Maia gives me advice

This past Sunday, I took Maia with me to my office. I was planning on filing a complaint on Monday, and I had work to do to get the Complaint and its Exhibits in shape.

First, we did some errands for her (shopping for school things--she started 3rd grade on Monday), went to Fisher to get Exhibit dividers, and to McD's for lunch. Then we went to the office.

My office is a cramped little space. There were two lawyers' offices and a so-called conference room (together with reception space and some other space) when we moved in. But on the first day, as I stood in my office, I realized that we could use it for a real conference room. And so, instead of having the conference table from our old office moved up to our house, I changed my mind and had the movers move it into the space that I had intended to use. Instead, I moved into the so-called conference room. Later, when Tom, my partner joined us, I didn't have him or Will move into the small space I was in because it didn't seem fair. I didn't want to ask anyone to do a thing that I wasn't willing to do myself.

"Why didn't you want a window?" Maia wanted to know. She had left her drawing and come into my office.

I said that I had wanted a window and had started out in Uncle Tom's office.

"Why didn't you stay there?" she asked.

I explained all of the foregoing to her. I had thought that it would be a teaching moment--Daddy sacrificing for the sake of the office.

She thought about what I had said. "You don't always have to be so nice," she said. "It's okay to be a little bit not nice sometimes."

John, Tuesday, August 3, 2010

ps From a telephone conversation I had today with a lawyer on the other side, it looks as though the case (which I actually did file on Monday) may settle.