TO WIT: PRESENT AT THE CONCEPTION
For some time now, it has been my practice to retrospectively review my calendar at the conclusion of every month, just to see where I’ve been and what I’ve been up to. The more astute practitioners among you might conclude from this disclosure that I am a bit of a masochist, for there could be no other reason why anyone would voluntarily relive a month in the life of a lawyer. Well, if you think so, please keep it to yourself. If it ever got out, even I couldn’t stand the pain.
There are of course practical explanations for my calendar review, such as remembering expenses I may have forgotten to charge, or perhaps reminding me of something I need to follow up. But there is another more personal reason why I do review, and it has to do with my nature. I tend to be highly self-critical, and my monthly retrospective affords me the opportunity, in the privacy of my office, to flagellate myself for my mistakes, in a psychological sense of course, the better by which to not repeat them.
This month however, in an otherwise blissful moment of self-recrimination ver an oral argument that had gone awry on the 22nd, I was suddenly illuminated by a flash of intuition, that inexplicable spasm of intellectual machinery someone less modest might call creative genius. At once I got down on my knees to give thanks and then rushed to my typewriter where I now sit, ever so grateful for yet another coalescence of inspiration and deadline, an process which, like the delivery of justice, occurs at random and cannot be adequately explained.
I had spent the better part of my month in rather seamy environs and for me, that’s fairly typical. I had handled parts of seven divorces, two custody fights, a wrongful death, three estates, a mental health proceeding, two workmen’s compensation cases, one automobile accident, one fraudulent conveyance, two bankruptcies, and an entire unrecorded horde of law book salesmen. And that was only to the 22nd.
There was not one happy event in the bunch. The only laughter I had encountered all month was in the mental health proceeding, and that was from the patient who had been sedated far beyond tranquility.
Perhaps that explains the low esteem in which we, as a profession, are held. It is the nastier bits of people’s lives which call us into service, and we spend so much time with our hands in other people’s toilet bowls, it is no wonder our clients recoil when we extend those hands for payment.
God knows it is not my intention herein to depress you. After all, you’ve had your own month to contend with. I do think, however, that I have stumbled upon the solution, and you can either read on, or turn to the judicial opinion page and remain forever unenlightened.
People have need of lawyers because there are many laws they do not or cannot understand. By and large, those laws regulate unhappy occurrences, such as death, divorce and taxes. There are precious few laws, and hence little need of lawyers, for the happy occasions of life, such as birth, graduation, confirmation, bar mitzvah, marriage (first time), and the like. If there were such laws, there would be greater need of lawyers for joyous events and if the public became acclimated to utilizing our services at those times, our esteem would rise.
For instance, if the legislature went to work on the laws of weddings, making the subject as joyfully incomprehensible as, say, the laws of auto insurance, everyone would have need of a lawyer to get married. Some colleagues, sensing new opportunities, would no doubt specialize in the field, giving honest meaning to the term “matrimonial lawyer.” In time, lawyers could stand up next to clergymen at the ceremony, just to make certain the parties truly understood all the implications of “in sickness and in health.”
The logic extends just as readily to the subject of birth and related concepts. As in anything else, the sooner the lawyer is consulted, the more likelihood there is of success. Carried to its logical extreme in this regard, I can envision a time when lawyers will be required to make a great many late night house calls. For my part, I prefer early morning calls, but hey, that’s what makes the world go round.
The more we associate ourselves with life’s happier moments, the greater will be our prestige and that’s important to me. If I had wanted to spend my life as the object of scorn and revulsion, I could have just as easily gone to dental school.
I know my proposal will not gather the fancy of all my colleagues. We have so many laws already and some lawyers simply do not have the kinds of experience necessary to appreciate the basic premise. But for those of us who duke it out in life’s muddy trenches, and who are tired of being held in the esteem otherwise afforded a slug, there is merit here. Write your congressman today and advocate new legislation. If he is a lawyer, he will understand. Avoid compound sentences.
© 1985 – S. Sponte, Esq.