Monday, March 16, 2015

My weekend in DC

Again, I struggled finding a column idea.  And I had TWO to write this weekend--my regular column and also a requested column for a special Tribune Conference section.  I wrote three conference columns.  THREE.  None of them felt right, although I may post one of them here tomorrow.  I like some of what I wrote, but I don't think it's what my editor will be looking for.

Maybe I'm struggling so much right now because I've been reading West of Sunset by Stewart O'Nan, which is a richly imagined portrait of F. Scott Fitzgerald's sad last days in Hollywood?

Yes.  I'm F. Scott Fitzgerald now.

Anyway, I started paying attention to the snatches of conversation floating past me and suddenly I had an idea.  Here it is.


2 comments:

James said...

Much better than the quotes I heard in court waiting for the elevator down to the ground floor. A hostile woman yelling into her phone said; "The police f'd up, the DA f'd up, and the Atty f'd up. We are f'd up."

Although, our courthouse has a variety of great quotes etched into the walls throughout the courthouse:

"Where law ends tyranny begins." William Pitt, 1770 A.D.

"It is not good to be partial to a wicked man, or to deprive a righteous man of justice." The Bible.

Lisa B. said...

I love this. And also, I love James's court elevator phone-yeller. How many times a day do I say this? Well, never, but I could, that's the point. It's an eternal truth, basically--everyone f'd up.