Flirting with Disaster

Have you ever found yourself in a place where you totally didn't want to be and yet you weren't really sure how to get somewhere else and so there you were, lost, basically, hoping someone would come along and push you in the right direction? That is my life right about now. Lost. And in need of a push.

If you've been to visit here in the last few months, you have surely noticed that the law has lost its glamour for me and that I am floundering in a place of uncertainty, trying to figure out what the hell to do with the rest of my life. I've a ton of ideas, but one which I keep coming back to involves dance. And one way to make a living with dance is to teach it. Sure I could open a studio, but that scares the shit out of me (and requires a ton of money upfront anyway). So I thought, hmm, what about teaching in public school? I could be happy as a dance teacher. Because not only do I love dance, I'm stone cold jealous of teachers with their regular schedules and their summers off. Straight up, no bullshit, hard core jealous. And yeah, teachers make shit money, but not a little as you might think, considering they are home by 4pm and have summers off. Especially not here in NJ. Sure $50Gs a year won't make you rich but you ain't starvin' neither. So, I figured I get licensed, I line up a job, bang, I'm outta here.

Which led to me spending the better part of today researching what it would take to become licensed to teach in NJ. As turns out, if I want to teach Social Studies -- very little, thanks to my fancy-schmancy anthro degree, but if I want to teach anything else -- like dance -- I'd have to take a bunch of college classes...upwards of 30 credits worth. So I thought, hey, no biggie, I can take some classes. I like dance classes. I can make it work. I'll give up a yoga night. Or come in late a couple mornings ort whatever. And then I thought, oh fuck, the best I can do while still working is one class a semester -- and if I need 10 classes, that's 5 freaking years. And I thought, oh hell no. And so I stopped looking because I can't stay here, lost, for five years.

And then, last-minute-Charlie (one of my many bosses) sent me an email telling me he needed xyz done by Monday morning. Luckily, its the weekend of my high school reunion so I had an excuse to get off the hook, this weekend, but I know he will fuck up my next weekend and the one after that and the one after that. Cause god forbid he should consider that maybe, just maybe, I might have a fucking life worth living. Or, god forbid, he should assign the fucking work when he finds out about it instead of waiting until the last fucking minute. the mother fucker. Last time I had to work with this guy, I didn't have a day off for 33 days, and that was just last month. I wanted to tell him to go fuck himself, but that probably wouldn't be good for me so I said sure, I can work my face off all next week and for the rest of my natural born life until I have another acceptable excuse to run away. So you see, I definitely do not have 5 years to give.

And then, just a moment ago, I read about even more layoffs in the legal world (30 senior associates, like myself, let go from one of the nation's most prestigious law firms). And I thought, god I wish they'd lay me off.

Yes, I actually wished to be laid off.

Because as financially devastating as that would be, I know it would also be completely liberating. It would, for sure, be the push I seem to need to get the fuck out of this indecisive place.

Yes, hoping to get laid off seems counter intuitive and a bit nuts, but what are my other options really? Sure, I could go to some other shitty law job but what's the point? I'd take another job and a salary cut to go along with it and end up just as miserable but without the advantage of being able to escape to the islands a couple times a year. So, maybe like pulling off a band aid, a swift kick in the pants right out the damn door is what I need. And without a job, I could get my 30 credits in one single year. Granted, unemployment would barely cover my mortgage, but I'd get at least a few months of severance first, and I do have a little bit of savings, so I'd be OK for a bit. Scared as hell, I'm sure, but not starving.

So yeah, I'm flirting with what would likely be a total disaster, for a little while at least, but really, what's the point of money if you are too damn depressed to spend it? Or worse, if you aren't even allowed out of the office long enough to spend it? And what's the point of life if you don't get to live it? So please, bring on the layoff.

PS - my prayers will not likely be answered. Unfortunately my firm is financially sound (unless they're totally lying to us). Best I could do would be to get "asked to resign" - but you don't get severance for that. Ergo, still damn stuck.

