So a couple of us from Corporate, and a bunch of guys from Tax and two or three from Environmental went out last night with an eye toward getting the kid from tax drunk enough that he would try to hack into the email system and send some juicy emails. We didn't succeed. Instead we cooked up all the stormiest gossip we might send around the office. I was crying, I was laughing so hard.

But you know, today, sober, I'm remembering some of the stuff that got said. There are very few secrets at law firms, although some stories take a long time to come out. Last night I learned that a tax partner I've always liked and looked up to, who was great to me when I was a first year associate and who still takes pains to have lunch with me a couple of times a year, closes her door and screams -- literally screams -- at her kids on the phone daily. That just creeps me out. Lady, go home to your family. Something is seriously wrong. It's harder to look up to her, even though she's always been a role model and a mentor to me.

And of course we got into all the divorces going on with the more interesting partners. And from what I could tell it looks like there's a romance starting between a couple of the third-years who were out last night, both of whom are married. I do admire the lawyers who can do this kind of work successfully and stay married to the people they were married to when they started. But even among those supposedly happy couples, well. All I know is I've been groped in the back of cabs on the way home from closing dinners where everyone had too many scotch and sodas. When I was a fourth year I had a little thing with a junior partner in litigation, who was "separated" from his wife but has since gotten back together with her. I don't think anyone at the firm knows about that but listening to the talk last night I got nervous. I have some secrets I'd prefer to believe will be kept.
- posted by Blogger @ 8:47 AM