WORKING: CONVERSATIONS WITH ESSENTIAL WORKERS BEHIND THE SCENES IN THE COURT SYSTEM

Written by Suzanne L. Schmidt

At the end of the workday, like the rest of us, Senior U.S. Circuit Judge J. Clifford Wallace at the Ninth U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals heads home. When he walks back into his chambers the next morning in his suit, tie, and cufflinks, everything has magically reset. His preferred lamps and lights are on, and the rest of the lights are off. Three sharp pencils are lined up on his desk precisely in the same spot they have reliably appeared every morning over the past several decades. Also, on his polished wood desk is a document outlining his schedule, his mail laid out in a specific order, and a neatly stacked pile of e-mail printouts that require his review for the day.

If you were a courthouse ghost that enjoyed sleeping in Judge Wallace’s chambers at night, you would be woken up each morning by none other than Karleen Jones Fowlkes, Judge Wallace’s judicial assistant, gracefully resetting the space.

As Karleen has dutifully assisted Judge Wallace for a cumulative total of 21 years, we felt compelled to interview Karleen for the fifth of an occasional series inspired by Studs Terkel’s 1972 masterpiece Working. In this series of interviews, we discuss the lives of essential workers (excluding lawyers and judges) and the work they do behind the scenes in the court system.