"Beauty confronts us with the requirement that we place ourselves among...the redeemers, the leaders in the protection of life. Once you have seen the bush on fire, you are not going to get out of the assignment unless you close your eyes to the beauty.... [You] either have to close your eyes or go back to Egypt and set the people free." - Rev. Dr. Rebecca Parker, "Rising to the Challenge of Our Times"

Thursday, January 12, 2006

'cause the darkest hour...is just before dawn

In this case the great Mama Cass (http://www.casselliot.com/) was clearly referring to any time I would actually be able to run outside in the morning before work. Has it always been that dark at 6:45 a.m. in January? What is this, freakin' Alaska or something?

I have been running on a treadmill (at the gym) a couple times during the week, and in the park on the weekends when it's not pouring rain and one has time to wait until the sun rises. I wouldn't characterize the training as intense, but I feel like it's an improvement over this time last year and the year before. Come February 11 and the 4-mile "Run Valentine Run" (benefiting Legal Services of Northern California) I will be trained better than for the last two years' events, after which I always said, Dang, I did OK at this, but if I'd TRAINED, I'd be kicking serious BUTT. So, a warning to all those butts about to be kicked. Gently.

On the subject of weekends: this coming one is 3 days long and I'm going to stay home and bake bread (maybe) and work on my essay for the ABA e-journal that has the carrot of much prize money dangling before it. 600 words on My Life in the Law, How I Been Changed, and so forth. It was smart of the ABA to limit it to 600 words. Even at 600 words, the prize of $5000 only amounts to $8.30 per word. This may sound like a pretty decent rate but I'm hoping it's still too cheap for the vast majority of attorneys who do not work for legal aid and thus the pool of contestants will be reduced.

My Life in the Law is proportionally a bit short compared to My Life. Yet, it has revealed much to me. Not much that I was really thrilled to find out, but if you're in the business of getting some real revelation it tends to be short on pleasantries. Not devoid of, but short. I don't want anyone reading this who may be considering a legal career to let it change his / her mind. It's just that the magic process of drawing things to us that we need to learn about, when we can't seem to recall having signed up for that particular class, but now that you mention it, yes it was a prerequisite we should have finished a long time ago.
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