72 Hrs. in Quarantine...Tough Way for a Boy to End a Summer

We're not really quarantined, although we do have the flu. Swine flu that is. Middle son had it last week with worse symptoms than oldest son who has it this week. Middle son was confirmed with it only on Mon.- the testing takes several days b/c it is sent off to one of only a few places in the country performing the testing. Since my husband is active duty Air Force and we get medical care at our base through the DoD (Department of Defense), my son's mucas sample was actually sent on for confirmation as H1N1/swine flu after initially determining it was Type A flu. According to a friend in a similar situation, civilian doctors are not all sending positive Type A flu specimans on for the further confirmation b/c 1) the few centers doing the testing are so back-logged; 2) symptoms are proving to be mild; and 3) patients just have to wait it out, whatever type of flu it is. Oldest son is fine now, after some fever the first 24 hrs., but quite unhappy about being advised to stay home for a few days and having to postpone his first piano lesson and miss our local ConQuest team's kick-off bowling night, considering he feels so well now.

This is just funny to me to be on the front side of the expected wave of this flu as children return to school and pass it around to each other. Thanks be to God, for us it has been a mild flu bug and I suspect will prove to be the same for other relatively healthy people. The reactions we have been getting are interesting and what makes it feel funny. Music teacher at school said the boys would be "famous" once the word got out; my sister who is a nurse said "gross;" and my office wanted me to stay home for a few days so as not to expose everyone.

Anyway, it has made for an interesting and trying end to our summer. My boys head back to school in 1 week and we are all ready for the schedule, challenge, and friends, not to mention the sacramental life. My husband has been doing "Daddy Daycare" at home 3 days a week while I work my PT schedule and needs to knock out some reading, what he was supposed to have been doing while on this flex/elective schedule. He has done a great job and, after the initial adjustment, they've had fun going on field trips to the movies, our city's Children's Museum, the library, parks, the pool, and hopefully still to come- Sea World.

Why practicing law is like learning a foreign language...and a piece of every lawyer's vocation

Not just because there is an entire legal vocabulary, often Latin, to learn and apply.

Practicing law (or any profession/science-art) for that matter is like learning a foreign language b/c you know you're making progress when you begin to think in the new language, to process in the new language, to make the new language a part of your life, rather than something grafted on for a certain number of required hours.

The past couple weeks have included some firsts for me professionally, including my first client dying (as in one I knew b/f the family came to us at a death for probate). She was a cancer patient, already undergoing experimental treatment when she came to us for a will just a few months ago. Another client is the daughter of another cancer victim, really struggling to accept her mom's death and work w/ me to complete the probate of her mom's estate. (Both these clients' situations lended to increased anxiety for me when my own mom was admitted to the hospital last week, although she has now returned home w/ a treatable diagnosis, thanks be to God and modern medicine.) These clients have given me food for spiritual reflection and crept into my prayers, in a way different from the often rote prayer I pray for all my clients. Bless them and all their loved ones, my Lord. And make me your instrument in their lives, if it be your will.