Belated return!

Well, it's been wayyyyyyyy too long since I updated. I've gone back and forth about whether to keep blogging here, open up a new blog or just let the whole online blogging thing die a slow and painful death. I've decided to stick with either 1 or 3. I guess we'll see in another couple of months.

It's fitting that my last blog posts were about starting my new job and passing the bar, and now, several months later I've been working myself to exhaustion and hardly had time to think about blogging, much less actually wanting to sit down and write. But T is out of town for work tonight, I've got time on my hands, and I'm kind of tired of watching old re-runs of Malcolm In The Middle and 30 Rock on Netflix. So here's a quick recap on what's been happening since I finished the bar:

I finished the bar at the end of July, and then a week later I had to take the MPREs because I'd never actually gotten around to signing up for them during law school. Let me tell you: that sucked. Don't do that, if you can avoid it. It seemed like everyone else was relaxing and enjoying the fleeting period of time between finishing the bar and starting work/freaking out about not having a job. I didn't get even that fleeting second. Because I took the bar on one week, and had to immediately cram for the MPRE the following Friday, and then started work on Monday. My head was spinning.

But then I went to work, and I pretty much have hardly caught my breath since. I go in most days around 9 a.m. and leave anywhere between 6 p.m. and 9 p.m. That's probably a cakewalk for most first year associates, so I feel bad feeling bad about this. Working with The Gang isn't the typical, "big firm" experience. Still -- did it never occur to me that by going to law school, I was headed toward being an actual lawyer? With lawyer responsibilities and lawyer hours? I was commiserating with a friend who is in a terrible first post-JD job working for an emotionally abusive jerk boss who alternates between screaming at her and confiding his marital problems to her. (She has it worse.) We both agreed that we've learned more in the pair of months that we've been baby attorneys than we did during all of law school, and it's definitely more exhausting and difficult. Yet...

This is exactly the job I wanted. I am working with immigrants who are facing removal proceedings, and I am being given the space and support to come up with creative solutions for defending their right to be/stay here in the United States. I'm helping victims of crimes and their surviving family members navigate through the bureaucracy of state prosecutors' offices. I've attended marriage interviews and asylum hearings and gone to court. I have my first court date here in Big City (my first one was out of town) this week! Really, truly, I love it.

And our apartment is great. We no longer live in Tiny Firetrap Apartment, but have moved exactly one block down the street, to a new third floor walk-up with bigger rooms, hardwood floors, a small porch and roof access. We actually have space to invite friends over, and have been able to host a halloween party, pancake dinner, several game nights and other festivities. When I come home now, after work, I look forward to eating dinner with T, watching a tape or hanging out with him in the office while he works and I surf the internet, and then having quiet cozy time before doing it all over the next day. Most nights now, I'm too tired to go out. But on the weekends, our friends from the neighborhood are all around - we were so lucky to not have to sacrifice our awesome location for an apartment upgrade. We get together, or we walk downtown to go window shopping. Sometimes on Saturdays I have to go to the office for a bit in the early afternoon, but the minute I walk out of the building my mind switches off of work and on to the rest of life. So, life's pretty good. I can honestly say that finishing law school was like stepping outside into a bright sunny day after endless days of being shut up in a dark library. That was one long, difficult stretch, and I don't regret it for a second, even if our paychecks are being devoured by student loan bills. But it sure feels NICE out here in the real world again.

new haircut new job new chapter

yeap. i finished the bar, for the first time ever, and hopefully the last. and a week from now, i'll be starting my new job as a law clerk for a small immigration group that i shall call The Gang henceforth, for lack of a better descriptor and for anonymity's sake. if i pass the bar, i am anticipating being a young associate attorney, but that's for chillier days of late fall. for now, i plan to walk to the office and do my time as a good little legal researcher and client handler and so on and so forth. i consider myself extremely, incredibly, horrendously lucky to have found a job, all thing considered. and to be able to work in my field, in the kind of small office environment i was hoping for, and to be able to maintain my car-free lifestyle? all blessings that i thank God for. because i sure didn't do anything to deserve them. but i'll do my best to use my blessings for good things, and to remain grateful.

these are exciting times, in so many ways, on the home-front. because of bar stress and all that, i've not updated on the housing / apartment hunt situation. but we are hoping to have a sweet new place in the same neighborhood sometime within the next two months. we managed to negotiate a fair deal with our landlords of the past 3 years, in which they agreed to let us move out whenever we want, as long as we take the responsibility of finding a new tenant that they approve of. so we're not bound for another year at this point, and they don't have to worry about us ditching them in the dead of winter with no prospects for a new tenant. with the new job, the new paycheck, the new apartment (hopefully. soon), the new lease on life, and the new haircut for the first time in OVER A YEAR, i'm feeling nervous and excited at once. things are heating up around here, i'm grabbing my saddle and holding on for the ride.

Own Date

Took myself out on a very lovely date tonight.

T and the dog are gone for the weekend, down in Virginia visiting his parents with my brother in law. They drove off this afternoon, and I walked them to the car, wearing flip flops with socks and trying to ignore the fact that the sidewalks were crowded with summer Friday passersby. This is the second weekend in a row (and next weekend will be the third) that T has left town for at least part of the time. Last week, he was visiting friends in NYC and next week he will be down in VA again. I'm so glad he's taking advantage of the summer and getting out and about to see friends and reconnect. But I do miss him. Already. And with both him AND the dog gone, the house feels especially quiet and lonely.

But I've never been one to dislike solitude. So after reviewing contract formation for the trillionth time (I take back what I said about learning anything useful for the bar in Advanced Contracts), I grabbed my keys, wallet and the Summer Fiction edition of the New Yorker, and just walked out the house. No feeling guilty about leaving the dog. No rushing to be on time. I just went down the stairs, stepped out onto the sidewalk and walked the two and a half blocks to one of our favorite Mexican restaurants.

