The Velvet Hammer -

Don't write out "to do" lists.  Don't want or need to see how much there is to do.  What would be the point. Besides, the lists go around and around inside my head like a pinwheel anyway.   

Lately though,  have been a bit filled to the gills.  Can obsess about work when the kids are away.  But when they return - it is kids plus work.  Add to that the house remodel and have no breathing space left at all.

This manifests the day before the party.  Rush to work.  On the way from car to office, drop off some recycling in dumpster.  Also drop keys.  Can here the clank at the bottom.  Reach over trying to grab them.  Dumpster lid flops across back.  Legs dangling, waving in the air.  See them.  Can't reach them.  Am unsuccessful dumpster diver. 

Walk into office and happily Mike is right there in the kitchen.  Tell him dropped keys and he gets a tool and goes to fish them out.  Don't realize it at the time but dropped keys are an omen.

Go straight to deposition.  Cristina calls to go to lunch.   Need to get Alysha's birthday present on the way.  Drive to store.  Buy present.  Go to Red Robin.  Noelle is not happy with me.  She is on break from school and waiting for my call.  Call and wait for her to get back to me.  Mommy Lawyer Guilt sets in.  Put brand spanking new iphone in purple case on lap to make sure hear it when rings.  Eat lunch.  Get up and drive back to office just in time for second deposition.

Am getting ready to leave office to go to the conference room when realize.  Don't have iphone.  Whaaaaaaa.  Look in purse and coat.  Dump purse out.  No phone. Forgot it was on lap so wouldn't miss Noelle.  Must have stood up and dropped it.  Call Red Robin.  No phone has been left.  Yeah right.  Call Cristina.  She will go back over there to find it.  She goes back.  It is gone.

Which brings us to the day of the party.  Have crossed it off on calendar.  DO NOT BOOK ME.  Have 2 dozen people coming to house that we've only been in for a week.  Jon the builder arrives at 7:15 and is working on the fireplace which won't be done for another week but at least is no longer a hole in the wall.  Dust is flying. 

Am checking email, writing preamble and conclusion sections for the two summary judgment responses (that Paul and Garth wrote).  The ones Grinches Nick and Dale filed the friday before Christmas Eve.  Have to make fruit salad, buy desert, find a gluten free version, get more food, wrap gifts, get card, do something with construction debris and moving blankets, figure out where dishes are and wash them.  Etcetera.

Email pops up.  Co-counsel Gordon is stuck in Las Vegas at the airport.  The flight is delayed.  He can't make it in time to cover the deposition set for 1:00.  I have to do it.  Waaaaaaaaaaaah.  At least it is by phone.  But wait.  Have no cel phone.  Lost it day before.  Have to go to office.   Drive.

Deposition starts.  And keeps going and going and going.  Engage in twitter rant with twitter pals.  Here is how it goes.

• I'm not supposed to be working today. Supposed to be getting ready for alysha's 21 birthday party at our new house.Instead am stuck in dep.
• Defense lawyer is moving at the pace of a slug. Am going crazy listening to his monotone. Want to shout out: HURRY UP!!! Bite tongue.
• It is a ponderous, agonizingly slow, repetitive monotone that is driving me bonkers. I have places to go things to do for Pete's sake.
• @davidsug seriously. The billable hour enables gross waste of time. If they got paid like us based on results - life would be better.
• @mitchjackson if he was doing this in trial, the entire jury would have fallen asleep by now. Depos should be abolished!
• @wyzgaonwords envision eyes rolling around, arms and legs twitching and aura of intense frustrated exasperation emanating from my rigid form
• okay 1 hour 45 minutes and defense lawyer #1 is done. #2 is now starting off by asking THE SAME QUESTIONS already asked. Kill me now.
• @Nicole1515 @DavidSug we should videotape the defense lawyers, not the witnesses.Maybe if they saw how awful they were, they'd stop.
• #2 says. Ok have nothing further. Oh, one more thing... and he keeps on going and going. Will no longer be upset. This is my life.

