May Day

Let's see, where do I begin to catch up on the past week that I haven't written?

First of all, Seva is now two days short of three weeks old.  She's healthy, thank God.  And she's growing, which is perceptible even though I see her every day.  And for that I'm thankful too.  I treasure those moments when she's awake, alert, calm, and her eyes are open and she's looking around.  It's as if she's beginning to take in her surroundings, even if her depth perception is not yet developed.  I'm almost certain that she recognizes me, or at least I hope she does.  Jeannie and I have really been blessed and I look forward to seeing Seva continue to grow and develop into a little girl.

Speaking of changes, this week is the first week that [...] is at its new location at the Cast Iron Building, 718 Arch Street.  Although I had some doubts and misgivings about moving from our previous location at 15th & Chestnut, I've been pleasantly impressed with the new building.  The two main things that I miss are my view from the windows at 42 South 15th Street and the fact that my commute was simply a 15 to 20 minute walk.  Now I have to take the 17 bus and I have just one window, behind me, that looks out to an opposing wall and a parking garage.  As a whole, though, the office set-up provides more privacy and overall a lot more square footage for the organization.  Although I've lately been critical of [...], I'll always give credit where credit is due, and in making this move, and actually making it happen, management has done a very good job.  With that being said, I'm still looking forward to going out on paternity leave in mid-June.

After finishing The Old Man and the Sea by Ernest Hemingway, I began reading Blindness by José Saramago.  I'm nearly halfway through now.  It's been a good book so far, but I'm really wondering how it's going to end, whether all the characters will be cured of their white blindness and whether the author will explain the cause of the epidemic.

Right now it's raining again.  There was already about an inch or more of standing water in our patio from a ton of rain that fell throughout the day and night yesterday.  What can we expect though, it's springtime.  As I was walking to the bus stop this morning, I noticed that little leaves are starting to emerge from the buds on the trees.  Spring is definitely here.  After fall, this may be my favorite time of year.  There's just something fresh and exciting about springtime, finally to be able to get out of the house after winter is over.

I have so much hope for the future.  I feel like I've been through a couple negative challenging periods recently, first with Ileana and most recently at work.  But I feel that these tests were setting me up for the next step, something different, something better.  In the case of post-Ileana, I'm now married to Jeannie and we have our baby Seva, and in spite of our occasional challenges and growing pains, we're happy.  In the case of post-[...], the chapter is yet to be written.  I can only hope for a similar storyline, a positive trajectory in the direction of a better me and happier, healthier future.

I was telling Jeannie earlier this evening over dinner how so many of my clients have been so happy and congratulatory for the birth of Seva.  It's really heartwarming.  I should keep it in mind that being a lawyer comes with its intangible rewards, of which this kind of thing is right up there at the top of the list.  This kind of genuine gratitude and recognition makes me think that being a lawyer isn't the problem, it's just where I'm at now.

This past Saturday, with the weather being nice, I thought on a whim that it would be great to go out to shoot some hoops.  I mentioned it to Jeannie that she should pack up Seva and come with me to the basketball court at 18th & Catharine.  We stopped by the YMCA, hoping that I could pump up my basketball a little bit, but the Y was closed, so I had to go with a mostly-filled ball, which wasn't so bad.  When I got to the court there was another kid, probably in his late teens, who got there right around the same time.  We shot around at one end of the court for a while until another couple guys came by, probably in their early to mid twenties.  About a half hour into shooting around, we got a game of 3-on-3 going at the other end of the court.  I told Jeannie before the game started that I was sure that I'd get winded.  And my prediction came true.  I had bursts of athleticism and flashes of some good offensive drives to the hoop, but overall my lung capacity and poor cardiovascular condition held me back from playing anywhere near top form.  I'll tell you, though, even though my body felt it for at least the next couple days, it was totally worth it, I had a lot of fun just playing ball, doing something for the heck of it, but still competing.  It was great.  I hope to play again this coming weekend.

Another highlight from this past weekend, Sunday I think, was looking through a lot of the poetry that I've written and saved on my computer.  Some of it made me grimace in embarrassment, but there were other poems that brought back feelings and memories that made me laugh and smile.  I know that many times there's no telling when inspiration will inspire, but I'm certain that there has to be a certain degree of intentionality necessary to write, especially when it comes to poetry.  I say that as a preface to the statement that I'd like to come around at some point and start writing poetry again.  I can't say that I'm any kind of master, but if I can make my future self laugh and smile, and maybe some others laugh and smile too, then it'll be worth it.

Reflecting on the paragraph before last, I realize that I love competing when it's fun.  And I hope to get back to that point when it comes to law.  It's fun to have fun and it's not fun to not have fun.  I'd like to have fun and be happy.

Going back to the topic of memories, I like to think of moments from the road.  The other morning (perhaps this morning?) I was thinking of being on the bus with Jeannie somewhere in upstate New York on the way to Montreal.  I remember being on the phone with Pito and Jess and looking out the window at the colorful trees on the side of the road and feeling excited about heading back to Montreal for a long weekend.  I remember sitting in the passenger seat as Jeannie drove the rental car straight from the San Diego International Airport south on I-5 to the Mexican border and down along the coast to Ensenada.  I remember the beauty of looking out and down the Pacific cliffs to the ocean below and the winding road along the sleepy Mexican coast, the hills looking really dry to our left-hand side.  I remember sitting in a bus seat in the middle of the dark night somewhere in Laos, listening to my iPod, including the song "Light of the Moon" by Scapegoat Wax, which I'll never forget.  I remember the bus stopped randomly at some point on the back road to let everyone out to piss and shit on the side of the road, without any light (except from the moon and stars) and without any cover.  It was one of those experiences that could never be truly captured on a camera, but yet it remains an indelible memory of life on the road.