Wizards and wands
I appeared in Court recently with an older client whose ex-spouse traveled widely and spent lavishly, in total disregard of his responsibilities to their near-to-grown teenage daughters. His Willy-Loman life was, though, a long chain of self-inflicted wounds, each wrapped in a delusion that he was too charming or too connected to face more than minimal consequence; a well-paid PR firm had scrubbed the internet of his most egregious misdeeds, the kind of conduct that thrives in the shadows where some men of a certain age exhibit their unspoken, newly re‑emboldened negative views out of fear, frustration, or simple lack of common-sense.
Were I able to speak of those hidden acts, you’d bet they would make for jaw-dropping, you’ve-got-to-be-kidding-me reactions; I will save the more salacious elements for my post‑legal career, when a mantra exhibited here of “details have been changed to protect the innocent” need not as fully guide my storytelling.
I could have in Court extracted that day (and so wanted to) some embarrassment from this gift to creation masquerading as an adverse party prone to tears, but the theatrical moments would not pay my client’s bills, or guarantee a well-deserved and more peaceful future.
More importantly, the recommended settlement was better than expected, a real‑time present in payment for finally casting this meddlesome ex behind to be viewed rearview only.
The path to that settlement, though, was littered with the arrows of outrageous fortune from an opposing counsel that I, in my 33rd year of practice, have little patience for. You see, I am the ever‑prepared soul, the one for whom ten minutes early feels late, and for whom - if it has to be done — sleepless, if necessary — I will find a way. This counsel did not comply with Court orders, and I doubt he kept his filings, some half‑complete, in any organized way.
And from that dumpster fire, cue the tantrums as strategy: some trad bravado in the false magnanimity of “allowing” me to draft the agreement, followed by a manufactured error seen by him in those drafts to declare himself the victim of some secret plot and a simple refusal to do the work himself; e-mailed performative threats of “follow‑up action” (read sanctions) with the Court; demands that I confess to invented errors and omissions; and, of course, the tired insinuation that a strong female lawyer is secretly weak when attacked by his brilliance. Behaviors only a hair’s breath less than abusive because they occurred in a courthouse rather than another public or private space. We both had to absorb poor behavior.
That case that settled - in part- because that counsel was fundamentally too lazy to prepare it — though both my client and I had to have the experience of both the ex and his counsel’s immaturity to get to a just result at journey’s end.
And here is the truth that they will never grasp which echoed in my mind as I walked away from an in-hallway tirade; the wand does choose the wizard, Harry. And, that truth’s addendum:
From client to counsel or in reverse, the wand may choose the wizard, but the wrong wand chosen by the untrained and undisciplined casts no spell at all.
