The weekend is over and I�m faced with two weeks of absolute work hell. I probably wouldn�t be feeling so panicky if I�d actually managed to get some work done this weekend. But, despite the fact that I actually dragged my ass in to the office both yesterday and today, I got precious little accomplished.
Part of the reason that I didn�t get any work done is plain laziness. I slept in late both days, and then didn�t manage to get out of the house until well after noon. With half the day gone, I found it too easy to make excuses for chucking what remained of the day.
But another reason that I didn�t get much done is that I�ve just been distracted. There are a couple of things that have been swimming around in my head, making it difficult to concentrate on the task at hand. I probably shouldn�t have gone days without writing in this journal. If I would have put those thoughts on paper sooner, I might have been able to sufficiently purge them in order for me to be able to get some work done.
Distracting Thought #1: Rich dropped by Saturday morning and delivered some disturbing news. He and Anna have been friends with a couple, R and K, for several years. Rich met R at work, and, through a series of job changes, Anna now works with K. We always thought that R and K juggled their large blended family very well. R has three daughters that he has partial custody of, K has two sons and one daughter from previous relationships, and, together they have a son. They went to church every Sunday; they had bar-b-ques; they took the boys to baseball. All in all they seemed like a normal, happy family.
Recently, R and K have been having marital problems; they�re separated, and have been moving toward divorce. That�s not the disturbing part.
R was arrested on Friday for molesting K�s 12 year old daughter. He�s been molesting her since she was 5. In a taped telephone conversation with K, he confessed to everything that the girl said had occurred.
The family is broken. The girl � I can�t begin to imagine what she�s been through. But, at least, she seems relieved that she�s not carrying this secret around with her anymore. K is devastated. The boys � they�re confused and scared. I don�t know how you begin to reconcile this revelation with the father that you�ve always known and loved.
My brother was obviously shaken when he told us. He�s angry. He�s angry at R, but he�s angry at himself, too. He�s questioning his own judgment.
Hell, so am I. How is it that we all completely misread this man? Where in the hell were those intuitive red flags that are supposed to go up when you come across someone so completely devoid of morality? If we can all miss a pedophile in our mists, how is it that we�re supposed to trust our judgment with anyone or anything? How do we teach the kids to be aware of such people when they so obviously get past the adults?
Gods, this man was my brother�s friend. He held my niece in his arms. He would have continued to be a part of her life as she grew up. If the girl hadn�t come forward, he would have continued molesting her and who knows who else. Rianna could have been his next victim. It makes me want to vomit. Or cry. I don�t know which. It definitely makes me want to take a very sharp knife to this man�s testicles. Slowly.
Gods, I hope he bears the full brunt of the justice system. And when he�s behind bars and the prison population finds out why he�s there, I hope they impose their own special brand of justice.
I know. As an officer of the court I shouldn�t encourage that type of vigilante justice. But, damn, this one landed too close to home.
Distracting Thought #2: Grandmother�s upcoming wedding. I know I promised to tell this tale soon. I just haven�t had the time. Let me just say that my 78 year old grandmother is driving us all batshit with her histrionics. The way she is acting, you�d think we were planning a wedding of a 17 year old virgin. And now, expecting the family to arrange all the wedding details, she hi-tails it off to California. She can�t even settle on a damn date. And we�re supposed to throw together a dream wedding � and do it within the next 6 weeks or so � when we can�t even get her to pick a date. She�s impossible to deal with. Thankfully, soon she will be Armando�s to deal with. Sucker � he has no idea what he�s gotten himself into.
Distracting Thought #3: I need a job. Well, not immediately. But I need to settle my post-clerkship employment plans soon. This black, jobless cloud hanging over my head is a constant worry. I updated my resume tonight. And this week I�ll be meeting with one of the judges who has offered to help me in the job search. So, I guess I�m making some progress. But I�d feel much better if I knew exactly what I�ll be doing come October.
Distracting Thought #4: I need to make some time during the hellishness that will be the next two weeks in order to draw up the custody papers for Yesenia to file. Damn it. I need an extra 4 or 5 hours squeezed into each day. Any idea how I manage this?
Distracting Thought #5: A couple of conversations that I had with MM have been bothering me. The first was about college degrees. She seems to think that a college degree is an infallible sign of intelligence. Now, I fully admit to being an intellectual snob. But, I don�t equate intelligence with a degree or a certain kind of degree or a particular number of degrees. I�ve met plenty of dumb ass individuals who had their walls papered with assorted degrees. I�ve also met some very intelligent people who did not have college degrees or did not have graduate degrees. MM apparently puts more stock in those pieces of paper than I do.
The second conversation had to do with school snobbery. Unfortunately, our peers are known for their school snobbery. When you first meet a fellow law clerk, they are generally more interested in knowing what school you graduated than in knowing your first name. If you didn�t graduate from a good enough school, you�re name is irrelevant.
MM and I both went to state schools. As such, even though you�d expect a healthy degree of school rivalry, you wouldn�t expect the same degree of school snobbery that you find with graduates of Harvard or Yale, for example. MM is not only a degree snob, she�s also a school snob. Her various snobberies get annoying sometimes.
I�m a firm believer that your education is what you make of it. I�m pleased with the legal education I obtained and I don�t feel as if I lost out in any substantial way by forgoing the big-named schools. And, especially after clerking for two well-respected federal judges, I don�t think that going to a state school is going to negatively impact my career in any way. MM not only has a chip on her shoulder with respect to the big-named schools, she also has a misguided sense of superiority with regard to her state school as compared to other state schools. I knew this about her, but for some reason it peeved me more than usual this time.
Well, there you go. A whole laundry list of distracting thoughts. Hopefully, now that I�ve put them all here, I�ll be able to concentrate on my work tomorrow morning.
Listening To: late night t.v.
Reading: nothing
Feeling: not as distracted