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Radiohead just released its new album online. It’s called In Rainbows, and it costs: however much you want to pay for it! That’s right; Radiohead’s just that cool and edgy. Of course, they can afford to be. So I’m not sure how much this is revolutionary. But still, it’s nice to see the music industry all tizzied up over it. I haven’t listened to the cd yet, but maybe I’ll post a review when I get a chance. I have the gut feeling it will be too modern, dissonant, and experimental for me. I have to admit, I was a little more of a The Bends and OK Computer (grr minus ‘fitter happier’…) kind of girl. A little more establishment Radiohead, if such a thing exists. Really, I just think I can’t quite get to the point where ‘like spinning plates’ will do it for me. I like my music a little more comfortable than that. But we’ll see. At any rate, [hehe get it] when it comes down to it, Radiohead’s still pushing boundaries.
No not politics, your brains, sillies.
http://www.news.com.au/dailytelegraph/story/0,22049,22535838-5012895,00.html
I’m definitely a right-brainer, although I can make it switch if I try really hard. Good times.
Ok, this is kind of a silly rant, but I’m ridiculously frustrated with Northeasterners inability to recognize that there are places where one might choose to live and exist other than Boston, New York, and California.
When I say I want to move to Denver/Boulder after graduation, I get looks either of disgust or disdain or just an instinctive, complete with that stare only a rich, easy-paved life in the Northeast can pull off, “Why?” I’m declared either a “outdoorsy hippie,” a “republican” (because clearly no liberal in her right mind would choose to live in a “red state”), or merely “insane.” I could make upwards of 30k more a year in NYC or Boston, why on earth would I choose to live in a cultural backwater like Denver where you can’t hobnob with Mischa Barton on a regular basis?
Why? Because believe it or not, some of us prefer the beauty of the mountains to skyscrapers, would rather spend evenings at home cooking dinner than grabbing 24-hour gourmet food leaving at midnight, would prefer ski boots over Prada boots, would rather spend our weekends hiking and skiing than at the hippest club, would rather work 50 hour weeks and and get vacation time and even be able to take 6-month maternity leave and still make partner (gasp!). Sigh. To them, this is “inconceivable.”
However, I currently have one ace up my sleeve. I just remind them of the most recent proof that God loves the midwest: Chicago and Indianapolis are in the superbowl, bitches.
I’m horrible at goodbyes. Really, tragically bad at them. And mostly I try to avoid them. Say, by skipping the country to not have to face the whole “graduation” thing. Or managing to dodge any farewells to friends while in Australia. And always choosing phrases like, “See you soon.” Saying goodbye, even if I’m going to see you or talk to you in ten minutes, makes me aware that something is ending and can’t be retrieved. Goodbyes give me an awareness of the persistence of time passing that I often like to forget.
Last week was my last day of my contracts and property classes and I’m frankly not dealing with it well at all. I once had a wonderful professor who that coming to the end of a class was a kind of death. Classes do take on a life of their own, a life that is brutally and forcefully cut off. And the first semester of law school is particularly intense. You get thrown into a whole body of knowledge and way of thinking that you do not understand and you feel like a child again, starting something totally new and incomprehensible, and you rely on these professors to guide you through it.
And so I felt abandoned the other day at the end of contracts. My professor is an incredible woman who, if you’ve seen the movie Legally Blonde, might remind you of the female professor who ejects Elle in the first class. This woman will tear you apart in front of eighty of your peers and leave you feeling hopelessly stupid. And yet, she has in many ways served as a mentor and a mother figure to us. She has had us over to dinner complete with homemade peach cobbler and will make you a cup of tea and listen to your infinite anxieties anytime. And today she told a wonderful story. A story of when she was teaching her first contracts class at the University of Houston.
One of her students was a boy named Kyle. And she was talking to Kyle before class and he said to her “We’ll ma’am I’m not very bright, but my friend Steve, he convinced me that I was smart enough to make it through high school and college and now in law school and he always helped me out. And well, Steve, he doesn’t have to work hard at all ‘cause he’s so smart and charming. But I’m so glad he’s at law school with me to help me out.” And she talked about how when Steve went to find his first job, working for a solo practitioner in Tyler, Texas, he told the old gruff man hiring him, “My friend Kyle’s coming too.” To which the old man replied, “No, I can’t afford to pay both of you.” So Steve said, “Fine, then we’ll split the one salary and if revenues go up when we come, we’ll renegotiate.” The man accepted, and Steve and Kyle moved to Tyler, where they both met their wives and started families. So many years down the line our professor got a phone call and the voice on the other side said “Hi Professor. This is Steve. I saw you at a conference in London, and I thought I’d call up to say hello.” And he proceeds to tell her how he moved from Tyler to Houston to New York to London through connections and all that. So then she said, with some trepidation in her voice, “Well congratulations on your success. But…how’s Kyle?” To which Steve quickly replied “Oh he’s down the hall if you want to talk to him.” And mildly shocked she said, “Oh no, no. Just, how did he end up in London with you?” And Steve said, “Well, Kyle’s good at some things I’m not, and I’m good at some things Kyle’s not. And so we’ve just stuck together through it all and helped each other out.”
And then our professor, mentor and guide, with the slightest hint of a tear in her eye, said to us, “So that’s really all I want to tell you at the end of this class. You don’t need me. You need each other.” And walked out.
I was going to end my blog post there, but I decided I have to share one more story. My civil procedure class also came to a close the other day. My professor walks up to the front of the room and says “I hear [contract’s prof] gave a really moving speech and even teared up a little. Well, I tried crying once; it didn’t work for me. Also, I’d say come and have lunch with me or keep in touch, but you all never do that either. So this time I’m going to be clear: don’t call me, don’t invite me to lunch, don’t send me an email ten years down the road letting me know you’re a wildly successful litigator. I don’t care. I never want to see or hear from any of you again. Go to hell.” And walked out.
And so I’m happy that there are contracts professors in the world. People who remind me that while we have guides and mentors, it is really our peers, our friends, our generation (all of you) who will mean the most in the end. But I’m also glad I have civil procedure teachers who remind me not to take this goodbye thing too seriously, and that hell perhaps ain’t such a bad place to go after all.
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