LRW faces the Council....

Today was Day 6 of my job as a Teacher's Aide at ISL. While I was on my break, I walked over to Mojo's coffee shop & ran into a fellow hot-mess-turned-success, who owns the coffee shop! We didn't get to talk for very long, but it sure was nice to run into an old friend & know he's doing well despite (or maybe even because) of his former levels of tragedy, not unlike myself.

Anyway, my day at ISL was good, there was not a ton of stuff to do & interacting with the students really is a joy. However, one of the teachers whom I assist always has some menial thing for me to do after the kids are gone, like sharpen & sort a bunch of colored pencils. Today, my last task was to open all of our age-appropriate French-French dictionaries to a specific page (218, if you're wondering) & cover the anatomical drawings from chest to genitals with Post-it notes that I had to tape down, as if this is going to stop a determined 8-year-old from looking.

As most of you will already know, I had a 2nd interview scheduled with the DA's office today at 4:30. Mercifully, my dear friend Steve was able to give me a ride from ISL (this would have been an hour-long multiple-bus excursion otherwise, so I really am grateful for this) to the DA's office. I got to there 15 minutes early, and when I presented myself at the front desk, the Rotarian Lady from the 1st interview greeted me warmly, and had me sit at a conference table in the lobby to translate 3 pages of legal-related sentences from English into Spanish & 1 page in the opposite language combination to work on. When she asked if I had a pen, I said, "Of course," and got started.

She came down & checked on my progress twice & the 2nd time she had me stop & come up to meet with the rest of the interviewers. "How many more interviewers are we talking about here?" I thought, and as I walked up to this conference room, I could see that there were no less than 6 other people seated around this table, with the hot seat waiting for me.

The lady who conducted my 1st interview was seated at the head of the table and on her right was a white lady from the victims & witnesses services & a Hispanic lady & to her left was a Black lady from some other department and another white lady from the Diversion Dept & another Hispanic lady. It felt like the council of LRWs. Miss Woman from the 1st interview says "As I told you in the 1st interview, the 2nd interview will consist of you role-playing with these Spanish ladies & these White ladies with you acting as translator & then you will go downstairs with one of our native speakers to go over your written answers" (Clearly I am paraphrasing a bit) but I am now thinking, "Bitch you didn't tell me anything about this at the 1st interview. I am sure about this because I was hanging on your every word." But I just went with it.

There were words I didn't know, OK. I think I conveyed the better part of the material but there were definitely what felt like pauses to me. There was even a point where one of these White Ladies kinda carried on and I got lost in what she was saying & I had to ask her to repeat it. But I soldiered through it and when it was over, Miss Black Lady said, "well, that went really well."

Now I have to say this. Despite the fact that she said that, if I had left right then I'd have said, "Oh well, you didn't get this one, you will do better & get the next one." The pauses made me nervous & probably hyper-critical, but when I was going downstairs with Miss Native Speaker to go over the written portion, she complimented my Spanish & said in so many words that it was "excelente."

We went over the written answers and talked about a phrase I had translated awkwardly from the Miranda rights and then it was over. She seemed to accept my translations & may have noticed that I corrected the  Spanish statements for grammar, accentuation & punctuation (I am sure any of my students who read this will tell you I am a stickler for these sorts of things). I think I forgot to mention that after the role-playing, Miss Woman from the 1st interview told me I should have a definite answer within 2-3 days.

I walked out into the beautiful, breezy weather & it felt like it used to when I was walking to work at Chateaubriand during those gorgeous, Pre-Katrina purply sunsets that we only get in South Louisiana, back when hope grew every day in my heart all the time along with all those different colored rosebushes I'd planted. I hope that's a good sign.

But if this is not what is in the cards for me at the moment, it is fine. My current job is really a wonderful opportunity to help NOLA youth to grow & learn, even if part of it includes a lil academic bitch-work There are a few LRWs there too, trust!

Thanks for reading!!