Excuse Me, Is This Seat Taken?

Still blogging away alongside three other talented bloggers.  Each week, one of us chooses a topic and we all post a blog entry on that topic, usually on Thursdays.  (Usually we are on time.  Usually.  Ok, sometimes.)

Here are the links to the other fabulous blogs:

Merryland Girl

Froggie

Moma Rock  

            This week, I chose the topic, and I asked:  Write about the most interesting or unusual or amusing way you’ve made a friend.

            I’ve chosen to share two stories.  I will begin with amusing.

            In January of 2012, I flew to Florida for a three-day break from the dead of winter.  I flew alone, my husband realizing the familial value of allowing me time to myself to re-fuel my depleted natural Vitamin D supply, then manifesting itself in a pronounced lack of patience and ridiculously pale skin.  I spent three wonderful days on Sanibel Island writing and re-charging.  Relaxing.  The trip was uneventful and too short, the plane home crowded and small.  I walked the narrow aisle to the back of the plane and found my seat on the aisle – ever the choice of those of us barely over five feet tall and thus fearful of being crushed in the other two seats.  The only other occupied seat on my half of the row was the one next to the window.  Its occupant was a tall middle aged-man who smiled as I sat down and shoved my carry-on bag under the seat in front of me. 

            After I settled in, the man nodded toward the empty middle seat and said, “Think we’ll get lucky and no one will sit here?”  I glanced around the packed plane and said, “I don’t know.  It’s looking iffy.”  And then, almost as if on a cue heard only by us, we began listing worst-case scenario seat mates we feared would soon join us:

            “I’m sure he will be very large, like 6’9”,” one of us said.  “Maybe a football player.”

            “And he’ll be eating McDonald’s,” the other added.

            “And carrying a screaming baby,” said the first.

            “And he will smell like Ben Gay and sweat,” the other responded.

So much did we enjoy casting our verbal parade of horribles that we almost didn’t notice that the plane door had closed – and no one had claimed the seat between us.  We gave a small victory cheer and then we proceeded to talk for the entire trip to Atlanta, where, it turned out, we were both connecting to other flights.

            It turned out that my new friend – we will call him R – also lives in Chicago.  This was Similarity Number One of what would soon seem like an almost-endless list.  R hailed from Michigan, not far from where I lived for three years when I attended law school.  R was a bit older than he appeared, more than a decade older than I’d initially guessed (he made me), a fact in which he took great delight and more than little amusement.  R worked in the same industry as my husband; indeed, they knew someone in common.  And R shared a birth date with my eldest daughter.

            Early into the flight, R confessed that flying jangled his nerves, so he’d made a stop at an airport bar before boarding.  He ordered another drink from the flight attendant and seemed disappointed when I declined his offer to join him, sticking instead to Sprite Zero.

            By the time we landed in Georgia, I knew quite a bit about R’s life – his numerous siblings, the fact his parents met when his dad crashed a wedding, his house in Lincoln Park, his recent break-up – and he knew a lot about mine.  He commented loudly that everyone seated in the rear of the plane probably hated us, as we had not stopped talking or laughing the entire one-hour flight.  Before we deplaned, he gave me his business card, and a few days later I friended him on Facebook.  We remain Facebook friends today, three years later, two strangers on a plane who clicked.  It was just one of those things.  Serendipity.  The luck of geography.

            I will finish with interesting – and a different kind of lucky.

            I graduated law school in May of 2000.  I took (and somehow passed) the bar in July, and began working in September, two full months before I was officially sworn in as a member of the Illinois bar (this is common practice, particularly at big firms like the one where I was employed).

            In January of 2001, two months after I took my oath, a partner pulled me in on a pro bono case, also not uncommon.  The client’s name was Obadyay Ben-Yisrayl, and at that time he sat on Indiana’s Death Row.

            As one might imagine, I was less than comfortable working on a death penalty case with exactly no experience under my belt.  I was tasked with drafting a writ of habeas corpus, which is a fancy way of saying that I would be helping Obadyah begin his appeals process with the U.S. court system, as Indiana had upheld all of his convictions.  Writs of habeas corpus are long and involved.  They take a lot of time, particularly where the underlying litigation has spanned years and numerous trials, four in this case.  The task was daunting and I didn’t know whether I was up for it, given the potential penalty should we fail.

            I’d of course learned about the death penalty in law school, and I’d graduated on the fence.  I was neither pro nor con.  And, really, it didn’t matter; it wasn’t my job to care.  An attorney is tasked with making sure only that her client had a fair trial and petitioning the court on the client’s behalf when – as here – he had not.  And so I dug in.  I read thousands of pages of trial transcripts, spoke repeatedly to the public defender who had handled the case before my firm agreed to sign on.  I looked at police reports and witness statements and photos and news coverage.  And then I met Obadyah.

            The assigning partner took a few summer associates and me on a “field trip” to the prison in Michigan City, Indiana, to meet Obadyah.  To say the experience was eye opening would be a major understatement.  The whole process of a prison visit – particularly to Death Row – is interesting and could fill a whole blog post, if not more.  There are guards and gates and pat downs and rules and cages and noise and smells.  And those struck me.  I noticed.  But what stayed with me was meeting Obadyah, this man accused of a series of brutal shotgun murders, a man written off by the state of Indiana and sentenced to die just a few years hence.

            I certainly wasn’t afraid of Obadyah when I met him – by that time, I knew enough to know he was wrongly convicted, and we were surrounded by armed guards – but I hadn’t known what to expect.  And I hadn’t expected the person I encountered.  Obadyah was nice.  He was friendly and smart.  Well read, well spoken, thoughtful.  Calm.  And gracious.  He was so grateful for our help.  He quoted philosophers and spoke knowingly of the facts of his case – a tremendous help to overwhelmed, uninformed me.

            I don’t know whether I said it that day or at a later visit (and there would be many), but I told Obadyah my hesitation at representing him, given my level of green.  He listened patiently and then said, “I am glad you are green.  You aren’t coming in with preconceived notions.  You are open to this case and to me and what I know and what I think.”  He told me he trusted me and that he knew I’d do a good job for him.  And so I trusted him, and I did the best job I could.

            With much help from the younger associates and from Obadyah, I drafted a lengthy writ, which we eventually presented to the court.  And through the many-months-long process, through my visits and phone calls and letters, Obadyah and I became friends.  Because he was such a good prisoner (what an awful clause!), Obadyah possessed privileges including a craft card, meaning he could keep a small blade in his cell.  He used that knife to make me a beautiful two-dimensional card, and one for my eldest daughter, too.  I still cherish those cards; Obadyah is a gifted artist.

            After I left the firm, Obadyah and I continued to send letters, until that eventually petered out for a while.  I kept track of his case online, joyously cheering when I read his death sentences had all been tossed out, so happy my friend would live.  We now keep in touch, somewhat spottily, through Facebook, which Obadyah is allowed to use at times since he is in the General Population.  I owe him a letter (I owe him about 100 letters), and I’d love to make another visit, as well.  I hate that Obadyah isn’t free from prison, but I am so glad he is alive.  And I will forever treasure the photo he sent me a few years ago.  On the back, he thanked me for helping start the process that eventually saved his life, the same process that deeply changed mine.  Maybe I should be thanking him.