Yes, at first it felt awkward to be standing in a restaurant filled with groups of young people, downing margaritas while servers hustled and bustled around the room, and to not be noticed, and then mistaken for a member of another party. But once I settled in with my chips and coke (and once my spilled coke was mopped up and replaced...yikes! Good thing I don't need to impress myself!) I was able to Just. Chill. Out.

While eating my chicken mole enchiladas, I started reading this really awesome short story by Jeffrey Eugenides (author of the amazing Middlesex). The short story Asleep in the Lord, is about a 23-year old religious studies major and uncertain Christian who set off to travel around the world in search of spirituality and ends up volunteering in Calcutta at a hospice run by Mother Teresa. He is trying to figure out where he fits in in the world around him, wedged as he is between the strait-laced European Catholic volunteers and the hippie New Age backpackers. He is also trying to summon the courage to do the "dirty work" at the hospice, to figure out the relationship between works and faith. Oh, it's good.

I got hooked at the restaurant, and finished the story at the park by my house. On Fridays in the summertime, there is always a family-friendly musical act going on at the park. When I rolled in, still feeling weird about being there without the dog, kids were running everywhere, young parents chatting it up and band members packing up gear. I sat and read on a park bench.

Now I'm back here, and recounting my brief but pleasant date with myself, because it was lovely, and I wanted to capture this moment. I am content, even if I am missing my husband and my little fur family. And even if I am in the middle of bar prep. We found the apartment we want, and assuming we work out the details the way we would like (it is a little complicated), we'll be able to take it over come September. This makes me extremely happy. The decision was easy, too. T and I went to see it, looked at each other and as soon as we walked out, said, "Let's do it." The best part is that it's only a block down from where we are now, and two doors from T's best friend, and overlooking the park. So, I'm keeping my fingers crossed.

Oh, summer.

5 weeks, 2 days (don't blink)

When I contemplated the idea of going to law school, it was actually a sticking point that I would be almost 30 when I graduated. I thought to myself: "But if I go to law school, I'll be turning thirty - THIRTY!! - when I get out!" As if by not going to law school, I would somehow stop the passage of time. I guess I'll never know... ha!

Now I've knocked out law school, I am preparing to knock out the big 3-0 in just a few weeks. That means reassessing the many (many) things on my 30 before 30 list that I have yet to do. Along with patting myself on the back for the ones I've accomplished!

Without further ado, a recap (for myself of course):

1) Read the New Testament
2) Plant a (herb?) garden
3) Perfect grandma's chicken and rice
4) Learn to cook Ajiaco
5) Attend Catholic mass in Italian Latin and Spanish *
6) Get a Brazilian wax
7) Be able to do a new hairstyle (no ponytails)
8) Introduce T to my Colombian relatives
9) Learn to hem / basic sewing
10) Record my dad's life story
11) Visit my bro in CO or wherever he is
12) Run in a race
13) Play on an intramural/community sports team
14) Get a bike
15) Go back country camping
16) Go fishing
17) Spend a night dancing at a Latin music club
18) Shoot a roll of film & frame a new picture for my walls
19) Take a Tae Kwon Do class
20) Take a yoga class
21) Publish a zine
22) Ride a wave on a surf board
23) Take accordion lessons
24) Be a regular volunteer
25) Visit at least two local museums
26) Do an agility course with E
27) Play blackjack in a casino
28) Get a spray tan
29) Visit a farm with my mom
30) Take a road trip with T

* I went to Catholic mass in Latin and decided that I'd had enough novelty mass. However, I also went to a UMC church service out of curiosity (it happened to be a predominately black church, and I am white, and church in general is still a different scene for me, since I wasn't raised to go) and I'm counting that.

Looking over this list, it's funny some of the things that I haven't done, that I thought for sure I would do. I can't believe I've had two years to shoot a roll of film, and I haven't done it. That seems like the kind of thing you almost don't put on a list like this because it seems too obvious or easy. But, surprise! Two years pass by and it hasn't happened. That's why I encourage people to do these lists and to keep them simple. After all, time flies faster than you'd think. (Don't blink.)

On the other hand, I am quite proud that I have read the entire New Testament and actually introduced T to my relatives in Colombia! I was really looking forward to doing both of those things and knew they'd be crossed off just because I already had plans to do them. But nonetheless, I love that they happened!

And there are some things I never would have done if I hadn't made a list and thought to add them. Planting an herb garden is one. I've always wanted to, but I am sure I wouldn't have actually done it if I hadn't put it on a glorified to-do list. So after I finished my finals, the first thing I did was buy a few little pots and some seeds and get to work! Since we live in a third-floor firetrap apartment, my seedlings only live on my windowsill. But they are thriving - all except for the basil, sadly. Or is it sage? I'm not sure. But I've got sage (or is it basil?), cilantro and dill, and I can't wait to eat them! Yum.

I'm talking like I've run out of time, but I still have 5 wonderfully summery weeks left. (Si dios quiere.) (I am probably going to give myself an extension to the end of 30 anyway, just cause.) I can't wait to get to work on the rest of my list, which is just a list of fun things I want to do, after all. Not chores. Not ambitious goals. Not serious milestones. Just the stuff that I want to be happening while I'm busy making other plans. You know, life.

It was a beautiful day.

