Alfalfa, Bastardy, and the College of Law!

Hi Ladies!!

First of all, my apologies for taking so long to actually post something! It's been pretty crazy and it has taken me what seems like forever to settle in here at NIU. I like it here so far. DeKalb has the perfect quality of being close enough to home where it's a quick drive and easy to get home but its not so close that I let family stuff get in the way of school. Plus, it's so much like Champaign that I feel so at home!

I'm living in these brand new apartments that are actually owned and run by the University. They are pretty much located in the midst of vast alfalfa fields and I do have a great view of the sunset every evening... quite pretty! The downside however, is that brand new means not really done.... the construction has not been completed as of yet. We had to move in later than anticipated which meant placement in temporary freshman housing for a week or so (ick!) and they're still working on paving the parking lots, finishing the community center, landscaping...etc, etc. So it's been really tough settling in and it'll be a pain in the butt for quite some time but I'm hoping it'll be worth it in the end.

The school aspect is going really well though! (So far, at least!) It's definitely a lot of work and intimidating at times for sure. The one week orientation pretty much consisted of a bunch of different people telling us that the next three years would consist of us being "eviscerated." So far no blood has been shed, unless you count the bloodshed in the murder cases I get to read of course. I did cry in my contracts class today though. But, it was from laughing so hard. We were going over this case, Fiege v. Boehm, that's referred to as "the bastardy case." (Yes, it's actually a word.) It's from the fifties and basically this woman got pregnant and she got the man to sign a contract to pay child support in exchange for her promise to not file bastardy proceedings (it was a crime at the time). Then he stopped paying and she went to court. He got a blood test and it turns out he's not the daddy. She still wants him to pay, he says the contract is invalid and also states that he never actually slept with her. Apparently, he only agreed to pay her because he didn't want his mom to find out about the whole thing. Then there's the notion that the contract could not have been in good faith if they had never slept together. Anyway the funny part was really my professor's comments. I'm telling you girls, you haven't lived until you've heard your professor, an old white man, say, "This was the 50's. Maybe she thought you could get preggers from what we used to call heavy petting. I'm telling you the demise of it is what has led to the demise of drive-ins all across the country." I don't know... maybe it's one of things where you had to be there but let me tell you, there were definitely tears involved.

Let's see, what else...? I have an awesome roommate, Nicole. She's from California but her parents are both originally from the Chicago area and they're NIU alums. She's doing her Master of Fine Arts in Acting and it's pretty fun to listen to her and her partner do their exercises.

I can't think of much else and I've already written a thousand pages so I'll stop. I hope all you are doing really well and I hope to hear from you soon!!!

Love ya =)

~Teena