Preppy Cliche or Possibly Gay

Today I led a private tour of the wine country for a law firm's annual summer associate's retreat. For those of you that aren't versed in the hiring practices of large firms, let me give you a brief rundown.

As you may or may not be aware, law school takes three years. After the student's second year, they have a summer internship. During this summer internship, they are known as summer associates. Basically it's a test run for doing the work. The students apply to several law firms, and they get hired on in the summer (hopefully) by at least one of them. Once they are hired on, they do some work; however, their workload is nothing like that of a full-fledged attorney. Often these summer associates come from a variety of law schools across the country, so the law firm provides them with housing in addition to paying them for their work.

Since this is essentially a 3-month courtship, the law firm also sets up a variety of activities for the associates: fancy dinners, cultural excursions, happy hours, parties, weekend trips. They do all of this to show them how fantastic their life will be should they get hired by the firm. How do I know all of this? Because my friend is a lawyer, and I got to be her date to all of the associate events she attended when she was working in New York for the summer. See, her husband was in DC, so she was allowed a guest to all events. I totally lucked out. I must say, I ate quite well that summer, and I had the opportunity to see quite a few Broadway shows, symphony concerts, ballets, and baseball games. The only drawback was having to spend time with soon-to-be lawyers who were being coddled for an entire summer and believed that they truly were cooler than Jesus (if not cooler, definitely smarter and more highly skilled).

Grab a seat and listen to this example, bearing in mind, of course, that not all future attorneys are like this, but there's always at least one in the bunch. There was a guy, we'll call him Reginald, who was at my friend's firm. He and his fiance, we'll call her Harriet, attended a couple of the same events to which I was invited. Unfortunately for me, I generally sat next to them. At first glance, this couple seemed a bit dorky, but nice enough. Then, I actually talked to them and discovered that they were intentionally pretentious snobs. Quite honestly, I don't think people can be as snobby as they were without making a real effort.

Often when speaking with them, the fact that my friend and I came from Oklahoma was brought up. Even though they were both raised in rural Pennsylvania, they seemed to believe that anyone from a flyover state such as Oklahoma must be a know-nothing hick. We always had to go through my educational background, which, in their eyes was sub-par. No, I didn't go to an Ivy (nor did they), and I ONLY had a Bachelors. Can you imagine? They constantly talked down to me as though I was far too stupid to catch on to their pretensions. When they asked about my friend's educational background, they brought up the fact that she attended Georgetown Law, but were horrified to learn that she attended a state school for her undergraduate degree (as did they). I had to step in and defend her intelligence to them a couple of times (along with my own). Now one night in particular, I was forced into a car with them. I was trying to just take the Subway, but my friend and her fellow lawyers insisted that I take the car. Unfortunately for me, I had to share the car with those two delights. As we drove, they put down the fact that I came from Oklahoma, that I only had a Bachelor's degree, that I worked as an assistant at a record label. They were especially disgusted by the fact that I knew so much about hip hop and rock (since, at the time, my employer was making quite a bit of money off of those genres). I had to listen to them carry on about how classical music is the only REAL music. Rather than spout of my knowledge of classical music (which is broad, since my degree focused on Historical Musicology), I just listed as they constantly put me down. Then we passed through Times Square. Just so everyone is aware, driving down 45th St past Broadway on most nights is a TERRIBLE idea. Why must drivers do it? Anytime a cab driver took me that way, I simply exited the cab. There was no point in sitting in traffic for a half an hour when I could just walk the 2 ½ blocks home.

On this particular night, as much as I attempted to get out of the car, I was denied. No no no…I had to just sit there with Reginald and Harriett. And what did we talk about? Musical theater. What specifically? Well, first we passed the sign for Saturday Night Fever, a play that my aunt had taken me to see a few months earlier. Now, just to be fair here, I'm not a huge fan of movies-turned-musicals, but it was entertaining. I enjoyed it. Harriet saw the sign and said, "Ick. Saturday Night Fever? That must be terrible."

"Oh yes. Can you imagine the kind of people that would go see something like that? Low class." Reggie replied.

I sat there quietly, wondering what to say. Then they asked my opinion. And I responded, "Well, it's pretty popular. My aunt took me to see it in January, and I have to admit, it was entertaining. The dancing was really impressive."

They looked at me with silent disdain. As the car sluggishly moved through traffic we got to the theater where Jeckyl and Hyde was playing. During my time in New York, Jeckyl and Hyde went through three lead males, and it was the brunt of all of my jokes. The commercials were not to be missed. Who were these leading men? Jack Wagner. Sebastian Bach. David Hasselhoff. Of all of them, the Hoff was, by far, creepiest. I've never seen Jeckyl and Hyde; however, at my brother's college graduation ceremony (well, it was really his EMT graduation ceremony), a group of musical theater students sang the love song from the play. And that's as much as I know about it….which is enough to know I never want to see it. (See, I can be a snob too, but I'm rarely malicious.)

On this particular day, Sebastian Bach was playing the title role. Since I often liked to laugh about it, I pointed it out.

'Sebastian Bach? Who's that?", Reggie asked.

"He was the lead singer of Skid Row. Now he's a Broadway star apparently."

"I assume that's not his given name." Harriet was not impressed.

"Uh, no. Stage name. I just think it's funny that he's starring in it and took over for Jack Wagner."

"Who's that?" They both seemed horrified by my knowledge and didn't see the humor in the whole thing.

"He was on a soap opera and had a hit song in the 80's."

"And they think these people are qualified to be on Broadway?" Reginald pondered.

