The Lawyer Novelist

The combined Senate/House bill is a done deal and will likely be passed tomorrow.

There is a lot of bad in the bill. But it is a lot less disastrous than attorneys who represent kids had been prepared for.


Still, this soon to be law hurts the disabled.


But it could have been worse.

I want to thank a staffer who listened and I want to thank a congressman who helped. The staffer was willing to pick up the phone at a moment's notice, was willing to listen and was willing to let me know what was going on in Washington. She deserves to be recognized. And as soon as I get over the exhaustion of having battled the battle, I'll let her boss know.

Mickie Work

Staffer for Joe Wilson, Congressman from South Carolina. Mickie, you deserve to be praised to the stars. Thank you so much for the last three days.

I must sleep now.

Kids have lost rights, but they are still protected. Just as Ms. Work told me they would be on Monday.

This blog is the Lawyer Novelist. However, there has been far more lawyer than novelist lately. That said, I do still read and, on occasion write, non-legal stuff. On the reading front, check out the Chatelain's blog today. It is a very nice short story, but sort of ho hum when compared with the raw eroticism and rich detail of -pick your story- in her great collection "Behind the Blue Canvas".

I always find it amazing to see the development of an artist, and this comparison is worth the look. I am looking forward to seeing Eileen publish her other recently excavated short stories so as to compare her development as a prose writer. Having spoken with her about her prose, I am always amazed at her (gasp) self deprecation over her prose. Completely unwarranted in my opinion. E should be as preening over her short stories as much as she does her poetry.

Another incomparable read is The Kite Runner by Kaled Hosseini. Perhaps all youse literary types read it already, but I am very taken with this book, which I picked up in the Burbank airport last week. It is the story of growing up in Afghanistan prior to the Soviet invasion and the horrible price that the characters pay as a result of the upheaval caused by that event. But it is more than that, much more. The author is truly talented and the story is captivating. For you poets, I'll give the following passage that made me chuckle; both from personal experience and from my assumption that others of you have been there, done that and got the t-shirt:

"Of course, marrying a poet was one thing, but fathering a son who preferred burying his face in poetry books to hunting . . .well, that wasn't how Baba had envisioned it, I suppose. Real men didn't read poetry-and God forbid they should ever write it! Real men-real boys-played soccer just as Baba had when he had been young."

That hit home for me. How 'bout you?

#

Speaking of t-shirts, got my official "Easy Ride for Autism" t-shirt in the mail tonight. Didn't get mine at the October 14 motorcycle ride for some reason. Black, of course. Matches my Harley. Will get much use.

The Lawyer Novelist hops out of his black pickup truck, takes off his official "W" baseball cap and hangs it lovingly on the ballistic nylon stock of the shotgun ensconced on his gun rack. He pulls out a cigar, snips it with his clippers, strikes a match from the heal of his shark skin cowboy boots and stares at the stranger in front of him.

"116 of you?"

The stranger nods.

"All special ed. lawyers?"

The stranger nods.

"And not one Republican?"

The stranger nods.

The Lawyer Novelist puffs lovingly on the now lit stogy. Blue smoke surrounds his face. "Well, ya got one now." The Lawyer Novelist looks the stranger up and down. "Are you wearing Berkenstocks?"

The stranger nods.

The Lawyer Novelist puffs and continues to stare at the stranger. "Guess I'd better make some phone calls," he says finally. The Lawyer Novelist wipes some mud off of the NRA sticker on the side window of his truck. He pulls out his cell phone and starts dialing 202 area code numbers. . .

#

The House and Senate conferees are very close to finalizing the IDEA reauthorization and hope to have it done by November 17. The Bill does much to hurt the rights of children with disabilities. It makes schools less accountable while, oddly, giving them more money. In effect, the Republicans are handing money to the very organizations that have worked against them for 20 plus years and saying "don't bother to tell us what you did with the funds."

I don't get it. But I'm doing my part to try to stop it. Or at least reduce the damage.

You are Sharon Olds, master of the everyday,
explorer of the female body and family.

Which 20th Century Poet Are You?
brought to you by




Tom? Not sure I understand this one. Though looks like I'm a shoo in for your next poetry contest.

A frenetic week that was supposed to be something of a vacation.
Napa, San Francisco, Palo Alto and Simi Valley.


Memories of my drive up and back through California’s “red” counties:

A hundred acres of freshly plowed dirt, the parallel lines perfect in their sameness. In the middle of this land, a man stood smoking a pipe, his blue flannel shirt shifting in the breeze. No truck or tractor in view, he looked like some sort of tobacco infused toadstool newly sprouted from the tilled earth.

A pink and blue sign bearing the words “ABORTION KILLS” that served as a tombstone for two stray dogs crushed by passing freeway traffic.

Massive walls of cotton the exact width, depth and length of cargo containers. They looked like semi’s on some marshmallow-land freeway.

Radio noise. Salsa Music, Marenge Music and 6 other styles unfamiliar to me. Country western music. Gospel discussions, Bible Readings and reruns of Rush Limbaugh competed for my attention. But Fresno’s “Alternative Rock” 104.1 stole me away with some of the most pounding, driving music I have heard in a long time. Foo Fighters, Chili Peppers, Velvet Revolver, Hole, Evanescence. . . and U 2. I’m no critic, but U 2’s upcoming album is going to be as big as Joshua Tree. I turned the music up so loud that the entire car became one big subwoofer and it became painful to touch anything metallic.

I realized that, even though I vote like a denizen of “red” America, it is an alien planet. And the miles passed quickly as I sat the cruise control to 90 to get away from that place.

