Speaking Truth to Power - Anita Hill [59]
Over the weekend I decided to move forward—to agree to the FBI interview, but on the condition that my own statement accompany the report that would be given the committee. When I spoke to Grant and informed her of my decision, she assured me that my statement would appear along with any FBI report.
On the morning of Monday, September 23, I rose early. I had tossed and turned in my bed all night, checking the clock periodically. At 5:00 I could stand it no longer. Getting out of bed was a relief; my sleep had been so fitful that I felt as though I hadn’t had any at all. The details of the events that I was soon to recount in my statement to the Judiciary Committee were turning over and over in my head. When I finally sat down to write, I spent four hours composing and typing a four-page statement.
At first my account was clear. I was calm. However, as I recalled and articulated my experiences, I became more and more tense and upset. The nine years that had passed began to fade, and I was reliving some of the behavior as if it had just happened. My writing became less and less cogent. The end document contained several typographical and grammatical errors. But I was so happy just to get through it that when I finished it, I did not reread it. Nor did I ask anyone else to read it for errors. I was too embarrassed by its content. If I had not sent it in to the Senate as it was, I might never have sent it at all.
The house had been quiet all morning. I wrote my statement without any interruption or distraction. But as I was leaving, the telephone rang. A stranger on the other end of the line introduced herself and said that she worked in the building where my doctor’s office is located. “You hit my car in the parking lot of the medical building,” she said, and mentioned the date of one of my visits to the doctor.
“What are you talking about?” I asked, genuinely puzzled.
“I had a friend with the police department trace your tag number,” she said.
Though no visible damage had been done to her car, she claimed that the collision had caused a misalignment of her wheels. I did not recall any such collision and was sure none had taken place. Nevertheless, I gave her the name of my insurance agent and asked her to contact him. “I am too distracted and too busy to take care of this myself.”
She insisted that she wanted to handle the matter without going to my insurance company. “I would be willing to settle with you for a new set of tires,” she declared.
“Look, I don’t have time to discuss this now. I’d rather you talk with my insurance agent and let him take care of it,” I snapped back. The conversation ended.
I drove the mile or so from my home to the university, printed out the statement, and had it notarized by Sheryl Waters, a notary public in the law school office. I called Harriet Grant to inform her that I was ready to send her my statement. She told me she would wait by the fax machine so that only she would receive it. I went to the law school fax machine in the library on the first floor of the building and telefaxed the statement to the number Grant gave me.
Finally, I had disclosed what had happened. After years of not mentioning it, or mentioning it only in the most general terms and even trying to forget the matter, I had recounted, in detail, the experiences to which I had been subjected nine years prior. But though I understood it was all far from over, I had no idea of just how tumultuous the next few weeks would be.
CHAPTER SEVEN
Monday, September 23, 1991, was like no other day in my life. As hard as I try, I cannot liken it to any occasion or event I have experienced before or since. Harriet Grant had advised me to send in my statement quickly. The hours I spent composing and writing it seemed to fly by. She’d also told me that the FBI would be contacting me to set up an interview. And the hours between her call and the FBI contact and then the visit by the agents were interminable. Half the day my heart raced; the other half I sat watching the clock, waiting