A Writer’s Diary Entries From Early September, 2002
Monday, September 2, 2002
8 PM. Labor Day weekend is almost over.
I’ve been reading my diary for last year’s Labor Day weekend when I was at Dairy Hollow. With all the other residents going away, I was about to be left alone there. Soon I would soon hear from Thelma to tell me about the phone interview at Nova Law.
Then September 11 would happen, and I would meet Vincent, so a lot of good stuff happened at this time of the year – at least to me – while the world changed after 9/11.
I also read some of my diary entries from early October 2001, when I’d returned to Apache Junction and was working on my book about the 1970s, emailing Vincent, getting off Klonopin, and awaiting my in-person interview here in Fort Lauderdale.
I viewed getting the position at NSU Law as a miracle, but if I hadn’t gotten the job here, I’m sure that eventually something would have turned up in Arizona.
Today I felt bad because I had totally screwed up the best time for the 2L night class’s Criminal Law ARP study group. Mark Friedman cleared up the mess by persuading Denise, the TA, to reschedule it for Tuesdays at 8 PM.
I should have taken control of the situation, but I didn’t. I’m such a lousy administrator. I feel like not going back to work tomorrow because I feel so incompetent.
Usually I try not to beat myself up for my shortcomings on the job, but I got so upset after reading those emails this afternoon at the office, I made sure to escape to the movies yet again.
At the Ridge Plaza, I saw M. Night Shyamalan’s Signs, which was better than I expected.
Well, I probably won’t stay in the job beyond this academic year.
I’ve got to make decisions about renewing my lease; maybe they’ll give me a lease term that would let me move to a cheaper place in the summer.
I also need to make a decision about bankruptcy, and that’s tied in with my application to the Bar.
A year ago I told myself, “Sweetie, this is all going to work out.” And the bar exam worked out, my sciatica and my testicular cancer scare worked out, and I guess things will continue to work out.
Up early, I left the house before 8 AM. The law school was locked, so I drove all the way to South Beach. There was barely any traffic.
I stopped at a meter by Lincoln Road. At Starbucks, I had caffeine-free passion iced tea, and then at Joffrey’s, I had real iced tea.
At both places I sat outside on the mall and watched the tanned, toned gay men walk around, some of them holding hands. And I listened to two passing homeless women talking to themselves.
Walking around Lincoln Mall, I picked up copies of the three gay weeklies. I felt like I was on vacation, and that rare feeling reminded me that I need to go to South Beach more often.
Although I probably should have stayed there longer, I did walk and then drive up and down Collins Avenue, Washington Avenue, and Ocean Drive for quite a while.
Eventually I took A1A all the way up to Hollywood Boulevard, where I stopped at another Starbucks and finished the New York Times as I sat outside and listened to the chain’s district or regional manager chew out the store’s manager, who seemed to have been screwing up lately.
From there, I got a baked potato – I know: its high glycemic index is bad for me – at the Wendy’s across from Broward Community College’s South Campus.
That was where I used to get a salad bar every day back in the fall of 1989, when I was on Nutri/System and Wendy’s still had salad bars.
After the movie at Ridge Plaza ended at 4:30 PM, I shopped at the Publix in the shopping center next door, came home, had dinner, and read the gay weeklies and the remainder of the latest issue of XY.
I feel like going to sleep early, but then I’ll only have problems staying asleep. I know it’s not good for me to be alone so much. I distracted myself over this long weekend by going to coffee bars and movies, but except for my appointment with Dr. K, I didn’t have much human contact.
While I know that having another person to be with is not the solution to my problems, I don’t need to be lonely.
Why am I so picky about guys? Like, I should be so particular when I’m over 50 and don’t have much to offer another person? It feels as if I’ve been alone forever.
Wednesday, September 4, 2002
9 PM. I just found myself drifting off on the couch as I listened to the Seabiscuit audiobook. It’s ridiculous that I fall out this early, and it certainly explains why I’m awake at 4 AM.
I don’t think I did much real work today, but there just didn’t seem all that much to do.