Let it be known that today was a beautiful day.
The weather outside was undeniably warm. No question about it.
I wore my brown HM t-shirt with the stripes, and my hot pink sweatshirt.
During Advanced Contracts, I discovered the rumor was true: I do NOT have to have all of my supporting documentation in to the State Bar Examiners by the regular filing deadline (Friday) in order to pay the regular filing fee.
I confirmed that with FSIL on the front steps of the law school building.
Although I spent about six hours in the library doing legal research for a client who is at risk of being deported to a country he doesn't know, where he would more likely than not be killed, I enjoyed the work. This makes me think I might actually like being a lawyer.
My life decisions, if only for a day, have been validated.
Tomorrow I have an appointment to look at a very promising apartment in our neighborhood and price range.
There is a pint of Ben & Jerry's ice cream and an episode of Steven King's The Stand awaiting me in the living room.
The windows are open and the breeze is blowing through the house and the noises of passing cars are soothing to some deep down part of my soul that was probably born in childhood when I had dreams of living in a big city.
Let it be recalled, it was a beautiful day.

perfect costs as perfect does

the search is on for our new apartment! t and i have already looked at two this morning. all this thinking about relocating really has me thinking more generally about where we live. essentially, it's the perfect neighborhood, as far as city living goes. it's right in the heart of the city, without being noisy. it's as safe as city living can be. the neighbors are a diverse set of characters: young families, old italians, immigrant workers, all ages and races. within two blocks of my apartment are two grocery stores (including whole foods!), a pet store, two coffee shops, several restaurants/bars, a wine & liquor store, mail supply store, playhouse, bike shop and park. my landlords are on the corner, as is a bus stop. and beyond the immediate vicinity, it takes between 5 and 10 minutes to walk to city hall, to the big shops, the tourist destinations, the subway and train stations. t's walk to work is about 15 minutes. i looked up the walkability score of my address yesterday on walkscore.com. out of 100 points, it scored a 98.

so those are all awesome things about our neighborhood. as you can imagine, it comes with a price that could be easily avoided by moving to a further out neighborhood. there are lots of cool, up-and-coming neighborhoods full of young, creative people doing interesting things, with housing that is significantly cheaper than the housing in our neighborhood. it happened that we really lucked out and it was pure chance that we found our current firetrap through word of mouth before we had even moved to the Big City. we rent from some old-school neighborhood types that don't know about Craigslist and are charging us less than market value. sometimes when i walk through our neighborhood and look at the amazing houses and beautiful street art and famous eateries, i wonder how we ended up here. that's when i start to think we're crazy for trying to get a better deal here in the neighborhood.

we absolutely have to find a larger space, soon. this tiny apartment has been perfect for the three years i've been in law school. if i were honest, i'd say i could continue to live here a little longer and save money, just to keep the location. but we need access to the outside, beyond an open window on the third floor. t routinely talks about wanting a better apartment. and our friends (who have two incomes) live in an awesome place just a block away. so we're searching, and we're putting up more money for it. but a part of me wonders if it's realistic to expect to find the perfect "next step" apartment in our current neighborhood. i also wonder what it says about us that this is where in the city we've chosen to live. we have friends who pay half what we're willing to pay, for much bigger space, in different areas. when people hear where we live, they peg us as yuppies. when i ask around at shops for potential leads in the neighborhood, i get comments about how hard places are to come by here and how expensive they are.

if we can pull this off, it'll be amazing. i just don't want to go broke doing it. oh, exciting times. i can't wait to see where we end up.

My favorite coffee shop

For the last three years, I have gone to the same coffee shop that is one block away from my front door. On good months, I go once a week. On bad months, I go once a day. But I always go. Yesterday, I cashed in my latest buy-eight-get-one-free coffee.

This morning, I was putting on my shoes and glanced at my blackberry to check my email, preparing to saddle up the dog and head over for a caffeine fix before class. The first email I saw was from Best Woman: "Isn't this horrible?" it said. And below that, an article from our local neighborhood bulletin board.

My favorite coffee shop had been robbed that very morning, while one block away, my husband, dog and I slept soundly. Not only that, but one of the baristas, the lovely baristas that I love so much because they are friendly, unpretentious and always remember my order... one of them was brutally sexually assaulted in one of the spacious bathrooms with the automatic light fixtures. It happened around 6:30 a.m. Right around the time they were opening.

Why should I write about this? It's not my trauma. These things happen around big cities every day. More than that. They happen in small cities, in suburbs, in towns across America. It happened in Richmond just before we moved there, to the family that owned our favorite toy store. It was worse, then.

But this is different because these are people I know. It touched my life. Rape. Robbery. Violence. It touched my life, in a way I've been privileged not to know. And more than scared, I am sad and angry. Why did this happen to someone I know? Why did they have to suffer this way, while just a couple hundred yards away, we were so close by? She ran to the convenience store that shares a corner with my apartment, and the guy who works mornings there called the cops. The cops, the news, they responded right away. And for that, this neighborhood is lucky.

I pray for justice, and for healing, and for repentance.

Thundersnow, ho!

Oh Big City snow, I'm so over you. It's hard to believe that I'm in my third year living in this place. I remember when I first started this blog we were still deciding whether to stay in Richmond or move. Hell, we were considering moving southwest instead of northeast. And now it's just another day of snow boots. Not that Northern VA has fared any better. (Worse, actually, from what I hear.)

But tonight is the night of the D Plan show, and we've got an old friend from college coming in to town for the weekend, and pretty much the entire city has declared it a snow day despite the fact that classes aren't cancelled and offices aren't closed. It's just an air of festivity.

I'm doing some pro bono work for an immigration attorney that I know through my extracurriculars. (Note to aspiring law students: law review and moot court aren't the only extracurriculars out there. Volunteering leads to leads!) So I should probably pull on the snow boots, wrangle up the dog-horse and make my way over to the coffee shop and get down to business before my friend's train gets in. Wahoo!

The future, in terms both long and short.

It's been so long since I've updated, especially with anything beyond "Oh, it's finals. Life sucks." So long, in fact, that I don't really feel like updating now.

But update I will. For posterity, as always.

Finals ended on Friday, and it's Monday today. So really, it's only been a few days since my semester ended, but it already feels like an eternity ago. Immediately after my last final (4:30 pm on a Friday... fun!) I grabbed a couple law school buddies and we met up with T who was having his holiday party after-party at a bar downtown. That led to more drinks, two pizzas, some fries and a homemade sausage sandwich, all consumed at various stops between the first bar and my apartment. I wound up at home several hours later, quite full, slightly tipsy and very ready for sleep.

