Water Ouzel

In some ways, it’s unfortunate that myself and others in my closest friend circle remain single.  However, there are benefits in the choices we make, the freedoms we have, the adventures we can choose to embark on (or not), and most importantly, the stories we are later able to share.

Among the diverse dating hypotheticals that could come up in singledom, the one that’s caught my fancy for the moment is Captain Hook.  If we’re true to the musical of course, Hook stole Wendy to be his and his crew’s mother, rather than to get a date.  However, if Wendy were a little older, things could’ve been very different.  I mean, how hard is it for a hook-handed man to get a date even, let alone maintain a serious relationship?  Sure, he’s good for a back scratch, but what about a foot massage?  Have you ever received a one-handed foot massage?  Not the most pleasant.  And what if you’re double hooked?  Or what if you’re just a stumper, with no cutlery at all?  Or what if you have extras, like that girl with six fingers and no thumbs?  How does this impinge on your datablility?

Sure, we’re in a highly technological society.  Protheses are no longer limited to metal implements and peg-legs.  But birth defects and injuries still happen, and the solutions to such problems are still reactions, rather than complete preventative measures.  Somebody still has to cope with not being able to physically do what other people can do.  And yet, genetically and otherwise physically a person could be totally ‘normal’.  What does this mean?

I guess that although I haven’t come out on top on the dating scene yet, I also still have all my limbs.  So that’s a positive.

DISCLAIMER: There will be nothing about WWII in this post, though a certain kind of airman might be mentioned.  Sorry, wrong great escape.

There are certain stories that we relegate to the kiddie library without really thinking what we’re doing.  There are the typical toned-down Grimm’s tales that were made by adults for adults to contextualize their worlds.  There are the Roald Dahl stories with only slight undertones of his creepier adult fiction.  There are the much-edited mini-versions of classic tales: Frankenstein, Oliver Twist, Macbeth.  One of the key ingredients to the acceptability of such stories for children is their unreality, whether or not they are based on actual events or could be.

One of the authors that directly disturbs this illusion of fantasy is Jules Verne.  Ok, so we haven’t made it to the center of the Earth and discovered a whole new world full of weirdo people and strange dangers.  But a submarine?  We live on ‘em.  Around the world in 80 days?  Way less, probably about 3.  I’m guessing here though, and using commercial flights.  Evidently his Paris in the Twentieth Century was fantastically accurate, but I haven’t read it.  In fact, other than the three I’ve mentioned, I haven’t read any of his 55 ‘known’ full-length works.  I couldn’t tell you what they’re about.  But probably they give a  depressingly accurate of the way our own advancement has trapped us in closer contact with each other and the broad world. We can’t downplay these as fantastical, and it’s hard to ignore the gloom and doom  attitude even the most positive versions show.

Of course the most clear example is 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea.  Nemo is the bad guy of the tale in many ways, mostly because he’s living his dream, away from the tainted world of man.  We identify with this.  We want this, in a world that seems to press in against our personal freedoms and allows us few choices.  Why else do so many intelligent young people switch professions or linger in higher education, seeking fulfilment?  Why else are there so many wanderers across the now highly connected globe, seeking something else in a different place just over the horizon?  Why the lust for adventure, for danger, for some montain-climbing, river-riding rush?  We are looking for our measure, which is hard to find in a world with no barren places, no hidden corners to really explore.

As Verne struggled with this, as he struggled with the idea of the scientific mind as a means and a tool for such escape, I wonder if he actually came to any conclusions.  Nemo dies, his dream failing.  Fogg and Lindenbrock both achieve their goals, get some acclaim, and supposedly live happily ever after, but who really buys into that?  As a scholar noted at a recent speech, “Verne is not intent on saving the world, but on creating a secondary world where he’s in command.”  Isn’t that hat all writers do?  It is enough?

