Being an attorney

For as long as I can remember, I wanted to be an attorney.  I wasn't drawn to it because of riches or fame.  In fact, when I first started entertaining the idea of becoming an attorney, there were very few television shows about the law on the air.  Really, the only one I remember by that time was Perry Mason, and I had and continue to have no interest in criminal law.  What's more, I'm not a litigator and have little intention of ever becoming one.

When college recruiters came to our school to pitch their universities, I asked them about their law schools.  I was told in almost a dismissively parental way that I would have to go through undergrad first and then apply to law school.  This made no sense to me, so I'd ask them Why?  Most of them, I'm sure, thought I was being cute.  I wasn't.

I went to law school and I was right:  Undergrad did nothing to prepare me for law school.  I would have been better served going directly to law school rather than wasting four years with subjects that may or may not have interested me.

Twenty-three years ago today I was admitted to practice law.  Since then, I've been admitted to several federal jurisdictions and practiced before countless judges.  I've enjoyed some of my time and I've hated other times.  I've met great people and I've met worse scoundrels.  I've had some epic battles with other attorneys and I've suffered through more banality and stupidity than I care to remember.

But what I don't have anymore is a career.  Our Mother always told us we should have something upon which to fall back in the event we found ourselves in dire straits.  I have three college degrees and have demonstrated competence and success but I have no career to show for it.  I have been deceived by more employers than I can shake a stick and have lost out on jobs because of politics. What was once a profession is now a business.

I was probably never and will certainly never be a great attorney.  I was a competent attorney, a worker bee, someone with occasionally brilliant results but more often merely adequate ones.  The Supreme Court was never my calling and I was never destined to wear a robe.  But I am damned good at what I do, I treat my clients right and I obtain the results they want, honestly.  None of that matters a wit.

So my career is over.  What I'm going to do with the rest of my life is open to question.

At the swearing-in ceremony, the state Supreme Court justice intoned From now on you are no longer just another Tom, Dick or Harriet but attorneys entitled to be called Esquire.  My brother, who was seated to the other side of our Mother, leaned in front of her and whispered in a voice audible enough for the fifty closest strangers to hear, I don't care what he says I'm still going to call you a dick.  I often told that anecdote for it's clever and witty humor.

I just didn't realize how prophetic he was.

(c) 2013 The Truxton Spangler Chronicles