On a recent Friday night, my husband and I settle into a posh hotel suite in Coeur d’Alene, Idaho. It has been a busy week – and herding our family of stray cats for a three-day weekend out of town is nothing short of a miracle. But happily, we have all arrived safely. Golf, hiking, and group dinners are before us, and son Andy and I are running races in Spokane on Sunday.
Don and I snuggle into a ridiculously comfortable mattress with pillows fit for royalty. We drift off, dreaming of fun family togetherness that is mingled with the robust male humor that permeates every gathering that our kids are at – from potlucks to sporting events and even those where solemnity is encouraged.
Unbeknownst to me, I am at the dawn of a very bad run. Around midnight, I am awakened by tsunami-like waves of nausea that bring me to my knees when I get out of bed. I yell for Don, and he carries me to the bathroom and deposits me while I howl for him to find a container so that I do not have to vomit on the floor. I spend forty-five minutes wishing I would die while intestinal contents flee my body confines. Afterwards, I gratefully crawl back to bed, muttering about food poisoning internet research. In the morning I feel fine, though I am unsettled by the memory.
Maybe my body was warning me that I was embarking on a 14-day losing streak. I ought not complain, in fairness to those who are enduring real heartbreak, but I am a tad superstitious. When something lousy happens, I wonder what is going to occur next. I was not a math major in college, but I am proficient in life-moments statistics. Unpleasant events are not delivered at measured points in time because the God of Random Acts is not that considerate. When something goes wrong, it might not be an isolated event; you could be in for a rough spell.
Sure enough, the next couple of weeks are not fun. The half marathon run was demanding to the point of harrowing, and I was disappointed in my finish time. A family misunderstanding occurred that caused hurt feelings. A few days after our trip, I received distressing news from a relative that brought me to tears. In the meantime, work was extraordinarily arduous. And to add to the pity party, though I am not a huge sports fan, four separate teams that I follow lost every single game they played within a five-day span.
Through it all, I wait for a ruling on a dispositive motion in the most significant case that, at least from a monetary perspective, I have ever been involved in. I have told the client that the prospects of winning are less than five percent. I stand by, knowing we are not going to prevail. I am filled with dread, but a part of me wants to lose and get it over with so that we can strategize our next legal move.
I wait, too, in the dentist chair two days ago, envisioning that a more-than-ten-year string of perfect dental checkups is ending. Bad luck comes in waves, not incidents, is my theory. The dentist reviews my x-rays, murmuring slightly, either to himself or the hygienist, in a language I do not understand. He pokes around my gums, and I expect bad news when he descales my teeth in one place longer than others.
I hold my breath, while he straightens up and leans back. Your teeth look very good, he says, if you are not using a water pic, you probably should. But there is nothing that needs to be done today. Keep up the good work. I exhale and consciously focus on relaxing my clenched hands. Maybe the tide of crummy luck is shifting.
Back in the office later that day, I wrestle with an annoying $1900 accounting discrepancy in a judgment payoff under a settlement, which is putting me at odds with my client. It takes all the strength I can muster to spend 45 minutes analyzing where the client’s math is in error - time that I cannot bill for due to the economics of the small case.
I am standing at the copy machine, grumpy and frustrated, when I hear an associate attorney call out and ask if I am sitting down. No, I snap, I am standing at the copier, why do you ask? We won, he said, the judge signed our order. I replied that it was not possible, we could not have won that motion because the consequences for the wealthy defendant were so devastating that the court would surely rule that it was subject to the contract’s alternative dispute resolution process. My associate smiles, and he hands me a hard copy of the judge’s legal findings and conclusions and judgment. My legs turn to Jell-O, just as they did when I crossed the half marathon finish line less than two weeks ago. I read the document over and over and jump up and down and scream with excitement.
No cavities, and I won my motion? I should buy a lottery ticket tonight. I think I am about to start a very good run.