Being home for Christmas has been somewhat unnerving.  True, there have been all the comforts of coming home to rest – not having to cook for yourself, an endless supply of toilet paper, and an easy recognition of your personal preferences and habits.  But there are also all the flaws as well.  Family are always the people who know how to really twist the knife deepest, no matter how far you grow beyond your childhood, or how far away you may currently live.  But there are other more subtle flaws that can come upon you unawares that are very unsettling.  Certain objects of everyday use that have resided in a particular drawer or cupboard for 20 years will no longer be stored in the same place.  Routines of getting the mail, bathroom use, and bedtimes are disrupted.  No longer is it just your roommates hogging the shower, but it’s a whole host of obligations and behaviors you had set aside.  Finally, there comes that time when some central place to your former life no longer smells right because you haven’t been using it.  There’s no identifiable ‘bad’ smell, the place just no longer smells like home.  It can be unsettling to confront the idea that the place you came from no longer exists.  It unbalances your ability to look forward.

I came to law school in the fall eager to DO Something, though I wasn’t sure what.  I did realize what I was getting myself into.  The work was actually not as strenuous as I’d thought, but I haven’t been exploring all the options I thought I would be.  This three year period is supposed to be discovery time for me, and so far, I’ve discovered very little.  Not that I haven’t been living, mind you.  I have accomplished certain social goals to keep myself from studying too hard, and I’ve managed to make Portland a little bit more of a familiar place for myself.  Still, I’m worried about the recurring theme I hear when I bring up my dissatisfaction to others.  There’s this idea that I’m doing all the right things, and working hard but not too hard, and that law school is something I need to get through, a challenge to be met that I am so far rising to.

It’s the wrong idea.  Law school isn’t something I just need to get through.  I want to live my life, not just ‘get through’ it.  So I need to be very aware of how it’s shaping the person I am.  Am I becoming more of who I want to be through what I’m doing now, or am I fading in some way?  What are the things that I will choose to integrate into my life and what will they say about me?  Do they count for more in the pressured environment of law school, or are they merely the things I should have been giving time to all along?

There is an idea that the truly great among us are defined by how they stretch and expand despite the confines of the environment.  Like a tree that grows around and eventually encases a fence, or the tomato that grows over its little box, there is something compelling about the idea.  We all want to stretch a little, to break the bounds we feel upon us.  Often we don’t through fear or sloth or even the rationalized concern over shattered bits of environment we might propel in our stretching.  And fear and rationalization and sometimes even sloth are legitimate.  After all, the slow growth into and around your personal fences can be painful.  Personally I’d rather be in an elephant box than a tomato box, with space to grow and the opportunity for mild but continual change, but so far I have been unable to find one of my own.  We can hope law will be such a box, but somehow I think not.  Ah well.

Now that I’m in the eye of the law school storm, it’s update the blog time.  Hooray!!!  So for your not-quite tasteful sampling pleasure, here’s the best of the professorial quotes from this fall.  Please keep in mind that some of these are merely slips of the tongue, and all of them have been taken out of context.  Enjoy!

Legal elements:

“tune of canna” (can of tuna)

“that’s not why plaintiff loses”  (no idea why this is funny, but I thought it was at the time)

“Congresspeople were doing things with mistresses…and masters.”

“bullshit detector for judges”

“debauchery meaning really crazy nutty stuff”

“I can see you don’t set out to sea very often.  Neither do I, right?”

“They kept making their own law.  Damn them.”

“I’d cross town to save 4 bucks on gin.”

“Nine even rather elderly gentlemen move faster than Congress.”

“This one splits the baby a little bit.”

Civil Procedure:

“Wigglesworth – It’s the best case in the book!”

“gen-u-ine”

“That’s not a privy…” (privity)

“Foursome…that’s a GOLF term.”

“It seems like skullduggery is afoot.”

“She’s ‘E’…for ‘Emily’”

“What do you do with International Shoe?”

“Oh shit, McShara.”

“They don’t want people falling off their motor-sickle and dying.”

“gad-about busybody SOB”

“FR3P…R2D2 doesn’t say anything about it.”

Contracts:

“…thrust upon him like some roving band of excavators.”

“If you reacted reasonably, you could’ve stopped the bleeding.”