Saturday consisted of watching old Christmas cartoon classics (the lesser-known, racist ones, because that's all they had on Netflix Instant Watch) while I purged my study nook of all my old notebooks, outlines, books and assorted papers. I also managed to purge my closet, which started out at the beginning of the semester looking so neat and tidy, but ended up the apparent victim of a deadly tornado. After throwing every single shirt, suit jacket and dirty sock onto the bed, I sorted clothes into "trash", "giveaway" and "keep" and then stopped, leaving the tornado debris all over the room. Hah. Finishing projects is not one of my strengths.

We went on a date Saturday night, though, which was awesome. T had brought a bottle of wine home a few days ago, which I stared at longingly for the last 3 days of studying, having realized that I absolutely cannot be productive if I've had a glass of merlot. T, the wine and I made up the street to a BYO thai restaurant, where the waiter immediately whisked the bottle away to be opened, only to return moments later with the cap unscrewed. "Didn't realize this was screw-top," he said, as we all looked down and laughed awkwardly.

And speaking of awkward, the post-finals reconnection is always a little awkward, because I've basically spent the last three weeks ignoring T while he goes about his business and I sink into a pit of despair and self-pity out of which I refuse to be helped. All of a sudden, with finals over, I'm ready to return to our amazing marriage, our passionate love and fond affection for one another, and I'm inevitably frustrated that life is not immediately back to normal, my husband isn't attentive to my every need and our conversation doesn't flow the way I remember it. It takes time to cultivate the closeness that I've shrugged off for the entire last month of school. And that is why our Saturday night date, despite my initial misgivings, was so lovely.

After dinner, wine and dessert, we made our way uptown to a local art theater to see Tiny Furniture. I could write a whole other blog post about why I thought Tiny Furniture was awesome. But suffice it to say that there aren't enough movies told from the point of view of a 22-year old normal-sized girl who isn't sure why she's living with her parents or working at a restaurant after having just earned a college degree, but is pretty sure that's okay for now and the answer isn't about finding the right guy or getting a makeover. I highly recommend it, and I'll leave it at that.

So anyway, after Saturday, the rest of the weekend (aka Sunday) was just a bunch of me and T poking around the house, planning for our upcoming trips, alternating between getting things done (me: put the clothes away, t: pack orders) and laying around (me: listen to savage love podcasts, t: nap). We went over to our friends' house to eat dinner and watch more old Christmas movies, came home and went to bed.

Where does that leave me?

Well, pretty much trying to fight off a sinus infection and avoid the freezing, freezing death cold of the Big City, while continuing to be semi-productive in planning for my future, in terms both short and long. (Short: trip to T's family's rental house for Xmas, then 2 weeks in Colombia. Long: another college graduation that may or may not lead to a paying job.) I'm putting together a homemade Christmas present for everyone in my life, and telling myself that is a form of productivity. And I'm carefully spacing out my consumption of Tylenol Head Congestion pills and Theraflu Warming Elixer (or whatever it's call). And forcing myself to update my blog.

NaBloPoMo (friendship edition)

I had time to kill yesterday, so I went to the downtown Borders Books. Borders is one of my favorite places to spend an afternoon, and it has been ever since the only bookstore I knew was in downtown DC. My dad would sometimes drive us into the city on weekends, take us to the business district and point out all the neat places he remembered from when he used to work in the area. Inevitably, we would end up at Borders, which at the time was this unheard-of idea for a bookstore: a place with comfy chairs and coffee and nobody hovering over your shoulder expecting you to buy something. We would spend hours there. After a Borders and a Barnes & Nobles both opened up near our house, we stopped going into the city as much. We called those places "the library".

So yesterday I was up in a corner of the Big City's Borders, which sits right in the thick of everything, and I was curled up in a corner on the second floor, next to the ceiling-to-floor windows that overlooked the scurrying pedestrians and hot dog vendors. I spent two hours reading a book called Toxic Friends: The Antidote for Women Stuck in Complicated Relationships. As per my usual method of browsing and reading, I had picked up the book, along with a large stack of others, from the Psychology/Self-Help section that always seems to beckon my narcissistic self. Since it was my first find, I started in on it first. And never moved on.

I've been thinking a lot about friendships lately. I had one friend from school whose friendship might be fairly described as contentious. This friend was a guy, but not that kind of guy friend. Just a kind of easy to hang out with dude who always seemed to be available for lunch or drinks and was one of several in a circle of friends I've made at school. He was nothing like me in most ways - his political beliefs were undeveloped but ran conservative, and he was quick to make offensive jokes. He also came across like an asshole to most people, at least at first glance. But he was friendly in his teasing about my six highlighters that I used to highlight class notes during Crim our first semester, and didn't seem to draw the distinction between me and our younger, more sociable section-mates that I had mentally drawn for myself. So I liked him and we hit it off. On the other hand, T was never a fan of this guy, mainly because I have a history of making friends with jerks, and probably because he suspected this friend's motives (which I didn't otherwise I wouldn't have been friends with him). Yet we remained friends for the first two years of law school, traveling as we did in the same circles.

Long story short, I "broke up" with him as a friend because of something he did that pissed me off and crossed a boundary. But more than feeling pissed off at what he did, I have also felt pissed off that he ruined what I thought was a good friendship. It hurts, maybe as much because I should've seen it coming as because it happened at all. I'm mad at myself for letting myself become friends, once again, with someone who isn't looking out for my best interests. And that is, perhaps, why I found myself relating best with the The Sacrificer.