In Napa:

Healing -Tears, wine and the cocooning comfort of Galatea have closed a gash in my heart. By Thursday, I no longer dreamt of a three year old boy in a beige cowboy hat driving a Humvee into oblivion.

Rewriting twelve pages on the novel. Would have been more, but the laptop did it’s typical dying swan. I’ve got a proposed logo for Dell Computers:

“DUDE! YOU BOUGHT A DELL? WHAT WERE YOU SMOKIN?”

Pondering love. Love and death, love dying, love in rocky soil that can never bear fruit. Then I realized that the best grapes in Napa are grown in rocky soil . . .

Checking off one of the things on my to do list - An interview with the Culinary Institute of America. Thought about chucking the law business to become a chef. Then I discovered that I made as much in the first 6 weeks of my law practice as a chef earns in a year.

Realizing that having children precludes some of the life paths I would like to walk down during the second half of my existence.

In Simi Valley:

In the middle of my week I had to fly down to meet with school officials who, when forced to the table, did the right thing. I longed for a megaphone to stick into the face of the school principal to ask “WHAT TOOK YOU SO LONG?” I’m still dumbfounded at school district stonewalling.


In San Francisco:

Fantastic sushi for lunch.

The best Moroccan food I’ve ever eaten. Thank you, Tom. You are a gracious person. It is great to see that nice guys finish first sometimes.

Realizing that it would be hard for me to live there given the noise factor. But at the same time envying those who do. It is a city beyond compare.

In Palo Alto:

Discovering, once again, that I put 40 to my stern a while ago, to paraphrase Jimmy Buffet. Had heart palpitations at a poetry reading and wondered if I should get a hold of a cardiologist. Then I realized I was sitting next to two talented, witty and beautiful women. It’s been some time since that has happened.

Eileen - Gave her typically profound reading and commentary. She also demonstrated once again two things I learned long ago (hint – 25 years ago, not 20). 1. Her literary knowledge is boundless. 2. Don’t try to debate with her. She’ll slice you up . . . and do it with wit, charm and stainless steel.

Barbara Reyes – Ebullient and effusive with a raw, street-wise bit of attitude thrown in. Then she got behind the podium and became more so. Do yourselves a favor and see Barbara read. She is a good poet who has the potential to become a great poet. And her delivery is a lot of fun to observe.

In La Canada:

Grounded and revived, I return to So. Cal. to push that rock up that hill once more.

And now I’m going to learn to play the flute.

And how was your week?

The disabled are no more immune from bullets or shraptnel than the neurotypical.

I'm a military brat. There is a tendency for the siblings of career military to join. One of the wierder things my father ever did was to steer me away from that inevitability.

A friend of the family was not so lucky. This person (if I were to give sex and disability it would identify the person) was cut down in Iraq. This person was so proud to be a member of the service and to be contributing. This person did a good job and should be proud.

I'm ambivalent about the war in Iraq.

The oceans I'm crying now . . .

One of the founders of the special education bar emailed me today. This person exhorted me to abandon the practice because attorneys will not even be able to make a living if the IDEA reauthorization is passed. In fact, this person said that children with disabilities will lose all due process rights the way things are going.

I'm crossing my fingers. The next two weeks will tell.

However, parents of kids with disabilities have the same legal issues as other parents. A client has asked me to help out in a property dispute. I can do that.

If the six of you who read this blog would call your representatives, those of you who live in the U.S., at least, and tell them that the loss of "fee shifting" would destroy the rights of the poor to combat school districts that are indifferent or out right hostile to children with disabilities, I'd appreciate it.

#

On another front, I'm trying to figure out which level of Dante's hell Yasser Arafat should be condemned to. I've concluded that Dante lacked imagination.

I have never been a fan of John Kerry. He struck me as far too obsessed with his own end game and, more importantly, he seemed to lack a sense of honor. Of moral integrity. However, to accept defeat and to bow out without putting the country through what Al Gore put the country through four years ago is a very classy move.

Just so that it may be said, I'm not celebrating this morning. I'm not a fan of "W". But, for me, he was the lesser of two weevels.

So, I, the plutocratic libertarian, will sigh, cross my fingers and prepare for the next case.

Thanks to two very nice folks, I'm devoting most of the week of November 9 to the novel. Hopefully, having that huge chunk of time will allow me to break the current log jamb.

As an aside, this will be one of the few political posts that I write. To admit that you are a plutocratic libertarian is to offend most of the special education legal community and almost all of the literary community. But there it is.

The first case has settled as it should have 3 weeks ago. My client is released from the equivalent of psychiatric prison. The school district and the department of mental health are out of pocket in the low 5 figures and I get paid. Not all that I should have, I cut my feees to get the deal done, but, still, a tidy sum for 3 weeks of part time work.

I should be elated. Instead, the white fog of depression waftes just behind my conciousness.

For those of you who don't know me, I quit being a lawyer in 2001. I swore that I would never practice again. In fact, I never actually left it, I simply stopped accepting payment. I gave daily advice on special education law to myriad mothers and a few fathers in doctor and therapist waiting rooms. I did a lot of good work and helped many parents to become better advocates for their children.

But this "practice" never involved the intensity of emotions of a trial. There was never an emotional investment.

A trial is a different kind of beastie. It is all consuming and, even part time, does not accept distractions. It sucks in your emotions, your intellect and your time. It robs you of your dreams as it pokes its cold wet litigation nose in your sleeping face with new ideas and tactics.

And then it leaves you.

It's kind of like poetry.

I'll be elated tomorrow.

Saving the world, one child at a time.

Back to the novel.