“…old English feudal land law that still wanders around and messes up things today”

“Even the trial judge went off on some crazy stuff.”

“…crud you can buy in the bookstore.”

“The proceeds went into his arm or up his nose or some appropriate place.”

Torts:

“As we all know, motor vehicles result in death…or can.”

“Ran out of time, but…splurt.”

“person number ‘13′” (yeah, not sure why this one was funny either)

“Would a court expect you to expose yourself to dead…death?”

“We’re talking about a drunk guy.  He’s not Spiderman.”

“struck the budgy…buggy”

“Sorry sister (wagging finger) – He’s not something you get to recover for.”

“At the point that the employee pulls into the parking lot, he’s on the frolic.”

“It’s a pro-cow kind of law – the cow, in effect, has the right of way.”

As I’ve been preparing for WriMo, legal memos, law school finals, and a variety of language and grammer intensive projects, I’ve been feeling a little lost.  It could be the new career seeping into my head and confusing the stuff already there, or the settling into a new locale, or trying to establish new writerly contacts way out West.  Or perhaps it’s been a different loss.  Perhaps it’s been something to do with the stagnation and year of TEAL deprivation that I’ve really been feeling the effects of.  No longer.  The website is back up, the year of no national parks has passed, and the BOOK is well on its way to reality.  Or so I hear through the grapevine.  No word on the website as yet….

It’s odd the way I spend too much time on the internet when I really should be working on my Civ. Pro. outline. Alas, I have a problem and I can’t help myself. SO instead I’ve been spending my time cyber stalking…myself. In particular I checked out my remodeling company (SLS Remodel & Additions) because their trucks have awesome logos and I keep seeing them around. Unfortunately their website is considerably more cheesy than I want myself to be. Ever. Despite my genetic heritage (thanks, Dad).

Otherwise, I’m evidently a British Graphic Designer. Who has been recently unable to support herself with graphic design work before she heads off to India and is working in a factory in the meantime. Why? Because she can weld and it’s money. Where’s my ability to weld? Where’s my India? Where’s my awesome mini graphic design projects? Somewhere, in another life, I was myself as a Brit and said things like ‘petal face’ and ‘bits and bobs’. But for the current incarnation, that’s nto quite the real me. Maybe next game.

When I was living in Boston I had high hopes of seeing a moose.  Maine was not really that far away.  I had friends I visited up there.  I passed by extensive moose habitat going to Montreal and Quebec City.  I was up early in the morning in mooseland for skiing and hiking and other outdoor activities.  It seemed inevitable that I would see a moose if I only kept my eyes open.  According to the local populations of various moose-inhabited regions, they were all over the place.  Alas, it was not to be.

Instead, I made the comment to several people that I really wanted to see a moose, would they help me look for a moose and where have all the moose gone, anyway?  So that started a spate of unhelpful comments.  “Look, a moose!” (pointing at an embroidered blanket of a woodland scene in a gift shop).  “Moose!  Over there!” (hand-waving at various hearth tongs and pokers with moosehead handles at a friend’s home).  “No really, it’s a real moose!”  (indication of mounted moosehead in the rafters at a Maine restaurant).  I know you all think it’s funny that I get excited every time and that I really am that gullible.  But seriously.  Enough is enough.

Evidently, even moving to the other coast is not enough.  So far, I have received in the mail 1) a ‘brake for moose’ window decal for the car I dont’ have, 2) a moose-covered potholder, and 3) moose-themed postcards.  But the one that really takes the cake is the departure gift from my old office in Boston, MA that was hand delivered to me here in Portland, OR late yesterday.  Let me just give you the visual image:

Yes, it IS a stuffed animal moose handbag.  It really zips open so you can store your goods in the moose’s insides.  It really is one of the most awkward looking things I’ve seen in awhile, including myself when I wake up on a Gene Wilder hair day.  And it’s all mine.

So I was reading for class today about some-or-other boring case from the 1800s, and there was this recurring idea of interpretation going on.  How do you know what a law really says?  In what manner do you determine meaning when there can be a multiplicity of understandings on a  single word?  Isn’t this the way fun yay part of law?