Sacrificers, according to this book, are those who put their heart and soul into a friendship, in an attempt to develop closeness. They often feel shortchanged when their friends prove not to be as dedicated. It's not the same as a martyr ("The Doormat") who constantly suppresses her own needs and wants in order to avoid conflict and go along in the name of friendship. But it definitely involves a great potential for power imbalance and letdown that isn't necessarily due to the other friend being "bad" but simply not living up to one's expectations. Sacrificers are often quick to move on from friendships that don't pay off.

The book helped me to understand why I felt so pissed off at this friend - it's because I thought we were friends who were considerate of one another, and it turns out he didn't feel the same, or at least not in the same way I did. It wasn't worth it for me to talk it out with him, but it still leaves me feeling shortchanged. I go through this transaction countless times on a smaller scale. I make acquaintances with someone, get excited about potential friendship, and then start to feel like I've invested way too much too soon and realize that the other person isn't as emotionally invested. Then I back off. Move on.

It's the backing off part that I am struggling with: when to do it and when not to. I frequently don't back off soon enough. I'll hang on to someone as a friend long after it's become clear that they aren't good for me in one way or another. See supra. And other times, I'll back off far too soon, misinterpreting a tone of voice as disinterest or an awkward conversation as incompatibility, never giving the friendship a chance. Occasionally, I get lucky and talk myself out of writing someone off just long enough to see that it's a friendship worth continuing to hang onto. And then being right about it.

Everyone says that friendship is like dating. What a cliche. How true. T and I had a long conversation about it last night, during our fantastic dinner date. We were talking about the differences between guy friendships, girl friendships and guy-girl friendships. As we sat and talked about it, between sips of wine and covert laughs about the bizarre wait staff, I looked across the table at him and wondered: how did I land this amazing friend? At the end of the day, I know that I am capable of making genuine friendships with some people, because I have a couple already. If they're all the friends I ever end up with, that's okay because they're all I really need. That doesn't mean I'm going to stop trying. I really want to get better at this friendship thing. But part of getting better might mean investing more in the people who have already shown that they care. It makes me think I have some phone calls to make.

NaBloPoMo (my brother's edition)

Well, I guess I'll catch up at some point in here...

My bro got here yesterday! When I got out of class at the ungodly hour of 9 p.m. and made my way back to the apartment, there he was, chillin with T and our friend A. They were squeezed into our little living room, gathered around the TV, which was playing a video loop of a fireplace. How cozy.

JC isn't sure if he's going to be staying on the East Coast or not, but I sure hope he does. To that end, I have managed to get him a little paid gig for next week! And by "get" it, I mean that I happened to come across an email last night from the law school, which was looking for people to videotape some training going on all next week. Since JC studied...videotaping (ha)... he's already got the job!

The best part of having him here is that I have another fun partner in crime to do things around the city with. He's generally up for whatever, whether it's kicking my butt in Bananagrams, going to karaoke or taking an impromptu trip to a casino. Hopefully, all three of these things will happen while he's here. He's only been to visit us in the Big City once before, and that was terrible and terribly brief timing. This time, he'll be here for about a week. Plenty of time to get into fun.

NaBloPoMo (the belated edition)

I meant to write something yesterday and never did. Probably because I was too busy creating To-Do lists with things like "watch 1 episode of Mad Men" and "print out Human Rights reading for tomorrow" (note: not "READ Human Rights reading for tomorrow"). In any case, I remembered about NaBloPoMo last night/this morning at around 2 a.m. when I couldn't fall asleep and was obsessively playing Texas Hold 'Em on my Blackberry while holding it under the covers so the light wouldn't keep T up. I decided to write this post in the AM and write a second NaBloPoMo in the afternoon/evening. I'm looking forward to today because my bro-bro gets into town for a visit! It's only the second time he's been to the Big City, but the first time he came was right before the start of Spring semester of my first year of school. I was not exactly the best hostess, on account of I was extremely sulky over having to go back to being scared to death. Ha! Memories...

Anyway, until this afternoon!

NaBloPoMo (having a drink with a friend)

A while ago I wrote about how my friend came out at our Halfway to JD party, in a drunken admission calculated to make the rest of us feel like we'd missed something obvious the whole time. Which of course, some of us had.

Anyway, I just got back from the bar where I had drinks with said law school friend and talked about trivial gossip. I regaled him with tales of this past weekend's Laguna Beach excursion. He told me about the people he's been seeing and the people he's been trying to avoid. I told him about my nascent plans to hang my own shingle after graduation. He regaled me with tales of his interviews with "the other side" (a.k.a. government immigration attorneys).

It was the kind of inconsequential chatter that I've been missing a lot of lately. And since this is NaBloPoMo and I am making a greater effort to document a bit from each day of my life for the next month, I'm happy to have this down on record: I do have friends, even if they are casual acquaintances. These kinds of evenings recharge my batteries and make me happy to come home and settle in with a casebook and a cup of tea. It's just nice to be around people.

Brief thought on moving back to Virginia

While we were in Richmond, I ran into some people we used to hang out with from college. One of the guys had moved to DC while we were living in RVA and has since moved back. He said that he likes Richmond a lot more now than he did when he lived there before. Before he left for DC, he described feeling bored with the city. He doesn't know if it's that Richmond has changed or himself, but he's goes out a lot more and has a lot more fun now.

This gave me some encouragement about perhaps one day moving back. One of my big concerns is that moving back to Richmond would be a return to a slightly more...stunted social life.

Anyway, it was a good weekend. The best weekends, it should be no surprise, are the ones that I forget that I'm in law school. I should think about that some, though. After all, aren't I going to miss law school when it's over? Probably best to spend more time focusing on the here and now.

A soccer adventure, or how I forgot I was in law school for one night

Last night, I felt like I got a taste of my life in the days before law school was even a twinkle in my eye. Ironically, it started with my skipping class to study Federal Courts.

I do that. Skip class, I mean. And skip it to study. There may be little to no logic in it, but I've realized that instead of beating myself up over it, I should just trust myself that I can learn the material, learn it well enough to do okay on tests and as long as I don't surpass my allowed absences, I need to go with my gut.

