Normally, the courtroom is where party-litigants finally get a chance to air their grievances. But once in a while, some overeager litigant makes their way to the back office looking for anyone who will listen to them. Small talk gives way to long narrations about what the facts "really are" or just how badly they've been wronged.
There's nothing the office drones can do about it except lend a sympathetic ear. Who hasn't been in a position where it seems the whole world is against you? There's a sadness and a desperation in their eyes. I didn't do it. It wasn't me. I was tricked. I didn't mean what I said. I'm telling the truth.
There's something very human about it. Rich or poor, everyone has their own idea about right and wrong. Everyone has their own version of reality where they're the heroic underdog fighting against the insidious forces conspiring against them. Everyone has their own way of looking at the world and that comes with it ideas on what is the greatest good and what is worst evil. A sense of justice innate in human beings, even among the simplest of us.
However, human beings are limited. They are limited in knowledge of facts. They are limited in understanding. They are limited in empathy for other's position. A persons idea of the world and his sense of justice is not and cannot be the ultimate truth in all circumstances and at all times. People often don't see eye to eye and the world itself will never bend to anyone's vision. The ego reels. It's amazing what the human mind will concoct to avoid admitting that it might be wrong. It will argue. It will scream. It will fight.
What happens when our worlds collide? When one man's vision goes against another? Historically, it usually ends up with someone's skull getting smashed in. But we are evolved and civilized creatures. One of the benefits of society is a justice system, where disputes are settled. Out of the many chaotic, competing versions of reality, a greater order is imposed. After due process, there is at last submission to authority; a reality accepted, often begrudgingly, in the interest of justice and social harmony. There is conformity to the greater ideals society has ordered itself upon. It's transcendental, almost.
Nowadays I'm not sure of anything. Looking back at all the things I've written, I wonder if any of it is still true or if it even was in the first place.
Things are scarcely what they seem.
