My Summer Break

By way of explanation

The other day, someone asked me what I do. Without premeditation, I told them I’m a writer. Not a lawyer, mind you, but a writer. It was the first and only time I’ve said that, and I was astonished that those words came out of my mouth.

For 45 years I’ve identified as a lawyer. I still maintain my law license, advise a small number of clients, and am active in the bar, but I don’t appear in court these days, and my legal counseling is very part time. And while in recent years some law students have come to know me as professor, the semester is over and I haven’t decided if I will teach again. I suppose that gradually I’ve been shedding one professional identity and taking up another, but “writer” was never where I expected to go.

I’ve always loved to write, though I sometimes worry that practicing law has ruined me as any other kind of writer. Legal writing, and especially written advocacy, has certain norms and patterns. There is a limit to a litigator’s creative freedom, and rules that curtail what can and can’t be said. At times I’ve tried to stretch those bounds, but only a little bit, and rarely.

When I was in college, an English major, I took a course in creative writing. Each student was required to write a short story. I wrote mine, turned it into the professor, and got it back with loads of red ink marks. My saving grace was the last line, which the professor liked.

The story was about a young man’s disillusionment at what he calls “the mechanisms of death,” which happens to serve as the story’s title. It was a melodramatic phrase concocted by a boneheaded college sophomore. The protagonist also is a college student (purely coincidental, of course). He is trying to escape the limits of societal rules and expectations. After several unsuccessful attempts, he surrenders to the impossibility of his quest. The story ends on a rainy day with our hero boarding a bus and leaning his head against the window as the bus begins to move. (No, I wasn’t plagiarizing “The Graduate.”) The famous last line that set my professor’s heart atwitter was: “The raindrops fell on both sides of the glass.” (Here, I drop the mic and walk off the stage.)

Recently, I haven’t been keeping up with this Substack the way I used to and was thinking of letting it go. I want to keep writing, but I’ve been trying my hand at something different, a longer work of greater depth than postings on a blog. “A book?” you ask. Yes, that’s my goal. It may or may not get finished or published or read by anyone except my closest and most devoted family members, and even then probably only if I guilt-trip or bribe them.

But recently I’ve run across some kind friends who have encouraged me to keep posting on this platform. Knowing that there are at least two people who enjoy reading these little rants, I’ve decided not to shut the Substack down, but because the book project requires much more time and discipline, I won’t be posting here as often as I did before. Consider this my summer break, to be interrupted on those days when I can’t control the urge to exit book-writing mode and address you all in real time. It’ll be just like when the Beatles disappeared for six months to produce Sergeant Pepper, except my hiatus won’t last six months, my book won’t revolutionize the book world, and I am not the Beatles.

Pity.

Oh, and if you notice that this post is snarkier than most, I blame Anne Lamott and her classic 1994 book on writing, “Bird by Bird.” I just re-read it, now and then breaking out in raucous laughter. Her attitude seems to have rubbed off on me.

That experience reminded me that it’s okay to re-read your favorite books, so I’ve also begun re-reading J.D. Salinger’s “Franny and Zooey.” I’ve read it twice before, once in high school and once a decade or two later. That book, and my 11th-grade English teacher’s comments on the essay I wrote about it, inspired me to become a writer, a seed that was planted but bore little fruit until these last few years. As readers of “Franny and Zooey” will understand, I’m now at liberty to bring comfort to Salinger’s “Fat Lady.” I’m sure she’s out there somewhere, sitting on her porch, swatting her flies, blasting her radio, and reading my posts.

Have a wonderful summer! I look forward to connecting on the other side.