12 Sharpied Men

Today as I was sitting at my sewing machine, I suddenly started thinking about contraband items in a court of law.
Okay, it was more like this. I was sitting at the sewing machine working on some curtains for Jacob's room. They weren't turning out like I'd hoped, and I reached for my seam ripper to take out some errant stitches. Unfortunately, I didn't have my seam ripper at hand, but I did have one of those little pairs of fold-up scissors. As I was unfolding them, I thought about what nifty things they are - so little and portable. This was instantly followed by the thought that it was too bad you can't take these little scissors on airplanes anymore, because they make such excellent travelling scissors. Then my mind quickly flitted across the list of things you can't take into some public places nowadays, which led me to think about being a prospective juror a few weeks ago, and the list of things they said we couldn't take into the court if we were selected.

In short, the thought process looked like this: sewing curtains ->   scissors -> contraband airplane items -> contraband court items.

Anyway, I did get called into jury duty a week or so ago, at noon on Friday after being placed on call all week long. And they did read a list of things you could not take into the courtrooms with you in our little introductory "You're Such a Good Citizen, Welcome to Jury Duty" speech. Most were very obvious: explosive devices, firearms, gunpowder, tasers, etc. However, one of the things on the "forbidden" list was permanent markers. Yes, they said that we could not take any permanent markers into the court room. This worried me for a moment, because sometimes I have a stray Sharpie in my purse because they're just so useful (well, that and because I almost never clean out my purse). I was worried that if I had one in my possession I might have to hastily and secretly dispose of it in the trashcan if I was selected. However, just minutes later the judge came in and said that they didn't need us for jury duty after all and that we could all go home. I was then so overjoyed at being off the jury duty hook for the next year that I forgot about the permanent marker issue and went on my merry way.

But yesterday, my train of thought led me back to it, and now I'm wondering why. Why would permanent markers not be allowed? Is it because they want the jurors to take their time and deliberate slowly and carefully, and not to scribble down a permanent and non-erasable "guilty" or "not guilty" right away? As if they want us to write (and deliberate) in a pencil-kind of way, and not in a more permanent permanent-marker kind of way.

Or are do they perhaps have really nice juror tables and also give out super-thin paper in the deliberation room, thus causing problems in the past with permanent markers bleeding through the paper onto the nice tables?

Or even worse, perhaps jurors made embarrassing doodles on their super-thin deliberation paper and those embarrassing sketches of the courtroom staff were becoming permanent parts of the furniture?

Or perhaps they're having trouble with juror graffiti. You know, in a "12 Angry Men Armed with Permanent Markers" kind of way.

I'm just not sure. And since they didn't pick me, I didn't get to ask.

Actually, it's really okay that they didn't pick me, but I really would like to know.