I checked on the ARP study groups as they met at noon, 12:30 PM, and 4 PM.
I spoke to several students, and in the late afternoon, Yvette came for a visit. She went to Hawaii from late June to early August to take three law classes at the University of Hawaii at Hilo.
Her husband and 7-year-old daughter came along, and she made Hawaii sound like a paradise. I’d very much like to go there one day.
After checking with Teresa, I made reservations on JetBlue to fly to JFK on the Tuesday before Thanksgiving. That turned out to be a lot cheaper than Southwest flights to Islip.
I’ll be going back to New York about a year after my last visit. I may not get to Manhattan, but I’m going to try to take the train in for at least one day.
We’ll be going over to Mattituck for Thanksgiving dinner. It will be my first time seeing her parents’ house there.
If I were home in Florida by myself, I’d probably be really lonely. I’ll feel better being with Teresa and Paul, her parents, and the rest of her family on a family holiday.
In a few days I’ll make flights for Christmas in Arizona. While I’m not sure I can take three days off at Thanksgiving and then another ten days or so at Christmas, I’m going to try.
I miss traveling.
This afternoon when I called David at his office, he told me he actually checks the website of the Florida Bar Examiners every day even though we’ve been told the test results won’t be posted until September 17.
David said he likes his work at the law firm; he’s doing a case on his own for the first time.
Unlike him, I tend not to think about the bar exam because it doesn’t mean that much to me. If I fail it, I’ll feel bad – but it might be a blessing in disguise because then I’ll know that I want to leave my job.
I’ll stay until the end of the academic year, and in the meantime I will figure out what I want to do with my life.
Maybe I can get a lease that ends in June, so I won’t have to commit to staying in this apartment for the next academic year.
I just realized that I won’t be back from New York till December 2, which is two days after my lease expires.
Sat Darshan wrote that she envies our Florida rainy weather, but I told her that we are supposed to be getting a real downpour over the next couple of days.
When I took a walk at 7 PM, the humidity was enervating. After coming home,I did a load of laundry and then went to get some shampoo and liquid hand soap at Walgreens.
Now that I’ve written for a while, I’m feeling more alert than I was when I began this diary entry.
I don’t know why I was so unproductive today. I didn’t take Prevacid and had a lot of gassiness around the time I left work, but dinner – a couscous-and-veggie wrap, papaya and yogurt – seemed to reduce that bloated feeling.
I almost always stop eating by 6 PM, and then I usually don’t have breakfast till after 7 AM because I exercise first. Is it strange not to eat for over 13 hours?
You know, whenever I catch a glimpse of myself walking – in a store window, say – I see an old, dumpy, frumpy guy. Is that how other people perceive me?
Thursday, September 5, 2002
9:30 PM. I just fast-forwarded through Voyeur.com, the terrible film that Kevin was in. The sound was all but inaudible on the video I got, and the whole thing was just amateurish female nudity and slashing.
But it was nice to see Kevin in a small part as the weirdo gardener. I remember that back in Los Angeles, Kevin showed me another movie in which he played a homeless halfwit falsely accused of murders. I guess Kevin is naturally cast as an odd loser.
I have to admit I had a big grin on my face as I watched the film because it was so unrelentingly awful.
Today I finally wrote that letter of recommendation for Rosalie’s candidacy for director of the UF Law Library and mailed it off to Jerry Israel, the head of the search committee.
I also finally sent a reply to the Florida Center for the Book’s question about which book had the greatest impact on me.
As usual, I just made up something, saying I read The Forsyte Saga when I was 16, and although most of my work in fiction has been a reaction against Galsworthy’s kind of novel-writing, for a few years it showed me that a novel could create a real world, blah, blah, blah. I’ve raised disingenuousness to an art form.
Today I checked on the ARP sessions that started or continued and put out some fires in regard to other study groups.
Next Monday I have the workshop on case briefing, and I printed out material I found online that I will go over tomorrow and over the weekend. Next Thursday I’ll also be doing that Career Cafe with Paul Joseph at 5 PM.
