THERE are these moments when I feel like I should be writing sketches for standup comedy. Like for any other ideas, those for such sketches play around in the writer’s section of my head, and I find myself chucking as mentally, observable situations turn into jokes in that section of my head. Funny twists in those jokes and would be punch lines have me sometimes smiling, sometimes chortling, and sometimes laughing out loud.
Should the moment ever come that I determine to write sketches for standup comedy, one of those sketches would be about Lady Justice, whose statue greets us in the lobby of Baguio’s own Justice Hall. Beside that statue is a bench one can sit and await one’s lawyer while he battles in a nearby courtroom. So you and your lawyer, of course, text each other.
You: Am here na, lobby.
Lawyer: Please wait. Just sit there. There are benches.
You: Yah, am sitting na. Beside Lady Justice. Trying to talk some sense into her.
Lawyer: Haha. She’s blind.
You: Kaya nga talking sense into her eh. I’m whispering in her ear.
Lawyer: What did she say?
You: She’s quiet nga, too quiet. I told her Lady Justice, you have to listen to reason. You have to listen to my lawyer. I told her she has to listen to you, not that other guy. He’s lying, plain and simple.
Lawyer: Sorry please wait.
You: Yah, take your time.
I have a lot to tell this Lady Justice. Am telling her she has to open her eyes. I mean, what’s with the blindfold. Come on already Lady Justice, you have to read the pleadings. What, we have to read them aloud pa to you because you like to not open your eyes?
Your lawyer is silent on text, as he battles in the courtroom. So you go on whispering to Lady Justice, telling her, come now, really. How does this work if you insist on not seeing the truth. Ah, those scales, you say. They’re supposed to determine the truth.
But Lady Justice, how do you know what they’re putting on those scales if you don’t take off the blindfold? For all you know, one scale could be stacked with rotten fruit, kilos and kilos of it, stinking already because of the spoilage.
The other scale could have just one piece of paper that contains the correct evidence, making that one piece of paper precious because it contains the truth. So, hello, stacked scales.
You are thinking to stand up already and take the blindfold off of Lady Justice, since you’re fed up, when your lawyer appears, done with the battle inside the courtroom.
It is time to go look for lunch. You head off, you telling your lawyer: you know, this Justice is blind thing, maybe it’s there only so that Lady Justice wouldn’t have to look at ugly lawyers.