Friday, April 30, 2010

Day 251: Fifteen minutes till procrastination becomes abomination.

("Baby don't look so nervous, they just want the facts, and it's all written out in the USA Patriot Act..." -A.M.)

Speaking of which, do you have any idea how many laws there really are in this here free country of ours? Something like "hundreds of thousands", and of those over 4,000 are crimes. Craziness? In Sweden there is a single volume containing the entire criminal code of the country. Of course, there's quite a size difference between the nations...but should that make a difference in determining the scope of crimes against society?

And what of the danger of becoming lost in the massive mountains of volume upon volume of statutes? Do you realize that not only is it virtually impossible for a person to live out their life in America WITHOUT breaking at least one of these laws--but even more ridiculous is the tiny percentage of people who ever actually recognize that they've done so. Isn't this a little bit silly? (To walk the line of the inarticulate!) What I mean is, what's the point of such heavy regulation when it hardly keeps people from committing crimes? The result is just that whenever someone who gives a shit happens to come across a person who happens to be committing a random little arbitrary crime without even realizing it, well, the Government gets to spend (strike that: all but HAS to spend) our nice, neat tax dollars to persecute the poor sucker. Cuz after all, "ignorance of law is no excuse"...

But anyways. When it comes down to it, i have two weeks from today to slalom through to the end of my final exams of my final quarter of my first year of law school. And what have i to show for it? An overinflated sense of importance imbued on four otherwise inconspicuous mornings, and a disproportionate amount of stress aimed at these ephemeral days and the tests they represent--rather than at the reality of the mess of law represented by the tests themselves, and the fact that i myself am bound to adhere to the content of each one, and so much more besides. As are most of you, I imagine. And the difference? Maybe just that I'm learning how to name all of those old, nameless worries...

Nah. It's mostly just me being dramatic, I'm sure. And uncharacteristically stressed out. Well, not that, exactly... More like uncharacteristically recognizing the dire need to let the stress come, for to induce action. But instead I'm just watching it brood out there on the outskirts of my daily life, as we count down toward (clear) transition. And like always it's just me, just here, still saying to it 'tomorrow'. "Tomorrow you can come riddle me some! Today I'm too busy listening to the loveliness of these sad songs..."

("And my body, by the letter of the law, is still my own when I lay down in the darkness, unburdened and alone..." -A.M.)

Faretheewell folk,
-LaW

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