Better Late Than Never

MY NAME: CLC (will also respond to "Hey you!")
CHILDHOOD AMBITION: To be a lawyer. So apparently I am living the dream.
FONDEST MEMORY: My 27th birthday.
SOUNDTRACK (OR THEME SONG): Creep (Radiohead), The Gambler (Kenny Rogers),
RETREAT: Ritz, Saks, either of the ballparks, Starbucks, Cody's. What can I say? I am a lover of palliatives.
WILDEST DREAM: Quitting my job and having everything actually work out for the best.
PROUDEST MOMENT: ???
BIGGEST CHALLENGE: Achieving perspective.
ALARM CLOCK: My blackberry. My cellphone. Then my blackberry again. (Getting up is hard)
PERFECT DAY: An unplanned, unstructured one where quality time w/ the people I care about most falls into my lap.
FIRST JOB: Clerk in law office (estate planning).
INDULGENCE: Shoes, handbags, and any all other nice girly-girl things.
LAST PURCHASE: Burberry trenchcoat.
FAVORITE BOOK: Again, picking just one is not possible. Hundred Years of Solitude (G. Garcia Marquez); Jarhead (A. Swofford); and one I am reading lately (mostly in airline terminals) which I haven't finished yet, but which I am sure will remain one of the all-time favorites, The Thinking Fan's Guide To Baseball (L. Koppett)
INSPIRATION: My friends.
MY LIFE IS: pain management.

My Card Is . . .

So I'm blatantly ripping off, of all things, an AmEx ad. It reminds me of those chain emails I've received from time to time with questions like "Coke or Pepsi?" In case you've missed this particular ad, it has a list of categories & the famous person hawking the card allegedly fills in their answers. Here are mine . . . pretend I'm famous. Oh, I look forward to reading yours, so rip-off away!

My name: Lulu
Childhood ambition: To be president of the United States (I've gotten over it.)
Fondest memory: My grandfather keeping me company all day when I was sick with the flu and there was a family reunion going on when I was five-years old. One of the few, true moments of kindness I've experienced.
Soundtrack (or theme song): I'll run with theme song -- very Ally McBeal -- "Me" by Paula Cole.
Retreat: Napa. I'm always happy there.
Wildest dream: To own a bookstore in Healdsburg & to cultivate a reputation as the town eccentric.
Proudest moment: Passing the bar.
Biggest challenge: My mother.
Alarm clock: My cellphone.
Perfect day: Alone, with the newspaper, nice weather, nowhere to go, so I can explore, and having some good books to read later.
First job: I had a few and can't remember which came first -- tennis instructor, babysitter, and law firm clerk. I was decent at the first two and fired from the third (ironic, eh?) but it took me years to realize it.
Indulgence: Shoes.
Last purchase: A cab ride home.
Favorite book: The Divine Secrets of the Ya-Ya Sisterhood.
Inspiration: My friends.
My life is: Where I want it to be most of the time.

Not so lucid thoughts on work . . .

Do you ever want a job sometimes that you can just put away at the end of the day? At 5pm? And walk to the subway and just go home and not think about anything again until the next morning? For the last two weeks, I've been obsessed with a motion I'm filing tomorrow. It's 12:45 in the morning, and I just got off the phone with the paralegal (who is unfortunately still at work doing the finishing touches). I've been repeatedly checking my email ever since I left the office only a few hours ago to make sure that "everything is still going fine." This kind of hyper-worry makes me crazy. I can't let it go, and there's no way I'm sleeping for a few hours unless I take some NyQuil ('cause it helps you get your zzzz's . . .). Despite this, I can't say I would want to be doing something else. There's a bit of an adrenaline rush that comes from finishing up a big project that has you at the office to all hours. This time too, lots of us were there, so there was that tired camaraderie that comes with late nights and a shared experience. I also like winning -- and I think I'm going to do that again with this one. Kind of sick, isn't it? I suppose it's fortunate I feel this way because I think this would be an incredible drain otherwise. Lately I've been feeling like I'm finally settling into this as my career. I knew I wanted it a long time ago -- got off the track for a few years to make sure I wasn't missing something else -- came back and "went for it" during law school. Then I started this gig and suddenly wasn't sure that I made the right choice. This is hard a lot of the time. I see people leave work at 5 when I'm going for my second cup of coffee of the afternoon at Starbucks. I wonder if they have fuller, richer lives than I do. I like to think I don't compromise on anything -- that what I lack in "free evenings" I make up for by not sleeping and packing in events and people. I rarely sit at home and tend to operate under the theory of "I'll sleep when I'm dead." I don't know if I am. I hope not. But at least I feel like I've hit a point of contentment that I haven't felt in years. Are any of you similarly conflicted?