This afternoon I chatted with Cindy, who left tonight to spend Rosh Hashanah with her family in Buffalo. Then I ran into Jane Cross, who told me that she realizes she needs to work less hard – something I told her months ago.
So many people at the law school seem overworked to me. Hell, I suppose nearly all Americans seem to be overworked.
Who’s not overworked? I can think of Teresa, Jonathan, and a few other lucky people. But it seems as if you have to live off someone else to manage it.
Back in the late 1980s, I lived off credit card companies and student loans. When I was writing stories in the 1970s, I lived off my parents.
I can’t say I’d be writing fiction now if I didn’t have my job, although I really got into my 1970s book of stories last October because Vincent inspired me to work.
One day I’ll be able to make sense of my college experiences and write some amalgam of fiction and memoir.
The further away we are from my college years, the more pleasant and innocent a time it seems. That time was thirty years ago, equivalent to how far in the past World War II was to those of us in 1972.
It’s taking me a long time to accept how old I am, and I’ve yet to completely work myself through it. At this rate, I’ll be 71 by the time I start feeling like 51.
Monday, September 9, 2002
9:30 PM. I just got home after my evening skills workshop. After a few people left early, I had about half a dozen students stay until the end – which was similar to the number of students at my 3 PM skills workshop. Everything seemed to go okay.
Actually, I remember Marty Peters’s sessions at UF Law attracted about ten out of roughly 200 first-semester students, and the ten included me, Marsha Proctor, and another student who graduated ranked in the top 10 out of 200.
So, like Marty Peters, I probably attracted some of the 1Ls who need a skills workshop the least. Although I rambled a little, I know I dispensed some valuable tips, and I will get better as I go along. I wasn’t nervous.
Last night I slept well: when I got up at 2:45 AM, I took a Klonopin and fell back asleep until almost 6 AM, which is late for me. I dawdled at Starbucks, figuring that I could show up at work around 9:15 AM.
I left my office at 4:15 PM and stayed here until 7 PM, when I returned to the law school.
As ARP director, there are a lot of things I have to check up on, but I figure that just as the entering 1Ls learn how to become law students, I will also learn how to be better at my job.
I do worry about my memory lapses. Today after having a meeting with Ivette, I realized that last week when I wrote in this diary that I had a meeting with “Ivette,” that student was actually Beatriz.
They are both about 27, Latina and blonde, but I am bothered by my name mix-up in the diary entry even though I knew I was talking to Beatriz at the time of our meeting.
I also did something today that exemplifies the old saying, “There’s no fool like an old fool.” I got an email from Caleb, a 26-year-old guy who answered my ad. He sent a link to a homepage with a gorgeous young blond guy in a swimming pool. I didn’t bother to look at any more pics because he wanted me to leave my email address, something I would never do.
But it took me hours to go back to his response and see that this was a scam. Caleb never really said where he lived, although he claimed he was “a manager at a real estate company” and that “My best friend Lindsay took this photo.”
Okay, I didn’t respond to him, but if I were sharper, I would have seen through the scam right away and not bothered to hit the link in the first place.
Why would I think that any 26-year-old would respond to my ad? Silly rabbit.
At least I know that someone named Orin who sent me a photo of a goofy-looking guy in Alaska wearing a hat with a fox’s head on it must be real.
No scammer would think that awful picture would attract anyone – especially someone who described himself as an animal lover.
The photo brought up bad memories of those disgusting stoles with fox heads on them that horrified me when I saw them as a little kid at Great-Grandpa Max Shapiro’s fur factory.
I made reservations for nonstop America West flights to Phoenix on December 7 and back to Fort Lauderdale on New Year’s Day. The fare was about $230, cheaper than I expected.
Mark Savage wrote that he and Janet had a wonderful time in London. It was his first visit, and he went to most of the big tourist places. I guess that’s something I’d do on my first trip, too.
Mark said that after two days of school in New York City, he’s pleased with his class at his school, “but then they all seem good after only two days.”
I’m going to try to unwind now. Since I worked late tonight, I can again plan to get to school a little after 9 AM tomorrow.
