Street Level

(From Zach)

I have been saving up my words for months and will use them all on this single post, no doubt. Working at THE FIRM does not leave one spilling over with words at the end of the day, but I should summarize some important points on life, THE FIRM, and NYC.

I am loving being a summer associate in a BIGLAW firm. You make more money than a first year and have relatively little if any actual responsibility, so it is hard to get too stressed out, although MB will tell you that I manage to do it. BIGLAW recruiting is an interesting process. Since law students are so immature - remember, most of us have never had a real, full-time, roll-up-your-sleaves-and-get-dirty job - that they are forced to compete for talent using the most time-honored techniques - booze, food, and endless entertainment. I turned down box seats just to write this post... I will not complain about the lunches or the parties. You have to take them and the accompanying hangover in stride and realize that this is a part of the process. In a year, you will be chained to your desk drafting documents, so you should get to know the people you will be working with now (why it matters is a different question considering the chaining to the desk point). For those that don't have anything else to do, check out abovethelaw.com for more insight into BIGLAW and the life of a summer associate in the Big Apple.

My other summers are great people overall, since THE FIRM puts great effort into hiring nice people. My office, which I share it with one other cool guy, has a large window that looks out toward Broadway (Bway in NYC). They got rid of co-ed offices after - well - nevermind, kids, use your imagination like your mom told you to. THE FIRM was recently remodeled and updated, which I am thankful for since before it had a reputation for being really old-school. It still is in its own odd way, although we do have a website now.

For those who keep asking what it is I do, or want to do, at work, please stop asking. It is not that I don't want to tell you, it is just that I can't explain it without killing you of boredom, so save both of us the pain. I could tell you that I worked on an "indenture" but then you would want to know what the indenture was and I would have to tell you that it is something you prepare after the OM ("offering memorandum") and you would have to... You get the idea. It is a different language (that is about all I know myself).

Moving on to popular myths about NYC:
1) Dogs always kick dirt over their business. FALSE. Only recently arrived dogs do this. Unlike dogs in the rest of the world, true NYC dogs just do it in the middle of the sidewalk and move on with life. If you see a dog try this, it is a sure sign they are a tourist.

2) All NYers are mean. TRUE and FALSE. You will find nice people at random and mean people at random, which, based on advanced science, means that there are neither nice nor mean people in NYC --> they are just average people on the whole with a few outlyers. This fact is demonstrated by the stone-faced murder look adopted by the native population that does not say anything in mean in words but does suggest they you have killed recently and will kill again if you try to take that empty seat on the subway.

3) Subways are reliable. FALSE. This statement is the classic case of basing a conclusion on a generalization. It is true that the NY subway will get you pretty much anywhere in the main part of the city at any time of the day or night. What this generalization does NOT reflect is the reality that on any given train, you may be inexplicably stuck in a dark hole far below some street in a car with no air conditioning between two people who collectly weigh close to a ton, or at least weighed that much before they shed several gallons of sweat on you...

4) Broadway is broad. FALSE. It would be more accurate to call it Quasi-Broadway or The Comparatively Broad Way since it is no wider that many streets in thousands of small towns across the interior of the continent.

And Life - I like life. Life is a good thing. Sometimes you forget how much you love being alive, but then tonight I was running in Riverside Park, which is truly beside the Hudson River. I was looking out at the pink sunset over the heights across the river. Riverside Park is an absolute gem, a true gift of Mr. Olmstead that goes on for miles of green. You feel like you are in the middle of a great forest. Anyways, I was running down the stone path next to the cool stone wall that holds up the upper level of the park and was looking out at the sunset through the tops of the trees planted on the lower level of the park. It was so peaceful and beautiful. I am so thankful that I hopped on a bus one cold Sunday morning and signed the lease on our apartment even though it felt like it was so, well, urbanish and kind of gross. It has been great and I can honestly say I like it. I will be glad to move into a nice doorman building with less that 1001 coats of paint on everything and that has more than 1 room, but I am so thankful for this little home.

Thankfulness aside, it is very easy for me to feel like I am going crazy in this studio. I thought that MB and not I, the guy, would be the one that gets fed up with the small size. Given my past living arrangements, which have involved random people waking me up while I slept on someone's spare couch, I really thought I could live through anything. BUT I was wrong. I am the one that craves room for a couch and somewhere where I can get away from, well, anything. I want order, lots of storage space to organize each piece of my life. Instead, I am left with boxes on the floor of the closet which does not have doors because I took them off so that we could actually use the closet rod for its intended purpose of hanging clothes. I am slowly adjusting, kind of. Now, back to surfing Craigslist for a couch.