Mosquitos and the Science of Legal Nuisances
Have you ever wondered why you seem to be cursed with bad luck in your law practice? Why situations that seemed so simple turned into catastrophes? Do you often feel like a shortstop, expecting to field one grounder, and suddenly you’re pelted by balls from every direction? Why are there so many balls? When did they change the rules of this game? Your key witness dies two days before trial. Your 50-page brief, along with seven copies, is due and all three of the office’s printers break down. Your character witness shows up to the hearing wearing a shirt that says “life isn’t always sunshine and blowjobs.” You are experiencing every-day legal catastrophes, and you aren’t the only one. Do not despair. The all-seeing eye of Science may have a cure for your woes.
Science recently showed us that some people’s lives are innately crappier than others’. Earlier this month, a popular online news source reported that mosquitos really do prefer some people over others. They’re not yet sure why this is, but one can and should make educated guesses. Mosquitos might feast on Sally because her mother ate potato soup with onions while enjoying a steamy romance novel on the night her little girl was conceived. The devilish insects may find Larry delicious because he was allowed to play the caterpillar metamorphosis game in his mother’s tanning bed when he was a child. Who knows?! Science is wacky. What we do know, with mathematical certainty, is that mosquitos are terrible. And so are the things that are happening to you in your practice. There must be some correlation.
If logic has taught us anything, it is that everything can be explained. There are no questions that cannot be answered. If you tell me that x y and y is infinity, then I’ll tell you that y must be the number of years it will take me to forget that Al Roker pooped his pants at the Whitehouse. That will take no less than 2 infinities to forget. You see? Everything has an explanation. As you may have learned from the documentary “The Secret,” there are no coincidences. Therefore, your misfortunes are not coincidences.
What you should work toward is figuring out the reason why these bad things are happening to you. Was it that you were born under the sign of Libra during a waxing crescent moon? Did you sleep on a bottom bunk as a child? Have you always tied your shoes a little too tightly? These are just a few possibilities. There are literally thousands of plausible explanations.
If you want to solve this puzzle, you must invest a great deal of thought into what the cause of your misfortunes might be. Just like the scientists working to discover what attracts blood-sucking, disease-carrying insects, your insights could also become very important. If the scientists figure out what it is about people that either attracts or repels mosquitos, they might find a better way to protect people from their bites, which can be deadly. If you figure out what attracts calamities to your professional life, lawyers everywhere could be free from the tyranny of internet disruptions, clients whose cars break down, and pimples on the day of trial. Life would be glorious, just as the undergraduate prelaw courses taught us it would be.
The only catch in this great plan is that you might not discover an answer during your lifetime. Science is not always as easy as the molecular physicists make it out to be. People still disagree about how old the earth is (even though we’ve seen the dinosaur saddle). You could go on for years as you search for a cure, suffering small agonies all along the way. There is one other option that a prudent person should consider: deal with it.
Bad things happen. Some may say that it is the nature of our profession to be inundated with troubles. Some lawyers have chosen to suffer these moments of cataclysm with grace and fortitude. They embrace the chaos and surprise even themselves with the inner strength they are able to summon. They deal with the stress by exercising, or sculpting, or masturbating in their office chairs.
The “deal with it” option is out there for you, too. But if you really want to make a difference in the lives of your fellow lawyers, follow the inspiration of the mosquito doctors. We know there’s an answer out there. You just might be the genius who finds it.
[image: mosquito via shutterstock]