Tuesday, September 10, 2002
9 PM. I just watched a PBS Nova special, Why The Towers Fell, most of it a discussion of the structural reasons for the collapse of the World Trade Center.
It’s hard not to think back to a year ago. On this day last year, I had my phone interview with Pat, Billie Jo, and Jane. Later that night, I felt so frustrated with my chiggers and my loneliness that I resolved to leave Eureka Springs as soon as possible.
It occurs to me now that it was only the 9/11 tragedy that grounded all the planes that kept me in the Ozarks until October, but I’m certainly glad I stayed there. It gave me time to adjust to life in Eureka Springs, a good place to be during that terrible time.
I also was able to give my Poetsluck reading at Dairy Hollow and to meet Vincent and to feel that I was a part of Eureka Springs for another three weeks.
I wonder if I’ll ever get a chance to get back there – or to go to another writers’ colony. I hope so.
The polls just closed, having been kept open for an extra two hours because of monumental problems with the new voting machines in Broward and Miami-Dade: another South Florida election fiasco.
I’ll try to stay up and watch the results of the gubernatorial primary and the anti-gay referendum.
Intending to go into work late this morning, I stopped off at the Starbucks on Broward Boulevard and arrived at the office around 9:15 AM.
Today I checked on the first meeting of the Tuesday ARP study groups; Matt and Christy and Tanya all seem to be doing a fantastic job, and I also met with Denise, who’s starting tonight, and with Janet.
At noon I went to the faculty Table Talk and sat at the table where Jim Wilets discussed an article he’s working on, “Sexual Dimorphism in the American Legal System: A Post-Feminist Critique.”
Although I felt a little hesitant to comment when I was sitting among legal scholars, I didn’t let that stop me. Actually, the pure intellectual theory is what I love about working at a law school even though I am no scholar.
Mark P was at our table but didn’t say anything. While I often think that Mark would be a lot better at my job than I am, he’s not that into heavy intellectual stuff.
When the winter and summer term evaluations and grade patterns came out today, Mark’s evaluations were again pretty bad compared to those of the other Lawyering Skills and Values professors.
I did sign up for Mark’s table at the October table talk, where he’ll be discussing an article on teaching and learning styles that he’s been working on.
This morning I woke up without anxiety, and my anxiety level was at about zero all day. On days like this, I finally think, “It’s over.”
But it’s not, and I find that out the very next day sometimes, when I wake up with those feelings of dread.
My anxiety levels seem to be higher on weekends than when I’m at my job, so I guess I do feel at home at NSU Law. There’s no doubt that in some ways I feel a part of a community in a way that I never did at ASU in Arizona.
I started to prepare for Thursday’s Career Cafe at 5 PM, when I’ll be discussing note-taking and analysis. Basically, I’m using the book by Rita Stropus and Charlotte Taylor as my guide. I may be highly disorganized – but I seem to be doing my job.
I heard from Ronna and Libby today.
Ronna and her family went to Cape May for a vacation and then had the bat mitzvah of Cara and Sid’s younger daughter, “followed by the start of school, followed by the Jewish holidays.”
She picks up Abigail from half-day kindergarten and then takes her to an afternoon program at a Montessori school and also takes Abigail and Chelsea to dance school and Hebrew school.
“I haven’t started volunteering at any of the schools yet,” Ronna wrote, sounding as if she could wait a lot longer before doing that.
In Los Angeles, Libby and her family vacationed in the RV right up to the day before the school year began.
She said they’ve had problems at church. First, the refrigerator in the preschool room died, and then the heater exploded in the room next door.
“After I had just set up the classroom, I had to rearrange it again,” Libby wrote. “This, and my own children starting new schools, has me whirling.”
So I guess these days even “stay-at-home” moms have hectic lives. I hope I can visit Woodland Hills and Jenkintown again. I’m lucky to have good friends like Ronna and Libby and their husbands.
After dinner, I went back to the office to do some work for 45 minutes as I listened to the news on NPR.
We’re on an orange security alert now.