Anyway, that's what I was doing last night. I was set up in the little corner of our bedroom that's been designated as my study spot, and which I've recently rediscovered as a less distracting place to read than the couch in the living room. I'm working my way through supplemental jurisdiction and debating whether or not to read United Mine Workers v. Gibbs for the gazillionth time. So I decided to take a break and check facebook on my blackberry.

"COLOMBIA!!!" is the first status update I see listed on my friends page. And that's how I learned that the US was playing Colombia in an international friendly match last night. "We're coming up from DC on a party bus!" was the first comment on the status update. And that's how I realized that the US-Colombia match was going to be played in the Big City. Oh crap!

In typical me fashion, I got super excited extremely fast and immediately start scheming for ways to get tickets to the game, planning the best route to the new stadium (that's 30 minutes outside the City) and imagining all the shots of aguardiente (a popular Colombian liquor) I would be taking in the parking lot. I leap over to the iPod, put on the Diomedes Diaz and start a massive text message campaign.

Can you guess what happened next?

30 minutes later, my blood is still pumping fast, but I have realized that tickets to the game are going to run us a minimum of $35 a person for the worst seats, we'll have to pay $15 for parking, T is going to be tired when he gets home and everybody else is out of town or studying. Plus even the soccer bars in town didn't know about this match, or just didn't care enough to remember it. I can feel my dreams of a Colombian rumba slipping away. I settle on watching the game at the one local soccer bar that's got the game on its schedule. I find a friend who's up for going.

When T gets home, he's up for watching the game but less than excited about watching it at my selected bar, which is admittedly a jock chain irish pub and not exactly our preferred atmosphere. He suggests the local German beer house around the corner from us, where we caught many a World Cup game. I call them up and they agree to play the match. But when 8 o'clock rolls around, T is on the phone with his business partner and my other friend has already committed to meeting people at the jock pub. I walk over to the German bar alone.

Sitting in that German beer house alone, eating a soft Bavarian pretzel and watching old footage of the fateful Escobar auto-gol (can any Colombian match be shown on a US network without that clip being played) I started feeling sad. Sad because I couldn't find other people to share my excitement. Sad because I didn't care about the game so much as the camraderie. Sad because nobody else in the bar was watching the game, and because the damn place was blasting polka music. Sad because I was homesick for another country.

The game started late, and T showed up just as it began. I learned from striking up a conversation with an older couple at the bar that the bar's owners had actually gone to the game. They had a bunch of tickets they were selling to go as a caravan with bar regulars, but they couldn't even give them away. We had just missed them. It occurred to me that anybody in the Big City who actually care about the game was actually at the game.

"I'm sad we're not there," I said to T.

"You want to go?" he replied.

"No, there's no point." I sighed, fully invested in feeling sorry for myself. We sat in silence, trying to get excited for a minute. "I mean, by the time we get there, the game will be almost over," I added.

"We can go, if you want to."

"Well..." I considered it. Thought of all the reasons it wouldn't be worth it. And then thought about what would happen if we stayed. We would drink a couple more beers. I would muster up a little enthusiasm, but mostly continue to feel sad, and then we'd go home. The polka would continue to blast.

"Eff it, let's go." I looked at T to see if he was really okay with it. "Let's just do it, why not?"

"Okay," said T. "But I think the dog needs to go out."

So I handed T my credit card, told him to finish his drink and pay up, and I walked back to the apartment to walk our dog and grab the car keys. Five minutes later, we were on the road. Before we even left city limits, I felt a thousand times better. I didn't even care if we missed the game.

We didn't really have much of a plan. I'd grabbed some cash from T's sock drawer, but not enough for us to buy two tickets to the game. Besides, we weren't even sure how much time would be left by the time we got there. We just decided to go and see if we could figure something out once we were there. Maybe they'd let us in to see the last bit of the game. Maybe we'd just party with Colombianos in the lot. Maybe the whole thing would be a bust.

We spent the drive talking about our days, like we'd do if we had had dinner at home. I watched the city lights as we crossed the bridge, as if we were driving back to Virginia. It felt like an escape. With my stupid new little Blackberry as our guide, we fumbled our way through shitty parts of abandoned towns to get to the soccer stadium. We laughed at the marker on Google Maps for Chiang Jiang Chinese Food. T rolled his eyes when I insisted he use Google Street View to figure out the best place to turn. "I can't even see that thing. It's not helpful!" And then he blamed Street View for nearly turning too early. "It looked familiar! Street View confused me."

Anyway, by some miracle we ended up finding the stadium about 35 minutes after our initial decision to go. Getting there involved turning onto a half-paved road, crossing railroad tracks and driving through a chainlink fence with barbed wire on top. But we did it.

The parking lot was closed off because the game was over halfway done. I jumped out of the car at the barricade and called over a parking lot attendant.

Parking Lot Man (PLM): "You know the game's almost over, right?"
Me: "Yeah, we're just trying to catch the tail end."
PLM: "It's supposed to be $15 to park here. That's okay. Gimme $10 and turn to the left and park over there."
Me: "How about $5?"
PLM: "It don't matter. That's fine."
Me (Running back to the car and whispering to T): "Quick! Give him five bucks, let's go!"

So we parked the car in the lot and walked over to the stadium entrance, fully prepared to bribe some other people to let us into the game. Cash in hand, we sauntered up to the entrance. There were at least three stadium attendances at the gate, none of whom was prepared to let us in without a ticket.

Me: "Even though there are so many empty seats? Can we just pay at the gate?"
Stadium attendant (SA): "Nope. If you don't have a ticket, you can't get it."
Me: "What are we supposed to do?"
SA: "Try over there?" (Gestures to the closed ticket booths.)