"I wonder what the real Bach would have thought about that?" Harriet wondered aloud (and when she said Bach, she chose to pronounce the "ch" as a gutteral sound, much like Channukah would be pronounced, as opposed to the more standard "k" sound.

"Yes, what would Bacccchhh think of that? I'm sure he wouldn't be pleased that some hack from a, what kind of music did that band play?" Reginald jumped in on the cccchhhh train.

"Uh, they were a hair metal band."

"A what?" Harriet asked. "I don't think J.S. Bacccchhh would appreciate that."

'Not a chance. I enjoy the music of Bacccchhh. You probably aren't familiar." Reggie added.

"To be honest, I took an entire course on Bach. I know quite a bit about him. But that's really neither here nor there."

"Oh, so you are familiar with Baccchhhh? I don't know why anyone would listen to anything other than classical music. It's just a waste of time."

And that's when I stopped talking. The next part of the conversation revolved around the fact that I only had a Bachelor's degree with no solid plans to go to graduate school while Reggie was in law school and Harriett was getting her PhD in English. I had never been happier to get out of the car and wave hello to the hooker in front of my building.

Now before I give ALL summer associates a bad name, many of them are very nice. These two were particularly dreadful. And, just so you have an update, Reggie was fired in his first year on the job. No one was ever fired from that firm. Apparently, he wasn't a good fit.

Now, back to my tour. The morning started off with a bang—literally. My driver and I set out early to go up to Napa, and I've never been happier for having such foresight. As we drove along the 80, we heard a loud "BANG" and the sound of shattering glass. I looked behind me, thinking that a car hit us, where I noticed that one of the windows appeared to be gone. Not believing it at first, I stuck my hand through the windowless window. Yep, no window. We turned around and switched to a new bus. Since we set out so early, this little setback wasn't a problem in the least. We arrived at the resort exactly on time.

I spotted the group, and they started to board. As everyone was getting on the bus, I noticed one summer associate in particular, and I wondered if he had recently auditioned for the remake of the made-for-TV movie, "The Preppy Murders". I kid you not (because this is the kind of thing I could never make up), he was wearing penny loafers, white shorts with a woven brown leather belt, light blue Polo shirt with the collar flipped up, and a white sweater tied around his neck. He topped the look off with sunglasses that rested atop his blonde head. Once on board, he sat with his crossed (man-style) in the middle of the aisle, as he leaned back reading his New York Times. Seriously? The guy wasn't even 25 years old. What is that? At first glance, I wondered if he were gay. No straight man would wear that get-up? And surely it was a joke! But alas, his lady friend, who was a bit taller than him and thin and cute, wearing a plaid dress and white sweater tied around her shoulders acted as the perfect beard.

Once everyone was aboard, I welcomed them, offered them water and air conditioning, and asked if they wanted commentary. Of course they didn't, but they said yes, putting me into the awkward position of giving them a very brief history of Napa Valley. Once I finished my uncomfortable history lesson, they asked me to turn on the air conditioning, and I obliged. Then, they asked for water, so I started passing it to them. As I got to the back of the bus, Prep School Murders was complaining about how cold it was (as if I were deaf).

"I know we asked for the air conditioning, but we don't need to feel like we're in the Arctic. This isn't a ski vacation. We're in Napa. I'd hate to have to put my sweater on. I didn't bring it for that. This is ridiculous. They clearly aren't concerned about our comfort. I don't see why it has to be so cold. I mean, the least they can do is oblige our request. This is unreasonably cold. What are we? In the Arctic?"

I was standing next to him the entire time he was talking.

"It seems a little chilly in here. Do you think we should turn the air conditioning down?" I asked the group.

"That would be nice. It's freezing. You don't have to put it on full blast."

"Right. I'll fix that for you." With that, I went to the front of the bus and adjusted the temperature. It was at that point that I decided to make myself scarce. While making myself scarce, I started getting very irritated by everyone on the bus. Why? Because I know these people, and I'm just as smart and educated as they are…and my background is not that much different…and I too went to a hoity-toity school. Yet, they chose to view me as a lesser human being and treated me as a servant. Is this what my life will become?

As we arrived to our first stop, PSM decided to take over the tour-guiding duties because he found himself to the most hilarious person on the bus. He wondered aloud why I was there since he did such a good job on his own. My day was going downhill fast.

We toured the art gallery at the winery then had a tasting. I stood in the back, desperately wanting a drink. Luckily for me, the wife of one of the firm's attorney's handed me a glass saying, "Here. You need this. It will make us more tolerable."

Try as I might, I can't hide anything on my face. Open book.

We left that winery, and some members of the group abandoned the bus, so the numbers changed. Our next stop was lunch. We got there, and I secured tables and wine for the group. I managed to weasel my way into a on-the-ground picnic with one of the firm's attorney's and her husband. They were quite nice and made an effort to learn a little about me. Hopefully they determined that I'm not an uneducated idiot.

As everyone finished their lunch, I attempted to gather them up to leave. At one of the tables, the picnickers made no effort to clean up after themselves. They just sat there and waited for me to pick up their trash. Little did I know I was also a busboy. I started picking up their trash, and the girls thanked me. I certainly felt appreciated. As I was walking the ten feet to the trash can, a couple of the guys noticed that I was picking up their mess and started helping. They even went as far as to apologize for the bad behavior of their colleagues.

Our journey continued on with a final stop at another winery. We toured the facility, and the group ended up talking so loudly that the tour guide gave up and abandoned his attempt at giving a tour. It was a damn shame because he was a really great guide, and everything he said was quite interesting.

We left that winery and dropped the group off at their resort. Most of them said goodbye and thanked me. A few chose to ignore my existence. Man I love 2nd year law students with a ridiculous sense of entitlement.