Three hours have been sucked out of OUT OF OFFICE day.  Go for very quick run.  Have to.  Am mad crazed woman.  Need stress relief.    Cristina and Noelle get cupcakes, flowers, disco ball balloon.   Anne has ordered all the Thai Food per list written out during deposition.  It tells Rice & Spice do not deliver until 7:00 and please have it be hot. 

By time get home Jon the builder is gone.  Nancy and Gustavo the housecleaners fantastically are done and gone.  Scurry around house in a tizzy.

And then somehow it is time.  Everyone shows up.  Everything is perfect.  It is a family friend filled wonderful evening.  Alysha is 21.  We sing her happy birthday.  She blows out her candles.  Opens her gifts.  And eventually we call it a night.

Eagerly open the door to the hotel and rush over to the little table in my room.  There's the candle and right next to it should be the chocolate covered biscotti.  Last night found it in the little goodie bag left by one of the convention sponsors.  Didn't eat it then, but was saving it for a moment just like right now.  Except there is no biscotti. 

Where could it be.  Did I already eat it.  No.  Pretty sure did not.   Look all over room and suspicion grows.  Have adjoining room with Cristina and her friend Michele.  Would she - no she would never.  Open connecting door - they are out on the town.  Look inside room.  What a mess. Consider taking a picture of it, but decide to preserve world peace and don't.   Find various wrappers around the place but can see no evidence of missing biscotti.

Had been out with dear friends at a restaurant and did not order dessert because of the biscotti which isn't here.  Find a pack of gum and begin to chew.

A little while later I hear her calling me.  They are back.  Being cute and delightful.  I say - did you eat my biscotti. Cristina says - what biscotti.   Michele says - yes she did.  At the same time.

After spending four hours in CLE followed by three hours of receptions and a meal, I want one little piece of sugar and it has been consumed by my daughter.

This is how the second day of the WSAJ convention ends.

Phone rings at 7:10.  They haven’t unlocked our connecting door yet so it is Noelle seeing if we are ready.  Need to be in Theater to be sent out for walking tour at 7:45.   Crud.  Turn on fast mode.  Do everything needed to get ready, sharing one yard square bathroom w/Cristina.  7:25.  Realize, no time to eat breakfast.  7:30. Unpacking purse and packing beach bag.  7:35.  On mission to get up to 9^th floor, get beach towels, fill water bottle and get fruit. 7:40. Discover towel stand isn’t open.

Have to traverse pool deck to reach Windjammer food place.  Wind is crazy and snatches hat right off head.  Lunge for it and it hops away.  Lunge. Hop. Lunge…  It’s like a Woody Allen movie.  Cliché but almost magical and am giggling and wishing girls could see how silly this looks.  Finally hat gets wedged between two lounge chairs and I save it. 7:45

Get water, bananas and apples. 7:46 Rush back down to 4^th floor theater.  On wrong side of boat.  Can’t ever remember what is difference between starboard and the other board. 7:48.  Run into Theater and they are calling out the tour numbers.  Look for girls.  Don’t see them.  Wonder if they’ve already left because they predicted I’d be late and said they wouldn’t wait for me.  Would they really leave me.  7:49.  Girls come strolling in.  I confess no towels.

We walk down to the number caller outer and she gives us round purple stickers with “6” on them.  We decide to make a dash into our room again on the way out to get towels.  Get them hurry outside and are still only the second family to make it to our line up.

Don’t get huffy about being chumped into showing up early.  Patiently wait and are rewarded with adorable Croatian tour guide in white pants, blue tunic and fashionable blue wedgies.  She tells us the incredible history of this much occupied and invaded ancient place.  Things we have no idea about.  And then we are in the center of the old town which happens to be built around the original 1700 year old castle.   It is amazing not only because of how old and at times almost perfectly preserved it is (“The Cathedral is the Oldest Intact Building in the Entire World”).  But because people are still living in and all around it.

We had planned on being dutiful students for two hours.  We are enchanted and awed and entertained.  Say bye and go to open market.  Buy two baskets of raspberries.  Go to pastry shop.  Try to buy many good things.  But nope.  She doesn’t take euros or credit cards.  Their money is called Kunar (or at least that is what is sounds like).   Decide to eat back at ship.  Smuggle berries thru security.  Do our business and leave ship again headed towards beach.