T and I wander over and knock on the windows of the ticket booths, where a woman working late came over to tell us that we couldn't buy tickets after halftime. We wandered further down the stadium to the team shop, which had the game playing on a big screen t.v. that we could watch through the window.

As we stood there watching the game, I listened to another couple standing beside us, watching the game and talking to one another about how their passes would get them anywhere except the field. I looked over. They were wearing shirts from the local soccer team and big passes around their necks. Someone from inside the store came out and took orders from them. "How much is that shirt over there?" said the man. The store clerk went in and looked and came back with a price.

I turned to the couple. "Are you here with...the team?" The woman turned to me and smiled, "We're with the [Big City] team."

"Oh, that's cool," I said. "Well, it's kind of a bummer that your stadium won't sell tickets to people who want to go to the game just because we got here late."

"Half-time," she said apologetically, by way of explanation.

I shrugged. "Yeah, that's really disappointing."

I listened to the couple muttering and they eventually went back to their banter as they watched the game through the glass. Getting self-righteous and huffy, I began fantisizing about the bad review I was going to post on Yelp about the experience. After all, every news article about the game mentioned the lack of ticket sales. Why wouldn't they take our money?

"I'm not sure we're going about this the right way," said T. We stared at the screen. Score was 0-0 with just under 30 minutes left. "I don't think there was anything else we could do," I said back.

We glanced behind us to where a small cadre of people had gathered with the couple who had been standing beside us. They'd relocated somewhere back by a flagpole. I wondered who the hell they were.

"They want to get into the game?" I heard someone say. I looked over. A girl in a knitted beanie and big puffy coat rushed over to the storefront. Next thing I know, she was standing beside me.

"Here, take these, quick!" she whispered. "Don't tell anyone!"

She flashed two tickets to the game and pressed them into my hand. I grinned. She rushed away.

"Wow, thanks!" I said. I have no idea if she heard me.

And that's how T and I ended up getting into the game, where we caught the last 20 minutes of the US-Colombia international friendly from mere feet away from the US goal. We were surrounded by so much yellow and red and spanish and beer and soccer chanting that I couldn't stop smiling the whole time. It was amazing! We did it! And when I turned around from our seats, I saw this:



PAZ EN COLOMBIA. Peace in Colombia.

And then it was over. No score. Un empate. But on the way back, we drove under a bridge as a train passed by, and I noticed every diner on the side of the road. T laughed when I said, "The best part was that we just went." When I asked why he laughed, he said it was because of how nonchalant I was. I reminded him that this was kind of thing we used to do on a whim, to just go, to adventure out and find something to get ourselves into. It's how we have ended up tailgating a rodeo, napping on the Gulf shore, eating lobster rolls in Maine, climbing to the top of a drive-in movie screen. (And falling in love.)

Last night, I remembered that there is a life beyond law school, beyond work, beyond the daily grind and its attendant expectations. Thank God.

Out of breath, but breathing

I've spent the last three hours living an after-school special about Why You Don't Wait To The Last Minute To Assemble Your Applications. I guess this was a sequel to my 1L year lesson in Why You Always Check Your Legal Memo Word Count Before Saying "I'm Done" And Going To Sleep.

Anyway, I really am done now. Like it or not. And for the first time EVER, I felt an urge to run off steam. At 29, "firsts" don't come every day, but this was truly a first. So after I parked my car (legally -- check), locked it up (wheel lock -- check; faceplate put away -- check) and found the house keys I borrowed from T (in the locked car -- check), I suited up in some raggedy shorts and running shirt and WENT ON A RUN. All by myself. And not an obligatory run. I did that yesterday at the gym. This was a real "I actually want to" run. Cue the heavenly music.

Okay, so it was only a mile, and of that mile I only actually ran half of it: 2.5 blocks running, 2.5 walking, repeat. And I took the dog who had to do his business along the way. But for real, I came back sweaty and thirsty and exhausted. Yay :)

Now I am going to take a shower, await the return of my hero (T, as usual) and hopefully meet some friends for drinks and pub quiz where I will forget all about September and the Great Fellowship Debacle Quest of 2010. Bring on October!

Big wheel keep on turning

So I am currently in Applying For Fellowships Hell. I've got a self-imposed deadline of Friday for the first draft of my project description. Going from laidback summer to the pressure and deadlines of finding a G-O-B is neither easy nor fun. Getting my reading done is about the last of my troubles at this point. Thankfully, I've been on top of it.

I will be happy when September is over, fellowship applications are in, and I can move on to other, less time sensitive (though not less competitive) forms of job-seeking. In the meantime, I've very, very grateful for the New Yorker subscription T got me for my birthday. Nothing like losing yourself in a biography of the head of the NIH to make you forget your troubles and get a good night's sleep.

I'm not the best at multi-tasking or even thinking about more than one thing at a time. But somewhere in the back of my head, I've vaguely recalling that I have a date with my mom for an upcoming weekend trip to a "working farm," which I thought meant a farm that is actually functioning, but my dad pointed out to me is probably a farm where the guests have to work! Um... But yeah, that's one of those 30 before 30 things I've put on my list, and I can't wait to check it off! Also, we have a wedding to go to in October, and I have plans to wax and spray tan before we leave... I've even talked my FFSIL (faux-future-sister-in-law) into going with me for the tan! Priorities, priorities, right? I'm also going on a back-to-school outing to a MLB baseball game, for the first time since I moved to the Big City, and my BFF is coming to visit with her little baby boy, my honorary nephew. Good things abound, if I can just not sabotage my efforts to pursue this fellowship.

Please keep your fingers crossed for me that I'll stay on track.

One year of marriage down, one dress size up

I've now been married for over 1 year. Whoop! I'll write more on that when I finally (FINALLY, c'mon!) have our professional wedding pictures. We've been putting that off for, well, over 1 year. Suffice it to say that T & I escaped to the shore this weekend to toast ourselves at a beachside restaurant and draw love notes in the sand. We fondly reminisced about our Spanish honeymoon and vowed to go back again soon. My favorite part of the weekend was searching for seashells to complete the fins and eyes of a sea creature that T & I were constructing on the empty coastline of a wildlife reserve. Joint projects with T are always so much fun (and romantic)!

