There Was This Guy I Knew When I Was A Kid

The first half of a post by the I-usually-read-him-to keep-my-blood-pressure-from-dropping-too-low Mike Plaisted:

Pillar of the community – the only lawyer in town, actually. Always in a suit, even hanging around in his own house. Real straight up guy – MC’d everything from the Holy Rosary athletic banquet to the Kiwanis Club Christmas night. Nixon Republican, Vietnam War supporter, fiscal conservative. He was pretty cool, though. Coolest guy I ever knew.

When I stride into the courthouse every morning, I think about him. He was gracious to everyone, friend and foe. He stood tall in that conservative suit. I can’t say I ever saw him actually practicing law, although I knew that’s what he did. But he brought his kind bearing with him everywhere he went. People may have disagreed with him, but nobody didn’t like him.

The Vietnam era was ugly and, with me as a teenaged know-it-all, we had some very intense conversations about the war and all of the other extraordinary issues of the day. He was a WWII veteran, serving in a boat on the Pacific for some very long years. He respected authority and often seemed bewildered by the freedom my generation felt and exercised. We talked and yelled and vented – understanding each other more than we could admit at the time.

I learned from him the bearing of a true professional man, the respect for opposing views, the value of informed argument and fair play. It was he who first got me interested in the law and the interplay of facts and precedent, even though we didn’t talk much about the details of his work and I never saw him appear in court.

The only case we ever discussed was a client of his who was charged with littering, raising the following issue: if you pick up a can on the side of the road and throw it into a nearby river, can you yourself be charged with littering for simply moving something that had already been littered? 40 years later – 22 as a lawyer – and I still don’t know the answer to that one.

"This guy" was Mike's Dad, who died in 1971 when Mike was just 16. Not fair. But not forgotten, either.