The Price of Freedom

“I’m very disappointed in you.”

“I trusted you with this.  I don’t trust people very easily.”

“I don’t know if I’ll ever give you another project again.”

“I work around the clock, too.  And I still get all of the work done.”

            I later finished the draft brief and offered up more assistance over the weekend before it was due to be filed with the court.  “Thanks,” she responded coldly to my email olive branch, “but I can take it from here.”

            If I was into rationalizations, I would point out the irony of being dressed down for my own lateness by the lawyer in the firm who was famous for her legendary tardiness.  But I’m not the avoidance type.  She was right.  I had put off drafting the brief for her.  True enough, I was very busy with more immediate work-related deadlines.  But, somehow, I had still found the time to paint my living room with my mom that weekend.  And I dragged myself to the landscaping horticulture class I had signed up for, even though I was so tired by the end of the three-hour event that I was beginning to hallucinate.  It didn’t matter.  I wanted to be with my mom, I wanted to decorate my house, I wanted to learn about landscaping.

            I did not, however, want to draft a brief for her.

            It was nothing personal.  It wasn’t about her, per se, or the substance of the project.  As was the case with most assignments she gave me, the project was intellectually interesting and pleasantly complex.  I knew she didn’t trust easily, and I knew that based on our prior interactions, she was relying on me more and more.  Part of me likes that – pleasing those who are difficult to please.  I saw it as a challenge, an Everest to be conquered.  It was a reoccurring theme from my past interactions.  Winning verbal approval from my father.  Getting respect from the toughest, most critical lawyers in the firm.  Cracking the veneer of the “mean” secretary who just wouldn’t open up.  It’s almost as if being well-thought-of by people who don’t think well of hardly anyone must mean I’m pretty darn special. 

            But getting the ungettable wasn’t enough anymore.  The only thing that happened with my mean secretary is that she treated me like shit and hardly did any work to my satisfaction until she finally decided to fire me.  (She asked for another attorney assignment.  I gladly acquiesced.)  And the disappointed partner?  Well, I knew good and well what I was risked when I chose to do other activities rather than drafting the brief for her.  I knew how hard-won was her approval, and I suspected I was probably throwing it away.  But enough is enough.  There was always another brief, another deposition, another research project, or another work “something” that angled to steal what little time I had for my own interests and priorities.  For seven long years, I had chosen my work over what I cared about the most.  Each and every time.  But not this time.  Not for this brief.  I was already killing myself on another project at work, and I had to take time out of my sleep in order to get any quality time in with my family at all.  But I was doing it.  I was working and being with my family.  That brief was one thing too many.  It was too much weight, dragging me down.  I had to cut it loose. 

In return, I was told that everything I had to give was not enough.  I was told that if I had given a bit more, and if I had tried a bit harder, I could have gotten it all done.  And she was right.  I could have.  At the price of everything that really mattered to me.  Finally, I was ready to admit that the price was too high to pay, at least for me. 

So I quit my job as a lawyer today.  I chewed off my foot to save myself from the trap.  I’m wounded.  I’m bleeding badly.  The best I can do right now is to limp along.

            But I’m free. 

And for now, that’s enough.

Anita Schick used to be a lawyer.  Now she’s free.

October 21, 2006