TO WIT: RECESSIONAL
I am a lawyer and I believe in truth, at least insofar as it helps my case. I also believe in honesty and, off the record, straight answers to straight questions. It is therefore of grave concern to me now when acquaintances on the street, compulsively acting out their own variation of the “have a nice day” gambit, inquire of me “how’s business?”, and I respond, almost without thought and completely without truth, “Oh, I’ve been very busy lately, thank you.”
Lest you misunderstand, I’m not referring to clients who have accosted me to inquire why their work is not yet done, nor to colleagues who ask why I haven’t returned any of their calls. No, no, I’m talking about acquaintances, friends, family members, people who are concerned for my welfare, an entire class of human beings against whom deception produces, other than practice, absolutely no advantage.
Since by this time we are all friends, and since I feel compelled to be honest with someone, a dangerous professional propensity if left unchecked, it might just as well be you. The true truth is that, Lord, God of Hosts, business is just awful.
I am convinced that the fault is not mine. I am convinced that between my satisfied clients, however rare, and the potentially new clients that have never heard of me from the dissatisfied ones, I should have enough work left to get me through the decade. I am likewise convinced that if my past years at the Bar have not destroyed my reputation, there is nothing within my power to destroy it in the time I have left. Therefore I am convinced that the fault is not mine.
Rather I believe that so many people are frightened by the deep recession we currently face that they have put off until better times those elective legal activities which, until recently, generated for me my livelihood. They have put off the home purchase, the business acquisition, the vindictive and petty lawsuits, the head-on collision and the sudden demise and probate, hoping that the sun will come out tomorrow, clearing away the cobwebs and the sorrow, and that’s all right. I understand and I am not bitter. Far be it for me to remind them, though, that I was there when they needed me.
I am now alone, at least in the figurative sense. For many of my colleagues, the tumult and the shouting has also died. Unlike me, however, and therefore willing yet to preserve a semblance of dignity for the profession, they don'’ actually come right out and say it, but I can tell they're slow. The plight was most obvious at lunch recently, when one colleague bragged about his recent settlement of a case which generated for him a three figure fee, an announcement which garnered him oohs and aahs from those assembled, along with the check for the whole table, a tab comprised of seven orders of cheese sandwiches and water.
Another colleague recently confided to me that he had fallen into the questionable habit of kissing his mailman the first thing of every morning on the theory that it might be the only warm body he’d see that day. He was obliged to abandon the practice however when the Postal Service sent him a terse little note advising of its opposition to forced bussing.
Some members of the profession have simply refused to take this lying down, and in an effort to keep busy, have developed highly original and imaginative ways to generate business. One such local colleague, taking his cue from the American Medical Association, has been promoting the need for an annual title examination. To that end, he has had printed and is distributing a three color pamphlet entitled “This Land Is Your Land—Or Is It?”, in which he describes such suggested services as a “year analysis” as fundamental to a healthy title. He has even gone so far as to suggest that homeowners cut down on salting their driveways. While I take issue with his particular approach to the problem, I nonetheless admire his innovative approach to dealing with lien times.
For my own part, I intend to simply ride this out until my captains and kings come back entirely of their own accord. To fill the idle hours, I have begun reading the advance sheets once again scrutinizing each opinion for clarity and logic, and then trying to guess what the facts really were. I have finally committed to memory after all these years the last name of my secretary and the first names of my children. I have hope for the future, a dram entirely undiminished by reality, and to provide whatever solace I can to colleagues whose economic circumstances challenge my own, I offer the following hymn:
God of the Lawyers, growing old,
Lord of Attorneys, hear our plea,
Though we’re tired, hungry, cold,
We have abiding faith in thee,
Lord, God of Lex, we look to you
Please give us one more chance to sue.
Far broke, our clients drift away,
In fear, some turn and hire the shrinks,
Who cares if lawyers go or stay,
Or disappear from courts and links,
Lord, God of Lex, may we be blessed,
With one more judgment to confess.
The tumult and the shouting died,
The soul for lawsuits people lack,
Gone their purse and gone their pride,
We look to you to put it back,
Lord, God of Hosts, relieve our woes,
With one more mortgage to foreclose.
Amen.
There is common strength in common prayer, and while I would prefer to hold out for the truth, I’ll settle for company in a pinch.
© 1983 – S. Sponte, Esq.