2002-12-06 12:24 p.m.
milk carton attorneys

"One of our attorneys is missing."

Sounds like the beginning of some John Grisham or Brad Meltzer potboiler, doesn't it?

But no, that's the word around the law firm I work at. One of the new associates (read: first-year attorney) has gone missing while on a business trip to Mexico.

I wouldn't be concerned usually � my first thought would be that he picked up a girl at a bar and is gleefully shirking his duties on his first big trip out of the US.

But his girlfriend hasn't heard from him since early yesterday and he didn't show up to his morning meeting today.

Now everyone's in a frenzy, rifling through his desk, possibly going to his apartment to find credit card numbers, calling card bills, any information that could be traced if, for example, he was mugged and someone's going on a tear with his wallet.

It's a detective story in progress, and this is troubling me in a way that Bubbe having a stroke didn't.

I don't know him all that well. Bill's a friendly enough guy: he always smiles and says hi in the morning, always asks me how my weekend went...nothing earth-shatteringly personal, but he makes more of an effort than most people around here. Hell, most of my attorneys don't make that kind of effort.

Law has never struck me as a dangerous occupation (unless you're trying war criminals or prosecuting gangsters), and this place always seems so calm and relatively unchanging, except in traditional ways, like switchovers in staff, etc.

But his secretary is sitting behind me, crying, and I haven't seen someone this scared since 9/11.

UPDATE: He's okay. Embarrassed, from what I hear, but he reported in, finally. No details yet, but it sounds like he went on a bender last night and overslept. Funny, and yet not.

We don't live in Belfast or Beirut or Baghdad or Tel Aviv, so kidnappings, bombings, hell, even fatal muggings are rarely a part of daily life, at least in a tangible way. I can understand why this kind of moment shakes Americans up so, but at the same time, I wonder if we're better off or crippled by the lack of perspective people in war-torn countries have, missing a resiliency. Maybe it doesn't matter.

I'm glad he's okay, though.