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The prosecutor rose again to say her piece. “Your Honor, this was an—I believe it’s set out in the Affidavit. But this was—this all took place at the Desert Lodge Tower, which as the Court is aware was designed by Mary Colter, who is a unique and special individual to those of us who live in the Southwest.

“This sign was a 1932 hand-painted Mary Colter sign. Although the $3,000 will attempt to repair it, according to sources at the Park Service, the sign will never be back in the condition obviously that it was in. So they have inflicted damage on something that will ultimately never be fully repaired.

“I should also note the Park Service has a very small number of such signs that were obviously the caliber of somebody like Mary Colter. And so they are feeling this damage I guess in a very powerful way. So they’re pleased to hear that the defendants were accepting responsibility and pleading guilty, and certainly hope that the defendants can understand the distinction between education and vandalism.

“And they clearly have the ability to educate and garner attention. But to direct people, which it appears they have done, to actually vandalize public signs is crossing the line into the criminal arena, and hopefully they will not go down that route again.”

The judge accepted the sentence and dismissed the second count against us, the actual vandalism charge. We’d have to meet with a probation officer. It was unsupervised probation, so we wouldn’t be getting visits from any officers; we just had to meet with one who’d go over everything with us. Then the judge had his say. “The Grand Canyon, in fact, most of our national parks are very special places. They have a tremendous influx of people, tourists year to year, and it is very difficult, simply because the number of feet on the ground, to protect them. But when individuals take it upon themselves to unilaterally affect what goes on simply because they think that—it’s rather egotistical on your part, simply because you think you know the English language better than others, to go around and force people to conform to what you think is appropriate.”

Benjamin glared back at him, perhaps causing him to lose his next words. I just wanted it to be over. No, that didn’t characterize us correctly at all, but I didn’t want to argue. “We recognize that, Your Honor,” I said.

“It’s kind of a crusade on your part, I can understand that. But now you see what’s happened as a result of your crusade.”

“Yes, sir,” I replied.

Benjamin offered no vocal response.

“That was a course of conduct that you decided to engage in,” concluded the judge before moving on to the final details of collecting our social security numbers and the rest. By the time we’d gotten to that guilty plea, I’d thought that had already been covered when we accepted the terms of the plea agreement: Paying $3,035 in restitution and a year of probation, during which we were banned from typo correcting and all National Parks. My head spun as we wandered out. The bailiff arranged for our meeting with the probation officer at 2:00 p.m. It was the earliest possible meeting, but it’d leave us barely enough time to get the rental car back to Phoenix without incurring charges for an extra day. I’d hoped to be screaming southward within minutes of leaving the courtroom and checking out of the hotel. No such luck.

I thanked our lawyer and shook hands with her. Her hand drifted toward Benjamin, but then dropped. He pointedly had not thanked her. He did not shake her hand. Once she’d walked away, he said, “Where’s a customer feedback card when you need one? I want my money back.”

We stepped out into the bright glare of a day nearing noon, the August heat attempting to get its licks in ahead of a line of fast-approaching clouds. We went back to the hotel and changed into civilian clothing, and then we stuffed our faces with roast beef sandwiches and curly fries at Arby’s. As much as I protest the national landscape’s saturation with the same handful of restaurants and stores, sometimes you need