When you lose the internet and hear your Dad telling you his rolodex works better.
When you lose the internet and hear your Dad telling you his rolodex works better.
The Way My Mother Tells The Story
… we didn’t catch that fish. The guy in the background did. Still, Dad did teach me how to fish. He was the best.
Yeats: September 1913
What need you, being come to sense, But fumble in a greasy till And add the halfpence to the pence And prayer to shivering prayer, until You have dried the marrow from the bone; For men were born to pray and save: Romantic Ireland’s dead and gone, It’s with O’Leary in the grave.
Don’t Be So Easy On Yourself
Trying to sum up our risky business, my Dad used to quote President Nixon: “Failure isn’t falling down. Failure is not getting up after you’ve fallen down.” Jason Isbell put it another way in this song against self-pity. Don’t be so easy on yourself (don’t be so easy on yourself)Don’t be so easy on yourself […]
Song For The Walls
A lawyer is more than a mouthpiece. When it feels that nobody will ever hear you – that your grief and pain are shouted in an empty room, falling upon silent and unmoving walls – a good lawyer will break through and force your message to be heard. H/T Eric Amble for the title.
Gloryland
If you have friends in Gloryland Who left because of pain Thank God up there, they’ll die no more They’ll suffer not again Then weep not friends I’m going home Gloryland, Ralph Stanley, and The Clinch Mountain Boys Trial lawyers become experts in the circumstances just before and after the end of life. Some deaths […]
Chest Fever
And as my mind unweaves, I feel the freeze down on my knees. Chest Fever was Garth Hudson’s moment to shine in The Band’s live performances. He was allowed to stretch out on the organ, often introducing the song with a proggy solo they called “The Genetic Method”. Peter Viney called the lyrics “dummy words”, […]
Coal
And we’ll keep on digging ’til the coming of the Lord Gabriel’s trumpet sounds ‘Cause if you ain’t mining for the company, boy There ain’t much in this town Tyler Childers, Coal When my Father was in school at West Virginia University, he made extra cash working mines operated by his family in Uniontown, Pennsylvania. […]
Temporary Like Achilles
Yield not to misfortunes, but advance all the more boldly against them. Virgil Like all else, misfortunes are temporary but not fleeting. They are often not necessary or destined. Many are preventable. Those that could have been prevented are often caused by negligence. Rather than submit passively to them like a victim, fight them boldly. […]
‘Kindness’ Isn’t a Priority in Trial Lawyering and It Should Be
When I was coming up as a trial lawyer, I stayed hyper-focused on maintaining a variety of skills during discovery to get at the truth. My Dad used to say, “You need more than one arrow in your quiver.” More often than not, whether in depositions or hearings, combat was the rule of the day. […]