Judge Robert “Bob” Downing of the 19th Judicial District Court, East Baton Rouge Parish, State of Louisiana, peered down his nose at my paperwork then looked up at Wendy and me across the top of his reading glasses. He paused, then looked back down his nose and reread my request. A few seconds later he put down the paperwork, took off his glasses and rested his arms on his large wooden desk and leaned forward. He sat silently for a moment or two, calm and not judging either of us .
“Miss Partin,” he began, “this is the first time I’ve been asked to emancipate a youth at their request.” Wendy looked up with a sad look on her face and quickly narrowed her eyes and looked back down at her lap where her hands held each other tightly.
Read more 
The Emancipation Proclamation
/in Uncategorized /by jasonpartinJudge Robert “Bob” Downing of the 19th Judicial District Court, East Baton Rouge Parish, State of Louisiana, peered down his nose at my paperwork then looked up at Wendy and me across the top of his reading glasses. He paused, then looked back down his nose and reread my request. A few seconds later he put down the paperwork, took off his glasses and rested his arms on his large wooden desk and leaned forward. He sat silently for a moment or two, calm and not judging either of us .
“Miss Partin,” he began, “this is the first time I’ve been asked to emancipate a youth at their request.” Wendy looked up with a sad look on her face and quickly narrowed her eyes and looked back down at her lap where her hands held each other tightly.
Read morePrince Edward’s Island
/in Uncategorized /by jasonpartinSome time after I saw Stevie Nicks and single handedly helped deliver phone books to all of Baton Rouge, I stayed with Uncle Bob and Auntie Lo for a while, and they took me to Disneyland to see my grandfather. Not Big Daddy, but Wendy’s dad, they said. He was a cartoonist there.
Read moreKelly Girls
/in Uncategorized /by jasonpartinThe weekend after I saw Miss Nicks dance, Debbie and Wendy picked me up at Paw Paw’s and took me for a drive. The new phone books had come out and were piled so deeply in Debbie’s car that I had to sit on Wendy’s lap until we had delivered enough for me to have room in the back seat. It was always fun with them, they laughed and joked and never asked me what I did on my other weekends, so I never had to think hard around them.
Read moreStevie Nicks is fine
/in Uncategorized /by jasonpartinI said goodbye to PawPaw and crawled into my dad’s truck. I was anxious to show him my award from school for having drawn the best art in Baton Rouge for my age. It had been all over the news, but he didn’t have a TV. Even if he did, it’s unlikely he would have been awake at 7AM for the Buckskin Bill Black show that I watched with Paw Paw before school. But I wanted him to know that I had been on television and was famous, just like Big Daddy had been so much lately.
Read moreMy favorite Cajun joke about a tree
/in Uncategorized /by jasonpartinA construction site boss was interviewing men for a job, when along came Boudreaux. The boss thought to himself, “I’m not hiring that ole lazy cajun…”
He decided to set a test for Boudreaux, hoping he wouldn’t be able to answer the questions, and he’d be able to refuse him the job without any problems.
Read moreWrestling Hillary Clinton
/in Uncategorized /by jasonpartin“I missed wrestling in the junior olympics because I overslept,” is what I told most friends later that summer. It was true, in a way. I never told Coach what happened, because he didn’t ask; he never asked about anything that happened in the past, only what I was doing today for tomorrow. But when Mrs. Abrams asked if I were okay – she didn’t ask what had happened to my face – I told her all of what had happened that day. I was transparent, like she had taught me to be.
Read morethe David Letterman show
/in Uncategorized /by jasonpartinWhen Mrs. Abrams answered the door, she was obviously shocked by the ringworm covering my right cheek, and of course she asked if I were okay. I assured her I was, and told her what happened, and that I was tired and out of money and had no where to go.
Read moreA part in Wendy’s story
/in Uncategorized /by jasonpartinI woke up and felt the back of my head. The ringworm was still there, so I got up and walked to the mop closet and rubbed fungicide on the raised bump without taking time to look at it. I was feeling impatient and was too hungry to think clearly, so I dodged traffic and crossed Government Boulevard and entered a conveneince store that sold cigarettes, lottery tickets, cheap booze, and sugary snacks.
Read moreA part in family
/in Uncategorized /by jasonpartinI awoke on the wrestling mat that morning, and yawned and stretched and tried to come to life. Dolly Parton’s voice was singing “9 to 5” in my head.”
Read moreA Partin History
/in Uncategorized /by jasonpartinI’ve always found it difficult to write a memoir of my Partin family. Most of what I’ve written is publicly available, but few people outside of the FBI have put together pieces of the puzzle about my grandfather, Edward Grady Partin. You may already know about him, even if you don’t recall his name.
Read more