My love. For so many reasons.

Yup. Enough said. He is great.

Up until this week, life had been pretty normal at the big law firm. I arrived most days between 7:30 and 8:30, and I left between 5 and 5:30.

Monday, I was so slow that I had nothing to do after 9:30. But Tuesday, the tsunami hit - I have had three long days in a row - yesterday I billed more than 11 hours.

Bed sounds wonderful.

Oh, and today I got to see my sister run a cross-country meet (so life isn't too hectic for the important things, I guess). And it was wonderful; she has put so much time into training and passed 7 people in the home stretch.

It's the small things life soft beds and sweet sisters that make me smile. Enough rambling; goodnight!!

My hero

Really, there is no intro...jump right on in.

I think I would rather be hurt personally than sit back and have to watch people hurt those I love. My sweet brother Jon has had his heart torn out of his body by someone who swore to love him and who swore to never leave him.

And yet I love her. I kind of always thought that anger was the opposite of forgiveness, and that once you forgave, you felt anger no more. But I am realizing that is not true. I think the two can co-exist. A forgiveness in light of what I have been forgiven, and an anger at the inhumane injustice that is being done. To someone who would die for love. That love is rare.

I don't think that Jon sees himself as a hero. But he is to me. A champion of love who doesn't stop loving when it gets thrown back in his face. A man who is committed to compassion and seeing the poor hurting soul, when that soul has spewed hateful poison. A man who longs to know truth, no matter what that truth means for his future, even if it means being ever alone. I respect him with all of me. I don't know how such a wonderful heart was ever woven together. But I am so proud he shares my blood.

And she is my family. And I would take her back in an instant. Because he would.

Cricket in the Chimmney

How I grew up in a house of eight kids, and six boys and am a light sleeper now, I have no idea. But somehow, it happened. I wake up every morning at 5:30 AM because there is a man ( I think it is a man based on how hard he hits the pavement, but I have not gotten up to see yet) who runs every morning at that time. I wake up at the clunk-clunk of his feet hitting the pavement.

Now, I am sure you are wondering whether this is a blessing or a curse. You were, weren't you. Well, I will answer this nagging question. I am sure it will be a blessing if anyone ever breaks into my house or when I have kids and need to get up with them in the middle of the night. But it will be a curse when someone breaks into my house and my husband who sleeps so soundly doesn't wake up - then I will have to be the hero. And really, in that case, I would rather not be.

It is also a curse when you are sitting in your living room across from your friends on a couch having pleasant conversation. Everyone can tune out that cricket that chirps continuously from inside the chimney. But you cant. And you are about to go crazy.

Week Two

Oooh I love the Biggest Loser. And I love having time to watch the biggest loser. It is on right now; it is good to see people pushed so much farther than they thought they could be pushed and do so much more than they thought they could do.

And by the way - that mention of having time to watch the biggest loser wasn't lightly said. Work hasn't picked up too quickly yet, and I have been home by 6 every night. It has helped to be eased into things a little bit. Work is such a different environment from the life I was used to living. It isn't better or worse, it is just different, so it is nice to have an average amount of work to do to ease me in. I have worked for both difficult people and wonderful people thus far. I have learned already the importance of having thick skin for critiques and the necessity of giving myself grace. When asked this week was one thing I am really bad at, I said, "practice." And that is true. I enjoy doing things well the first time and knowing I am competent. I have a harder time plugging along, little by little, and embracing the necessary imperfection along the way. But with this job, there is so much to learn that I will have to give myself grace or I will be miserable.

So I am learning career lessons - about how to interact with partners, some who express their appreciation for you and some who don't, but I am also learning life lessons.

A Day Like No Other

Tuesday, September 8, 2009, 8:30 AM: My life changes. Tuesday, September 8, 2009, 5:00 PM: my life changes again. And no, this was not simply because the work hours of a day began and ended.

Life has been clever in the way it brings me important changes - they all seem to happen at once. Back in 2006, I married my love and bought a home and started law school within five weeks. This summer, I sold and moved out of my first home and bought and moved into my second home within four weeks and while studying long hours for the bar exam.

On Tuesday, I started my first "grown-up" job and found out if I passed the Missouri bar within 8 1/2 hours. Someone at the firm decided that that excitement was not sufficient. No, instead, with the bar results coming out at 5:00, we needed to have a party at 4:30 to welcome us to the firm - well intentioned, I am sure, but that meant that we found out if we passed or failed in front of over 100 attorneys whom we desperately needed to impress. And at 4:59, the wonderful (really, he is) chairman of the firm meandered over to ask about my first day. Guess who I was speaking with when I found out my results.

But the good news is that they were happy - both the first day at work and the bar results. I passed, and the firm promises to be a fabulous place to work.

Paul threw me a spontaneous celebratory party that night, and my friends and family dropped their plans to make the party. It was a great night.

Tomorrow, Tomorrow, I _____ You, Tomorrow.

I am not quite sure how to fill in this blank - "eagerly anticipate," "dread," "look forward to," "have no idea what to expect from," etc.

September 8, 2009, is the day I start my first real job as an attorney. And for those of you who have asked, there is no difference in the US between an attorney and a lawyer (I think attorneys like to be called attorneys because of all the "lawyer" jokes out there). Anyway, for some reasons, the Missouri firms and the bar examiners thought it would be fun to bring added stress to this new phase of life by establishing the potential for horrific humiliation in front of all our new colleagues on our first day of work. Because tomorrow, at 5pm, all the Missouri Bar candidates (including myself), will also find out if we passed the bar or not. After chaos ensues at about 4:58 pm, all the people whose name show up on the list on the Missouri Bar website will proceed to a happy hour. So of course I am left with the question - what if my name is not there.

So I wonder what tomorrow will be like - meeting a bunch of new people, taking our "professional photograph," listening to detailed instructions about how we will now be taxed at an insanely high level (thanks, Obama) - "so fill out your forms correctly," trying to obtain a rudimentary understanding of the complex phone system, beginning to practice seeing the world through six-minute increments, .... and then 5:00 will come.

Oh My.