The phone rings...

My first instinct is to salivate and exclaim "mmmm pizza," since the ring-tone on my office extension sounds identical to the one that frequently sounded off during early childhood visits to Pizza Hut. My second reaction, as Pavlovian triggers subside and I come back to my office, is confusion. Who calls a legal intern? In my particular case, virtually nobody. I got some training on how to check my voicemail and/or the appropriate greeting I should give if I answer -- apparently "Yo, WASSUP DAWG?!?" is not appropriate anymore, I suspect because it is so dated it's antediluvian, and yes now I'm envisioning Noah and his family tricking out the ark with some wicked hydraulics and wait what?... Oh crap the phone is still ringing...

My point? Nobody calls a legal intern in this department. Why would they? Approximately 2/3 of my projects are done under attorney supervision, meaning mainly I am like the Vietnamese sweatshop of the legal system. The real attorneys get their legal problems (in this very shaky analogy, this would be mining their infinte resource of client need), send them to me to be processed (researched/drafted), and then package and market the final product. Occasionally my boss - well, since I do work for a number of attorneys, this would be more of my uber-boss - decides that it would benefit me greatly to deal with the "finder" side of things. As an aside to explain this concept, there's a saying popular in firms that there are "grinders,minders, and finders" falling along first year associates/senior associates/partner lines. Grinders grind under the watchful eye of minders. Finders are the ones with their own client base and exquisite social networking skills who bring in the clients over which the grinders may grind, while the minders mind. Setting his sights high for me, or perhaps wishing to refine some of my rougher introverted tendencies, he refers me directly to clients so that I might practice building positive attorney-client relations. In these cases I do some phone calling, myself. But as often as not, these are one shot deals, or things that quickly (d)evolve into email conversations, probably because most people seem to prefer to have as little as possible to do with anyone in the legal profession if they can help it (we may be contagious!), although there's also the fact that I can never remember my extension number while I'm going through the "if you have any questions..." spiel.

And nobody in house calls a legal intern because either there's the handy dandy PH email system or the fact that I am a half minute walk away from any adjacent attorneys' offices.

Still ringing? surely they'd have given up by now. I would let it go to voicemail, but there are two problems with this: (1) as I mentioned, I am surrounded by supervising attorneys who know I am in my office, can hear the phone ringing, and seem concerned with my attorney/client relationships building skills; (2) I can't for the life of me remember any of my training on how to retrieve my voicemail or what passcode I entered. It could be anything from my most recent "exam number" to the PLU for a piece of vegetation that I remember from my fruit market days (I often use PLU's because it's easier to think "artichoke!" than a series of unconnected numbers and a year of typing these from memory has left them eternally engrained in my memory) to who knows, because I happened to set up my voicemail approximately three days after my last final after a very grueling law school experience after which my brain was essentially borscht without the sour cream.

So I answer, desperately trying to remember what to say other than NOT WASSUP DAWG? It comes out in some slurred but semi-professional greeting. I possibly threw in a "how may I help you," but this always seems like overkill before the other person has even had a chance to talk. The voice on the other line says something indiscernable in that familiar tone that reassures me they have no idea who I am or what number they have called. Taken aback, but attempting to retain some semblance of professionalism for the sake of the many attorneys in earshot, I stutter "I'm ... sorry??" and the person on the other line asks for somebody I've never heard of, annoyance mounting in her voice. I delve into my well-worn "I'm sorry, you have the wrong number" (although, really, why should I be sorry that they misdialed) as the other line clicks off. Stomach unsettled, but breathing returning to normal, I return to work, wondering if it would be unprofessional to just unplug the office phone, since after all who calls a legal intern? Hey, wait, where's my pizza??