I went to traffic court for a speeding ticket.

Court is like the DMV: it’s a place full of people I don’t see anywhere else. I sat there trying to look respectable and innocent and wishing that I’d taken more time with that. The fluorescent lights are not flattering.

The police officers and state troopers sat on one bench looking bored and mumbling jokes to each other. The attorneys seemed to be competing with each other to see who could carry the shabbiest leather attaché case. It’s guaranteed that if there’s a bow tie in the room, it’s on an attorney. They all laughed and joked, too.

I watched them laugh while I sat there hoping I was in the right courtroom. My ticket said I should report to courtroom 002, but the courtrooms were labeled A and B. I was nervous, and I resented how chummy everyone on the other side of the swinging gate seemed to be. How could I get a fair shake when they were clearly already colluding against all of us on the benches?

People were in a line handing papers to people behind the gate, and I didn’t know if all of us were supposed to do that. I asked a woman next to me, and she didn’t know either. She got up and left. A young man in a black vinyl jacket sat really close to me after she left. There was no one else on the bench, and I wondered why he scooted so close to me. Did I give off a maternal vibe that made him feel better?

The doors at the back of the courtroom were closed, and a bailiff warned all the men that they’d be held in contempt if their shirts weren’t tucked in. Women were warned to keep their midriffs covered. If those were the baseline criteria, I was okay.

The bailiff warned us that during the “call for the calendar”—which wasn’t defined for us—no one would be allowed to leave or enter the courtroom. We were instructed to plead guilty or not guilty when our names were called.

That was a puzzle. I wasn’t arguing that I wasn’t going 40 in a 25 mile per hour zone. I was just hoping that it would be thrown out because my record was so good otherwise. I didn’t get much time to think about a strategy because the names were called alphabetically and mine was one of the first called. I said “guilty,” even though I wanted to say, “That’s the judge’s call, isn’t it? What do I know? YOU GUYS are the experts here!”

A few people asked for court-appointed attorneys, and I thought it was totally unfair that no one said that was an option for our answers. I wanted a free attorney, too.

After the full list of defendants was read, a list of the ones who’d asked for attorneys was read, and those people had to come to the rail, where the bailiff had lined up Bibles. (How about the Torah? The Koran? The Upanishads?) The defendants figured out their right from left, shared the Bibles in a big linear game of Twister and were sworn in. The bailiff rattled off a half-mumbled statement that I mostly couldn’t make out that warned them of some circumstances that would result in having to reimburse the state of North Carolina for the attorney’s fees. Maybe it was just as well that I didn’t have an attorney appointed by the court. They were given pieces of paper to sign and sent to the clerk’s office across the hall.

I wondered if I was supposed to go pay my fine since I had pled guilty, but I stayed put, just in case.

Several bigger infractions were called before the judge—DUIs and driving on suspended licenses. These were people with court-appointed attorneys.

I was annoyed at how hard it was to hear the judge. I thought how unnecessarily baffling and stressful court was, and how even so, I still wouldn’t want to go to court in most other countries.

Then my name was called. I walked through the gate and stood where the attorneys had been for all the people before me. The judge was a well-known man in the region with a reputation for giving juveniles unvarnished, tough-love responses. I hoped he recognized me from taking his picture when he spoke to middle schoolers a month or two before. He also has a reputation for hugging every woman in the room outside of court. I’d been hugged when he visited the school. Shouldn't that count for something?

He asked if I had anything to say. I said I didn’t argue that I was going 40, but that I was preoccupied and hadn’t seen the signs. My voice shook, and I was mad at myself for not feeling more in control. I was explaining that I had a good driving record and no prior moving violations in North Carolina when the Dougie Howser district attorney interrupted and asked if he could speak to me.

I started to walk around the table, but I stepped toward the judge, and the bailiffs quickly closed ranks around him and told me to go the other way. I was a threat to the judge; who would have thought?

The DA said he thought I’d had a previous assignment to driving school. When I said no, he said he’d reduce the charges from speeding to faulty equipment. That only saved me $5 in fines; it was still $135 I couldn’t afford to spend. But it wasn’t a moving violation and wouldn’t make my insurance go up.

They wouldn’t let me take my knitting into the courtroom, so I got my yarn and needles back from the deputy in the lobby and took myself to lunch. I paid attention to the speed limit signs.