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The sight of roadkill is surprisingly shocking to me. I see these slaughtered creatures, so flattened they are like a detailed painting, in droves each day. In fact the different species whose insides I get the privilege of witnessing on crude display seem to be on the rise. It started with what I think was just a fox last Tuesday and has now, on my sixth day on the job, grown to foxes, badgers, rabbits, a fawn, pigeons, and squirrels.
Possibly the worst one was the rabbit stretched across a solid metre of road, something like a 2D model of the rodent’s intestinal tract.
That is a close tie with the solitary squirrel tail blowing in the wind through the middle of the road.
In other news, I have now observed practices in three different courts. The barristers and clerk in Oxford were having a jolly old time joking between cases, it actually made me kind of maybe want to work in the field. They seem like a solid bunch of smarty pants with a gift for the gab and close interactions with the opposite end of the systemic spectrum. This is a highly interesting domain. I don’t think their laughter and joking was callous, but rather similar to that of a doctor or a nurse.
They are confronted every day with matters of life and death and, on top of that, humiliation – possibly worse than death? – so they are probably most likely candidates for both empathy and humour. The former is debatable, you might say. I would say that without it, the latter is impossible. So a barrister without a sense of humour is more likely to be callous, uncaring and careerist.
I leave this open to further contemplation. “Sense of humour” itself is an extremely debatable term, because what of the Wall Street lads laughing in the back of a limo caught in a rain of dollar bills, champagne and prostitutes? They probably know a good joke or two as well.
And what of the serious defence lawyer lady working for the accused in the position-of-trust case?
In all her demanding, diabetic glory, she seems a right drag to be around. But her unbelievable persistence in getting what she wants seems, for now, a priceless skill for her job of defending the (potentially) undefendable. Let’s see how the verdict turns out. My point being, the haughty serious types may not be full of humour, or even empathy (who knows what goes on in there), but their commitment to a job immaculately done is a rare and impressive quality indeed. It may portray more integrity than some of the jesters.
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