Walk up around hill on charming narrow road.  There it is! Beach! Wind still whipping.  Rent white loungers.  Chair guy says umbrellas come with chairs but it is too windy.  Get settled.  Wind feels good as counteracts warm sun.

Girls complain about mankinis.  Men to the left of us are doing yoga poses on one leg– in mankinis.  Man strolls past us with big tummy almost completely obscuring front of his mankini.  White one with blue waist band.  Stripes.  Stars.  Black.  Pink.  We are in mankini-land.  Tell girls to get used to it.

Am reading but also looking.  Have been watching pattern plus stripe mankini guy two rows away and to the side having battle with beach umbrella.  He puts it up and sits down under it.  It blows over.  He pops up and puts it back up.  It blows almost over.  Puts it back up.  Blows inside out.  Fixes it.  Finally wind has had enough.  Blows so hard that the cloth part of the umbrella is whipped completely off leaving only the skeleton of shiny metal spokes standing.  He tries to put the cloth part back on.  Eventually gives up.  Closes up metal parts and wraps cloth part back around it.  Pretends to make it look normal.  Walks it over to pile of umbrellas and hides it underneath so chair renter guy won’t get mad.

Plan to stay at beach until we are ordered to be back on ship.  Wind eventually dies down.  Even with an umbrella, we’ve had enough mankinis for one day.  Head back to ship an hour early.

Noelle graduated from high school yesterday.   Somewhere inside me there is a frantic primal scream waiting to get out.  It doesn't seem possible. 

No more babysitters to juggle so I can go to work.

Or teachers' names to pretend to remember.

No more PTSA announcements to scan.

Or soccer and tennis games to attend.

No more homecoming dance send offs.

Or costco size bundles of construction paper to buy.

No more field trips to the courthouse.

Or English papers to edit.

No more late notices from the library.

Or snacks and lunches to pack.

High school is over for all my girls.  And I need to get a grip!

Photo:  Cristina wearing 5" heels; Noelle wearing flats; Alysha wearing 5" heels

Am late. The room is filled with female trial attorneys.  We call ourselves WOW (Women of WSAJ).  Am here to show moral support.   Move to the rear of the room, grabbing a cluster of red grapes along the way.  Take off puffy coat.  Stand and listen.

About ten minutes later my phone rings.  Go to silence it but see it is Cristina.  Are you still in a meeting she says. I whisper yes.  She promises to call later.  Put it on silence.  Another ten minutes pass.  I see someone on the other side of the glass door.  Break into huge smile.  It is Cristina.  She's surprised me by coming home from college (spring break) a day early. 

I wave her back.  She listens to the women talking.  Frustrations.  Worries.  The older ones providing reassurance.  Women are now at parity in terms of law school admissions.  But they comprise just 20 percent of the plaintiff's trial lawyer bar. 

Several talk about being mistaken for the court reporter. (Have stopped counting how many times this has happened to me).  The advice is to dress professionally and self identify to head off any confusion.  I look down at my boots.  Was in a deposition this morning.  Am wearing a long sleeve gray sweater and Joe Jeans with a hole ripped just under the right front pocket. 

As we leave and walk outside, Cristina says,  she can't relate at all.  She doesn't believe that female trial lawyers are treated any differently than the men.  She says:  you never had a problem being taken seriously or being treated differently. They need to buck up.

It feels like a punch to my stomach.  How can she think this.  And then I realize, it is because of me. 

Once over lunch a friend was urging me to become more visible in the Asian bar association.  I responded:  first things first - I haven't broken the news to my law partners yet that I'm a woman.

I've always wanted to be judged on my own merit as a human being.  Have always taught my girls  they have the power to be all that they can be.  Without artificial limitations imposed by others. To stand up for their rights.  And stand down bullies.

But now I wonder.  By modelling and speaking the language of equality throughout their lives, have I sheltered them too much from reality.