Novelista in the Making

So my colleague and I, both relatively fed up with the legal world and major devourers of the written word, have decided to write a book. A chick lit novel to be precise (we're both VERY familiar with the genre so it just makes sense, that and we are chicks). Which we will write under a pseudonym (we've another colleague who is a bit of a celebrity in the non-fiction world and we'd rather not have to deal with what she has to deal with).

We figure we'll spend one lunch a week work on it together and then work on it individually whenever when we can. It will probably take a while, at least a year or two we're guessing, and will eventually cut into our already meager social lives, but we figure the potential life of leisure at the end of the road (you know, after the book is published and sells a bazillion copies) is worth the lost social time (and sleep). Basically, we've got nothing to lose and we figure if we can make this happen then maybe, just maybe, we can leave law firm life behind. For good. Which would be just too cool.

We've played around with this idea now for a bit but yesterday, we cemented it and even did a little brainstorming. We've got some great ideas already and I'm pretty excited about it. You'll meet the heroine here, I'm thinking. We may even give her a facebook page. :) Granted, I don't know a damn thing about writing a novel, but I figure if this guy can write a novel on the fucking subway, on his fucking PDA, then we should be just fine.

And if I wasn't convinced enough . . . I just was given a lovely assignment which is going to basically ruin my entire weekend. Again. What the fuck is it about this place that ends up with me having nothing to do for three days and then getting slammed with work on a fucking Friday. Oh - and get this -- if i had fucking KIDS, guess what? That's right,mommies are excused from working this weekend. Don't get me wrong - good for them, I love moms, especially my own, but I want to know if there will ever be a I'm not a mom but I'm still fucking worthy of respect Day. But that's a rant best left for another day. For now, I've got to get to work and start thinking about what I'll be ordering in for dinner since I won't be meeting my friends for cocktails and appetizers this evening after all. God this sucks.

I just hope (please oh please oh please) this new venture pans out, 'cause I don't know what else I'll do when I eventually get so tired of the law game that I'd rather lose my house than come to work another day. I see that day on the horizon, for real, and I can only hope that I find an alternative before it gets here. So wish me luck, m'kay?

Too Much of a Good Thing?

On occasion, I've been known to take my clothes to this lovely little laundromat around the corner from my house for the "fluff-n-fold" service (for all you dirty minds out there, it's not that kind of fluffing). I do this even though I have a perfectly functional washer and dryer in my home -- machines I spent good money for when I purchased the home 4 years ago. Usually my excuse for paying 90 cents a pound for someone else to do my laundry, when I could obviously do it for myself, is that I don't have the time to do it myself (and because sometimes happy hour is more important than saving a few bucks for clean jeans) and this is sometimes true and sometimes my own rationalization for spending money somewhat frivolously when people around me are losing their jobs. On a few occasions I have a real reason -- i.e. the item needing washing won't fit in my washer and so I need the use of an industrial sized machine. Then the whole "I don't have the time" story really becomes true -- I mean seriously, who has the time to sit in a laundromat to wash ONE item? OK - maybe I could make the time, but considering the ridiculous hours I work sometimes, I would so much rather be doing something else. So, call me spoiled, but whatever.

So anyway, this morning I stopped in this lovely little laundromat to drop off my (fake) down comforter (no bird was harmed in the making of this item) which, having been in storage since last winter (yeah that's right, its winter bitches -- or at least it was last night), needs some freshening. Now granted, I haven't been there in a while, but this morning I realize I might use the place too much because the girl who weighs your clothes and gives you your receipt said to me "Good morning 'stina." (ok, she didn't say 'stina, since only d-bud actually calls me that, but she did know my actual name). Of course, she also said my king-size comforter would be ready by 6PM even though based on the number of laundry bags in line I probably should have had to wait until tomorrow. Which means I won't have to pile on extra blankets when the temperature drops below freezing tonight and instead I'll be able to snuggle up in my freshly laundered comfy-as-hell comforter. And sorry, but that's worth 90 cents a pound. Fuck, that's worth a hell of lot more than that. And if that makes me spoiled, well, then call me fucking princess. I figure fuck it, I'm already a latte-drinking-east-coast-liberal-elitist, might as well add spoiled to the moniker. ;)