigor was smart and strong and practically virginal. Vigor was a high school track-and-field champ and had gone away to college to study agriculture. Vigor was tall and broad shouldered. He had kind eyes. His hair was thick and neat and as dark as the seam of ebony marble that wound through the Cascade Mountain Range in his home state of California.
Vigor and America became lab partners, then study partners, then tennis partners. Eventually Vigor asked America if she would become his life partner as well.
Despite the fact that America and Vigor were raised in large tight-knit families, they were determined that their wedding would not be a slavish imitation of ancestral traditions. The ceremony would, above all else, be a true reflection of their green and matchless love. So even though America had been raised Roman Catholic and although Vigor had grown up Southern Baptist, in the spirit of ecumenical harmony the young couple decided that their marriage would take place on the neutral ground of the Kern County Courthouse in Bakersfield, California.
America and Vigor had arranged for their solemnizing ceremony to take place on Friday the 27th of June 2008. It would be the perfect day for a summer wedding, they thought. The spring planting and first cycle of weeding would be long-completed and school would be out for the tow-headed army of nieces and nephews who’d be pouring in from all over the state. If Vigor’s well-thumbed almanac was right, they would exchange their vows on a warm and cloudless day with temperatures dropping low enough in the evening to allow for the use of fashionable wraps and dinner jackets.
When there were only two weeks remaining before the big day, America allowed herself to enjoy a brief moment of self-congratulatory calm. She’d inherited her meticulous nature from her mother and had dutifully dug to the bottom of a highly detailed to do list. There was only one last item to attend to.
America popped open her laptop and surfed over to the Kern County Courthouse Web site. A few additional out of town guests had asked to attend the ceremony and she wanted to make sure that they wouldn’t tip the scales on the wedding hall’s fire regulations.
America was floored by what she found online.
The note was written on the Kern County Clerk’s Web page under the heading, “Marriage Licenses”. America read through it several times until tears of frustration and anger welled up in the corners of her clear blue eyes.
The note said:
The County Clerk’s office will not solemnize weddings after June 13, 2008. We will not have the staff or space to deal with an increase in both licenses and ceremonies. Because of long-term administrative plans, budgetary reasons, and the need to increase security for elections, the Clerk’s office will cease solemnizing weddings, which is discretionary on the part of the County Clerk. As done in other counties, information necessary to solemnize marriages will be made available to those acquiring licenses.
America was shocked. How could this be possible? She’d planned for every contingency. The tents were ordered, the caterers were booked. The Byzantine seating arrangement had been hammered down for over a month. And now, suddenly, the county clerk wouldn’t be performing marriages anymore?
The young woman turned her attention back to the Internet, conducted a flurry of probing research and then picked up the phone. She dialed the Kern County Clerk, a woman named Ann Barnett.
“Hello Ann,” America said as cheerfully as she could manage, “It’s America.”
America listened patiently as the older woman spoke.
“Yes, I see,” America said, “And that’s exactly what’s up on the Web site, but I have a few questions. I mean you say that you don’t have the staff or space to deal with the ceremonies but…”
She took a deep breath and charged ahead.
“I did some research and learned that you and your predecessors typically perform over 40% of Kern County marriages. And I know for a fact that the Kern County Courthouse has two huge rooms dedicated specifically for marriages because as you’re no doubt aware, I had one booked.
“Yes Ann, yes…”
America listened again.
“Yes, but Ann, as to the financial argument, as I’m sure you know the president of the California Association of Clerks and Election officials was recently quoted by Reuters saying that contrary to your claim, marriage ceremonies actually make money. In fact, according to the Bakersfield Califonian newspaper, Kern County civil ceremonies pull in an average of $50,000 a year. And as for staffing, those ceremonies take, on average, seven minutes to perform by staff who are paid less than $20 an hour.”
America listened to one final burst from the County Clerk. She sighed.
“To be honest Ann, the security issue seems like the weakest argument of all,” she said. “If it wasn’t a problem for the past two decades, why would it suddenly become one now?”
“Look Ann,” America said, “Let’s level with each other. Woman to woman.”
She chose an even tone and spoke clearly and calmly into the receiver.
“Ann are you sure that your decision doesn’t have anything to do with the fact that California’s Supreme Court struck down the state’s ban on same-sex marriage on May 15th in a broadly worded decision that would invalidate any law that discriminates on the basis of sexual orientation that comes into effect two days from now on June 15th?
“And isn’t it true that you requested that the County Counsel file a brief with the California Supreme Court opposing implementation of the May 15th ruling allowing gay marriage and that you subsequently made the decision to shut down all marriages when that same counsel advised that it would be illegal for you to only marry couples of your own choosing?
“And don’t you find it bit too ironic, Ann, that each of the five Californian counties who have decided to stop performing any marriages in the face of this decision have all voted staunchly Republican for over 40 years? I mean I know Republicans have said that gay marriage would ruin traditional marriage but I’m not sure this is what they had–”
But she didn’t get to finish her sentence. The line went dead.
Ann Barnett had hung up on America.
(Click to play song…)
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. . .
Here’s my little coda: if history has taught us anything it’s that people who line up against equality and love have been proven to be on the wrong side of the issue again and again and again.
As of right now, five four Republican-leaning counties in California have stopped solemnizing any marriages, gay or straight, fulfilling that age-old conservative adage, “If you can have it, no-one can.”
The counties are:
Merced County – strongly Republican (reversed its decision under intense pressure)
Claveras County – Republican since 1964
Kern County – Republican since 1964
Butte County – Republican since 1964
Kings County – Republican since 1964
You can contact the Kern County Clerk at the following co-ordinates:
Ann K. Barnett
1115 Truxtun Avenue
Bakersfield, CA 93301-4639
Regular Office Hours 8:00 AM - 5:00 PM Mon-Fri
Open To The Public 8:30 AM - 4:00 PM Mon-Fri
(661) 868-3588
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