The Hearing
The agenda for the school board meeting is posted on Friday at 4:47 p.m., because that is the legally mandated seventy-two hours before the Monday evening meeting, and because the district clerk is a woman who goes home at five. Agenda Item 7(c): *Motion to override Student Representative Council handbook amendment re: personal electronic devices.* Brought by Board Member Eleanor Welsh. Supported by Board Member Randall Foy.
Tessa's coach's sister is Eleanor Welsh. I found that out on Thursday, when I finally asked my mother to look at the board roster with me.
My mother drives me to the hearing. She does not say much in the car. She is wearing the grey blouse she wears to parent-teacher conferences and, occasionally, to funerals. Her hands are at ten and two on the wheel. She has the radio off. I am wearing the embroidered cardigan that used to be my grandmother's, because it is the piece of clothing I have that makes me feel most like myself, and also because Simone told me, on the phone at eleven the night before, "Wear the cardigan. It looks like somebody's grandmother made it, which it does, because somebody's grandmother did, and people on school boards have guilt reflexes around grandmothers' cardigans."
The district building is a low concrete thing that I have only ever seen on the way to the DMV. Its meeting room has those plastic stacking chairs and a long table at