Um, but yeah. On to other things.

I vowed over the weekend, as I munched on floppy McDonald's french fries during our drive back to the Big City, that I would eat only fruit for the next week. Why fruit, I have no idea exactly. But it had something to do with the fact that over the past week I'd eaten two cheesecake slices in 24 hours, and over the course of one day had devoured cheesecake, cake, cookies and three types of cheese. Fruit just seemed like the opposite of that.

Monday rolled around and we didn't quite have the money to go grocery shopping yet. So I winged it. It is now Thursday and here is what I have eaten over the course of the last four day, in chronological order (more or less):

MON:
Blueberry yogurt
Roasted unsalted cashews
Fruit salad
A piece of fudge (from the beach!)
Tostones
Fried oreos (no comment)
Spinach salad with gorgonzola, dried cranberries and candied walnuts

TUE:
An orange
Roasted unsalted cashews
Half an avocado with lemon juice
Prunes
A banana
Spoonful of peanut butter
Brown rice and bean burritos (we were out of food!)
A piece of fudge

WED:
Apple croissant (whoops)
Blueberry greek yogurt
Wholegrain crackers
Figs with cheese and proscuitto
Homemade cheese pizza (...)

THU:
Granola
A banana
Prunes
Some free samples at Whole Foods...

And there ya have it. Believe it or not, this is the healthiest I've eaten in a long, long time. The trick is that when I slip up, I'm trying to get up and keep going. Onward and upward to a healthier lifestyle and just a couple inches lost around that middle!

A year from now...

Where do I see myself in a year? Where do I see us? Those are the questions that I've been thinking about more and more these days. This coming week, I have a meeting with the two head honchos at my office to discuss fellowship project ideas. If I can come up with one wow their socks off and they decide they want to sponsor me, I'd have to start putting together an application for yet another competitive application process. (And I thought applying to law school was a pain...)

Let's just say I were to get a fellowship that would enable me to work on a project in the field of immigration over the two years following graduation... What would my life look like?

For starters, I would be staying in the Big City. T would keep his job (God willing) and we would have a dual income. Our families would secretly cry collective tears, while publicly putting on brave faces and expressing their vicarious satisfaction that our lives have flourished here up North. It would mean two more years of long, difficult commutes to T's family on the coast. Two more years of being displaced Virginians. Two more years of expensive housing, small living spaces at relatively exhorbitant prices. Two more years without yards or porches. Two more years away from communities we grew close to and left behind.

On the other hand, it would mean two more years of foot commutes. Two more years of being able to walk to our coffee shops, bars, restaurants, grocery stores, hair salons, doctors appointments, Macy's and our offices. Two more years of blissful ignorance of the fluxuation in gas prices. Two more years near friends that have moved closer. Two more years of living in an incredibly diverse setting and being part of a Sesame Street-style neighborhood. Two more years to develop deeper ties to friends we've met and allow the roots to grow where they have been replanted.

Um, more specifically, there are big questions: do we want to own a house here in the Big City? Do we want to have kids here in the Big City? Does T want to continue in his line of work if we move somewhere else? How important is his being vested at his current place? Will my law school's alumni network get my foot in the door out of this state?

If I get the fellowship, I imagine that the question of whether to stay or go almost takes care of itself. It would be just a matter of adjusting our mindsets to the new development. On the other hand, if I have to take a more, um, proactive approach to my career path, the options abound. Big City vs. Virginia is just one of the issues. Do I look for a firm job? Try to get hired at a legal services corp? Seek employment in rural areas where there is a greater need? Strike out on my own? Have I decided on immigration law after all? What kind? Blah, blah, blah.

I may sound like I'm freaking out, but I'm not. I'm excited and I'm just thinking outloud on my blog. T has been having some (unrelated) anxiety lately, so these aren't questions we're in a position to seriously tackle at the moment. In the meantime, I'm hoping that one day I'll look back fondly at this moment and cluck my tongue and smile.

Catching flies with vinegar

Aaaaaaaaand after two weeks of no beer, I broke my no-beer rule tonight. Wish I could say it was for something exciting, but it was just me, T and one of our Big City friends sitting around playing Settlers of Catan.

But wait - that's not what this post is about. This post is to give BIG UPS to my bloggy buddy, Law School Wife, for inspiring me to clean the bathroom and completely scrub my kitchen from head to toe this weekend! It may not have been the most exciting weekend in the history of weekends, but I definitely feel very accomplished :) So, thank you, LSW! You rock!

I spent most of this day with my laptop tuned into K95, mixing vinegar and baking soda, and wiping disgusting olive oil leaks from our formica countertops, trying to ignore the little mice poops I discovered all along the wall that was hidden by the microwave oven and coffee maker. Yuck! My reward to myself was to plan a game night, to just have people over and play Taboo or Scrabble or something... But nobody came, and T and I had to eat all the bean dip and homemade honey-mustard pretzel dip ourselves. He said I should quit feeling sorry for myself because I didn't actually plan anything, which is true. And to make me feel better, he disappeared to the bedroom and reappeared a few minutes later wearing a "cowboy" shirt and too-tight jeans. Who could resist? I had to smile, and then beat his behind in Bananagrams.

That's when our friend appeared, buzzing in to our apartment and arriving just in time to finish off the pretzels and school us both in Boggle.

All in all, it was a nice laid-back night, made especially good by my husband's efforts to cheer me up, Pandora's excellent Kenny Chesney playlist and a few beers. And even though I'm feeling guilty about the calories and my little beer gut, there's a little thing called Zumba that will be whipping me back into shape come tomorrow at 5:30 p.m. So there!