Well, now what do I do?

The "i"s will be crossed and the "t"s will be dotted on the settlement of the trial by the end of the day. It's an odd feeling, being part of an eve-of-trial-settlement. Sort of akin to how I imagine it would feel to receiving a letter in the last few weeks before a marathon saying that it had been canceled. For half-a-second, the thought that you'll have free time dominates; then you're annoyed and frustrated because, not only were you certain you would win, but you were certain you would dominate; then you feel a little bit sick and realize that weeks and weeks of work aren't actually going to be tested--that this is a lost opportunity in your professional life. Of course, at the same time that this vortex of conflicting feeling coalesces in your chest, a solid handhold appears in the realization that those weeks and weeks of work are what made the case end in the first place, so they aren't wasted; and the client is happy, so you've done a good job. But, obviously, this is a swirl of emotions that I'm going to have to get used to. Settlements on the eve of trial are not uncommon.

In keeping with this theme of endings, I just finished reading This Side of Paradise by F. Scott Fitzgerald. In a backlash to Dickens after I finished Bleak House a few weeks ago, I've turned now full tilt to early 20th century American authors.

I absolutely love Fitzgerald's work. The only real gripe I have is that the guy smoked like a fiend and died at 44 from a (series of) heart attack(s). If you only read one book by Fitzgerald in your life, don't read Gatsby, that is, unless you have a high-schooler at home and you need to help him with a book report. Read The Beautiful and the Damned. That's a masterpiece.

But, I digress. Back to This Side of Paradise. The protagonist is hatefully selfish and egocentric. The female characters are almost entirely unmitigated bitches. The men are shallow. And the older people are hypocritical prudes. And the writing is poetic and beautiful.

This passage, near the end of the book, I think I must have read six times:

Long after midnight the towers and spires of Princeton were visible, with here and there a late-burning light -- and suddenly out of the clear darkness the sound of bells. As an endless dream it went on; the spirit of the past brooding over a new generation, the chosen youth from the muddled, unchastened world, still fed romantically on the mistakes and half-forgotten dreams of dead statesmen and poets. Here was a new generation, shouting the old cries, learning the old creeds, through a revery of long days and nights; destined finally to go out into a dirty gray turmoil to follow love and pride; a new generation dedicated more than the last to the fear of poverty and the worship of success; grown up to find all Gods dead, all wars fought, all faiths in man shaken. . .

Why, of why, Mr. Fitzgerald could you not have given us another twenty years?