miss emma.

yesterday was a red-letter day, as it was the first day of my pre-law class. i anticipated it all morning and when i pulled up the case i was supposed to read for class, i had butterflies in my stomach. big butterflies. big fat monarch butterflies. call me silly, but i am hugely intimidated by the thought of being pre-law. maybe it's because my dad is an attorney and i see how hard he works and how busy he is, or maybe it's because i know how strenuous law school is, or maybe it's just because i still don't feel like i'm prepared to enter such an adult phase of life. or maybe it's a combination of all three.
but anyway, i pulled up my case on the byu law library website (intimidating, again) and i read it and then i read it again and then i thought about it and then i talked about it the rest of the day because it captivated me. it got me excited. it turned those butterflies into a spark.
the case we read involved a domestic dispute between newlyweds which resulted in the husband stabbing his wife nineteen times. she died, needless to say. anyway, the point of the case is whether or not words are provocation enough for murder, since the wife was relentlessly verbally attacking her husband. the court decided it was not so, and mr. kitchen knife appealed, but was unsuccessful again.
i had class at 7, so i had all day to think about how i felt about the case, and really how i felt about the impact of words. it's no secret that i'm a lover of words, especially the written kind. i live for those moments when i read something that makes me feel so deeply that it pulls at my heart-strings and gives me goosebumps. it's usually shakespeare. or gordon b. hinckley.
i called my dad after class and told him all about it and how we learned how to brief a case and how excited i was that i may have found what i want to do with my career. after we hung up, i realized i probably should've thanked him for giving me so much. and not only temporal things, but priceless and intangible gifts, like his love for words and his memorization skills and his tolerance for diversity. people have always told me how like my mom i am, with my appearance and my laugh and my eyes, but lately i've seen how very similar i am to my dad, on the inside.
so dad, here's to you.
thanks for making me smart and determined.