What a Dog

Have you ever seen one of those websites that has before and after pictures of people who were taking drugs? I have actually read some online discussions where people argue that those photos are exaggerations or sensationalized. It has been my experience that those photos are spot-on. In fact, sometimes they go easy on the person. They usually are a comparison of two arrest photos. The first one is usually taken at the time of the person's first arrest, and the second one at the time of the person's most recent arrest. The thing is, the person had likely been doing drugs for a while before that first arrest. That person's appearance may have already changed significantly before that person was arrested for the first time. So rather than the photos being an exaggeration, I would argue that sometimes the photos are really only showing part of the change.

About ten years ago I was working at a laundromat/dry cleaners. We were open until ten, so a lot of the car salesmen would come to drop off their dry cleaning because we were the only place open after they got off the lot at night.

One such person was Olivia DeLonte. Olivia sold cars for one of the local dealerships. She was probably about thirty-five at the time. She was a very attractive woman. And she was very attractive in a rather classy way. I remember her being very pleasant and having a very pretty smile. She was way out of my league. I didn't even bother trying to flirt with her. I was studying for the Bar Exam and working in a laundromat. She was beautiful, classy, charming, and successful. She would have laughed at me.

I now represent Olivia for a number of felonies. It seems at some point over the last ten years she got involved in heroin. To say that she no longer looks beautiful would be an understatement. She has gone from someone who would never notice me to someone I would never notice. Her weight was probably about ninety pounds. Her hair lacked luster. Her skin looks discolored and splotchy. Her teeth look like crap. She is so thin that bones are just popping out of her. Her fingernails are bitten off and dirty. Her breath is atrocious. She shakes and cannot hold herself together. The smile is gone. There is literally nothing left that is attractive about her. There is no charm, class, or confidence. It is incredibly sad. It is sort of like the woman I knew is now dead. Whatever happens to Olivia and whatever she is able to make of her life, she is not going to be able to re-claim who she was. Hopefully she can find some kind of life that is productive and satisfying, but she is never going to be that person she used to be.

I saw her today for the first time in a month or so. She went to a 14 day program. She put on fifteen pounds. A lot of the shaking has stopped. She looks a lot better than she did a month ago, but many of the physical and personality changes are here to stay. I do hope that she is able to maintain her sobriety.

Who schedules a meeting at four o'clock on a Friday afternoon? The Town of Speckville, apparently. The town of Speckville is so small that the "town hall" is not even locate in Speckville. I had a hearing there today to discuss a woman's barking dogs.

My client had thirteen hunting dogs that she kept in her back yard. They barked a lot. Neighbors weren't pleased. They complained. So she started finding place for the dogs to board. She is now down to two dogs. They are still barking. They are barking so much, in fact, that a neighbor apparently called some county official eight times in the middle of the night last night to report the barking.

Eight times in the middle of the night? Are you kidding me? A dog would have to literally be in my bed barking at me to cause me to call eight times in the middle of the night to complain. Can't this guy get a fan or something to drown out the noise? That is how I sleep. There could be a gunfight going on in my front yard and I wouldn't even hear it.

We formulated a plan to try to get rid of one of the remaining dogs and do something to get the other one to show up. I am not exactly optimistic that it is going to work. She will probably have to wind up boarding up the remaining dogs, too.

Among the strange things about this situation are that the dogs are hunting dogs. Apparently (I obviously know nothing of the subject) these dogs are not potty-trained and do not go inside at all. Ever. As such, she cannot put them in the house. She also is not a hunter. Her son is. And he doesn't live there. My solution would be, "Hey, son. Take the dogs and find a place for them." As I sat at this meeting for this civil matter, it did give me a newfound realization of the relative importance of the criminal cases I work on.