The Woman in the Taupe Skirt

I have often wondered what I would do in the fall if I lived in Sicamous full-time. Hidden among the long list of potential excursions is spending a day or two in court (See the Bernd Hermanski Architech's website for some beautiful photos of the inside and outside of the Salmon Arm Court House). I could get the flavour of the city that way. Wyona agrees with me that a trip like that would be interesting and if she is here she will come along. But she left for Calgary today, David was off at Kids Club, and so I brought Bonnie Wyora along with  me.

We climbed the winding staircase, noting that the second floor rotunda was full of people who began to move into the courtroom door as the voice on the loud speaker announced that court was in session. I saw a woman in a taupe skirt bullying another woman. She was waving a document at her and trying to press it into her hands. The second woman was softly saying over and over, “Please leave me alone. Please leave me alone.” She began moving backward, away from the bulling behaviour. An older man, perhaps her father stood nearby her, not knowing what to do.

Bonnie Wyora swept forward to the retreating woman and side stepped between her and the woman in the taupe skirt. She threw her arms around the retreating woman bending low to make up for the six inch height difference. She was hugging her and saying in an unexpectedly loud voice for the court house, “I am so glad to see you. It has been such a long time. How are you?”, all the time, her body kept between the frightened woman and the woman in the taupe skirt.

The woman in the taupe skirt was now yelling the name of the woman in Bonnie’s embrace. “You have to take it. It’s yours. Don’t make this difficult. So, you’re going to be that way, are you?”.

She pressed the document into the crook of Bonnie’s arm. The crush of the document stayed v-like for a while. Bonnie opened her arms, letting the paper fall to the floor, and stepped on the corner of it.

The paper under her right foot, she circled the woman around to the left, into Courtroom 201, through its open doors, and followed behind releasing the trapped document.

My interest of being with Bonnie for the day was lost. Rather than follow her in to the court to get my seat for listening to the proceedings, I was riveted outside, now focused on what was going to happen to that document that was floored. The woman in the taupe skirt retrieved the document, the sequins on her skirt swishing as she marched in the other direction, down the foyer, to the winding stair case and presumably down the stairs.

By the time I collected my sense to try to find Bonnie, she was in row 3 and the woman who had been bullied was in row 2. She appeared to be sobbing on Bonnie’s shoulder. The row of chairs between them made it impossible for me to see Bonnie’s face. I could see the woman’s face, whom I thought was never going to let go of her. But let go she did.

... plum crisp ...

... plum crisp with cream ...

When the judge stopped for lunch, so did we. We headed back to the lake. We sat on river rock chairs that we dragged around to the lake side of the balcony. It simulated a cafe before the lunch-hour rush of customers, with amazing outdoor seating.

We toasted home made-brown bread and heaped it with fresh bruschetta. We finished with a Plum Crisp. The tomatoes and plums were from Moiya and Dave’s garden. The cucumbers were from Glen and Janet’s garden. We took a picture of the dessert because it was served in dishes made by Rebecca at Pilling's Pottery Wheel. Our question to her in this blog post is ... how does one get just the right amount of cream when trying to add it to the Plum Crisp.

Long after the plums were gone, we finally felt safe to swap details of our different perspectives on the event.

Bonnie will post hers as Part II. 

Arta