But instead of being excited about the idea, I took offense at it.  Really?  Words?  Are they that hard to understand?  Are the meanings so different that we don’t really know what the law says in a particular instance?  Are words really completely not representative of the ideas inside our own heads?  I would say that statutory interpretation aside, we’re really missing something with this conception of language and communication.

SO let’s take a look at this from the old-school philosophy angle – the Allegory of the Cave (which is about where I stopped paying attention, thanks).  Here we’ve got the ‘real’ material world, and some idea of forms or ideas which are truer than true.  So in this case, everything we can possibly see or feel or touch is only like a shadow of the real thing.  Our lives as we know them are Micro Machines.  Not a particularly pleasant thought, but one the court seems to get along with well.  Also, it doesn’t seem to be that reasonable in the scientific era that we all believe in some out there ‘more real’ thing that is beyond possible conception.

So, another idea, and I can’t remember where it’s from.  Maybe Navajo?  Anyway, the idea is of signs being the true thing and all the associations being false – the symbol is what’s ‘real’.  For example, let’s say you have some stylized picture of a flower.  Obviously, it’s not a specific individual flower, or even type of flower, but a representation of the whole – specific flowers, associated meanings (love, youth, poetry), and all kinds of other related stuff that’s implied by a particular symbol.  The sign is more than the signified, or there’s multiple signifieds for a single sign (thank you, Saussure).  This is more in line with my own conception of the ‘real’ world and even how the law should be interpreted.

Ideas are fickle, changing, and always indeterminate.  It is words that are eternal, enduring, and defined.

Today was a good day.  I had lunch with my roommates at a local Mexican place, and it was actually good.  Out of the many restaurants in our neighborhood, it’s the first we’ve gone to together that we’ll return to.  I found out the major lawyerly memo I was freaking out about isn’t due tomorrow – in fact, it isn’t due till next week.  I actually had time to take a nap and read in the sun on a day that was bright, with just the perfect amount of wind – and in September, too!  I cracked open a bottle of the ‘bio-dynamic’ white wine I’d gotten on Saturday and shared it around, to the happiness of my living-mates.  Finally, I enjoyed on of the PR cigars that was mailed to me awhile ago, by myself, in the dark, on the porch.  All in all, a pretty respectable day.

I was just about ready for unconsciousness when I found out that Fletcher, my roommate Lindsay’s cat, had been in my room.  Normally, I like Fletcher.  Sure, he’s a bit on the heavy side and is probably the most hedonistic being I know.  He’d do anything for a good pet, and even though this means he has a tendency to park his butt wherever it’s most inconvenient for me when I’m studying, he doesn’t get ruffled when I just push him out of my way.

However, Fletcher has had the unfortunate tendency of late to pee on Walter’s bed.  Now Walter, my other roommate, does just have a mattress on the floor, and I have been convinced that Fletcher’s natural reaction was to treat it as a giant litter box.  Fletcher has been since banned from Walter’s room, but was allowed in mine, as he often curls up on it without showing any inclination to urinate.

Unfortunately, I had a false sense of security about the whole thing.  Fletcher was really just waiting for the opportune moment to let loose the floodgates.  And he seriously didn’t hold back this time.  I’m not just talking about a little pee.  I’m talking about serious puddling on top of my duvet cover slowly seeping into the comforter below.  I’m talking about little rivulets running  from the top of my bed to the hardwood floor below.  I’m talking about more liquid than a cat – even a big one – should biologically be able to hold.

I’ve had some gross cat experiences in my day, from the inevitable half-eaten remains of  ‘presents’ to the bloody, thick spit-ups of a kitty with mouth cancer.  And really, in the grand scheme of things, cat piss is not all that bad.  It’s not as corrosive as bird doo, and it doesn’t smell like some of the more pungent markings of other animals.  Still, there are limits to what I’m willing to allow in my immediate vicinity.  As a result, Fletcher my kit, you’re no longer welcome on my bed.