the pelican

once more with feeling

the thing about the fussy bookkeeper

is that i love her.

i mean, she drives me completely insane sometimes, but she has to. she's teaching me about patience.

she is so very fussy.

but then bookkeepers by their very natures (if they're any good at all) are fussy. they have to be.

they worry about so many details, they have so much to take care of and be responsible for.

they turn a business into a series of manageable numbers. numbers that add up and balance out and make sense. they rectify. they calculate. they keep track. they keep score.

the fussy bookkeeper i work with worries about all the stuff that nobody, not even the business owners themselves want to worry about. and she is responsible for great pieces of others' lives. their personal information. their identities. their health insurance. their direct deposits. their livelihood.

she has a way of doing things. she keeps her files a certain way. she knows the only way to do things is the way they should be done. she has a system. she has a program. she runs the till. calls the shots. directs the show.

and she's been doing it her way for eighteen years.

she is 70 years old. she has hearing aids. she is getting her teeth x-rayed. she has grandchildren she takes care of and helps out financially. she keeps a clean house and makes dinner for her husband and takes a bible study course every week.

and she is afraid of her computer and she gets confused by her e-mail and she doesn't like to talk on the phone and everything upsets her. the chaos, the confusion, the comings and goings of employees, the things that only she can keep track of if they get just ever so slightly out of whack, if the order is threatened, if the rhythm is interrupted, if somebody needs something special, if somebody gets a raise, if somebody needs to shift some things around, if someone needs something done other than the only way it can possibly be done correctly the only way it should be done well look out.

and so she needs caring. she needs to be listened to. she needs to feel appreciated. she needs assistance. she needs someone to write her letters. she needs someone to help her with her e-mail. she needs someone to find her files on her computer. she needs someone to help her with what she fears she can't keep doing forever but she can't let go of either.

she says she stays "with it" by doing work. she says this helps her keep all her marbles.

oh she can transfer funds from the trust to the operating account and she can keep track of all the client costs and she can do the billing for the hourly cases and she can do all the payroll and she can keep track of the money on the postage machine and all the employees' families dental insurance renewals and the malpractice insurance and the building lease and the employees' hours and vacation time accrual and pay for the office supplies and keep track of the law library subscriptions and she does her physical therapy and makes her doctor appointments and she comes to work everyday and does it all over again, no matter what.

and she holds it all together and she never misses a beat.

and i have been entrusted to help her out. back her up. help out with the office stuff. do some of the office management stuff for which there is essentially no manager.

and i am not precise and exact and immaculate as a fussy bookkeeper and i will never ever ever live up to her fussy bookkeeper standards. never be able to make her happy with whatever it is that i do when she's not present. never have everything the way it should be done in the fussy way. 

on the other hand, i will have to do things on the fly, in a whirl, in the midst, while multi-tasking. not because i want to, necessarily, but because there is no other way. she is part time, i am full time. she is a bookkeeper. i am a paralegal. she has been at this firm for many years, i have not quite been there two. she knows everything, i am clueless. she is in charge of the money. i have a caseload.

and i am to help her out and back her up not because i am in some way qualified to do this, but because nobody else wants to do it and because for some reason they trust me to take care of her. take care of her business. take care of their business with her, beside her. to take care.

and she is integral. she is indispensable. she is essential.

and she is a pain in the ass.

and she is my friend.

and i am scared to death that i have let her down. or will let her down. will do something wrong. not have time for her. lose my patience. lose my grip. snap crackle pop.

because the thing about the fussy bookkeeper is that i love her.

posted by: limine at 23:48 | link | comments (1) |

just busyness

some days are more of a monday than others. but this one, this is a monday in spades.

oh this law firm is going to be the death of me, i know it. a heart attack, a stroke, impacted bowels. ulcers. a nervous disorder. something. anything. maybe it's already happening. feels like i  am going to explode. implode. deplode?

whatever.

see, i've set three trials in the last couple weeks. that means i've been doing three different sets of initial disclosures -- which is a long-winded identification of witnesses and individuals with knowledge or information of the incident, all the known documents that could be related indexed and identified, etc. all within a specified time frame. meanwhile i'm in the middle of setting up seven depositions of experts in one case that involves five sets of counsel -- that's five different attorneys to schedule each deposition with. and i've got two boxes of documents produced by opposing counsel that in the midst of all this, i've been trying to digest, summarize and then make sense out of to give to the legal secretary to organize.

but back to those three trials set -- that means i've got three entire sets of deadlines to calculate out and set up ticklers and reminders for because there is a long list of court deadlines driven by the trial date. discovery cut-off, expert disclosures, pre-trial briefs, trial management orders, designation of order of proof, jury instructions, etc.

and meanwhile today is the day the postage rates change and the postage meter and scale are refusing to be re-programmed. and, the building is having problems with the garage door, and everybody has to move their car to another parking garage down the block, which involves issuing additional parking passes. and we have a very fussy elderly bookeeper who really doesn't need to be involved in any of this but is anyway, who keeps pointing to her copies of the parking passes and trying to tell us which ones are part of the lease with the building and which ones have been purchased from the city.

in the midst of this, we're dealing with the fact that we had to fire our runner last week. a sweet girl who couldn't follow a checklist if her life depended on it and who continued to walk out of the office everynight without turning on the dishwasher, filling the copiers and printers, putting the phones on night ring, turning off the lights or even managing to lock the backdoors and who, incidentally, also lost her parking pass in the two weeks that she had it, which will have to cancelled and re-issued, which makes the whole parking pass situation much more complex, while her mother calls to scream at me why oh why was her daughter fired she's the responsible kid she knows she gets good grades and she has to have answers to this why why why.

now, since the onset of the new receptionist, most of the administrative stuff has been given to her. but that doesn't mean that i don't get pulled back into it from sort of a well i'm unofficially in charge even though i'm not really i'm still considered an office manager even though there is no title and i'm really a full time paralegal at the same time and all on a fairly regular basis. why, i'm not really sure, but it happens. a lot. maybe constantly. because new receptionist is good and sweet but unsure of herself and wants to go over everything with me every time something comes up. because i agreed to this before when things were quieter and we were one paralegal too many and fewer cases and because i seem to be unable to just say no to just say enough to just say i'm sorry but i really can't do it all be it all write it all organize it all pick up after it all run it all and be responsible for it all no. no i can't say that because somewhere in there i believe i am responsible for it all somehow.

but in truth, i do not martyr well. no i don't.

and the fussy bookkeeper comes in to tell me that it's the new year and i'm not supposed to carry more than 40 hours vacation time over from the previous year and i've got 90 hours more or something, and that i need to take some time off because i can't carry any more hours and oh wouldn't i love to take some time off she really doesn't need to tell me that i need some time off this i know this i know but when oh when can i take it when i've got a trial set for early february in U.S. District Court that is definitely going to happen and a pre-trial order to get filed and exhibits to be made and a reply to a reponse to a motion for summary judgment to get filed with the court and and and did i mention that i just set three trials that have yet to have their deadlines calendared? yeah no problem i'll just take those 90 hours off starting right now. buh bye.

and so here i blog.

because this brief moment may be the closest thing i come to actually taking some time off any time in the near future. because my blog has been seriously neglected, as is just about everything else. my personal life. my house. my cats. my yard. my toenails.

and because i can. because i must. because it is monday. because my brain is full. because. just because.

posted by: limine at 16:20 | link | comments (2) |

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