There’s a scene in John Waters’ classic film, “Female Trouble” in which Edith Massey, playing Aunt Ida, begs her nephew, Gator, to give the gay lifestyle a chance.
Gator, poor thing, refuses, which sends Ida into pleading desperation.
Here’s the dialog –
Gator: Ain’t no way; I’m straight. I like a lot of queers, but I don’t dig their equipment, you know? I like women.
Ida: But you could change! Queers are just better. I’d be so proud if you was a fag, and had a nice beautician boyfriend… I’d never have to worry.
Gator: There ain’t nothing to worry about.
Ida: I worry that you’ll work in an office! Have children! Celebrate wedding anniversaries! The world of the heterosexual is a sick and boring life!
Sometimes I feel that way about the world of law.
For the record, I’m not trying to change anyone’s sexual orientation here, or even suggest that it could be changed – that’s not what this scene is about. The absurd humor in Gator and Ida’s exchange derives from Waters’ inversion of the normal situation: parents are supposed to nag you to be straight, not to be gay. Just like they’re supposed to nag you to get a job and work hard and act like an adult and get serious about your life and go to law school.
But a lot of the time I feel like Aunt Ida – pleading with lawyers not to get serious and buckle down, but precisely the opposite – to give something – anything – wacky and fun and subversive – or merely indecorous – a chance. That’s because, if you’re not careful, slaving away at a big law firm can drain all the spark out of life, leaving things looking…well…sick and boring.
Now and then, after I receive a new referral, I succumb to the temptation to Google that person’s name. The first few times I did this, it was to find out whether he or she was male or female. That happens sometimes – you get an email from “Pat” or “Jamie” or “Oyedele,” and set up an appointment, then aren’t sure what to expect.
The inevitable result of an online search, in the case of a lawyer, is a page from a law firm directory. You get a passport-size photo capturing the flannel-suited subject with a slightly shocked deer-in-the-headlight expression, then the inevitable list of schools attended, bar admissions and a capsule summary of obscure “practice areas,” all rendered in lawfirm-ese: “General Practice Group,” “Corporate Capital Markets Restructuring,” “Derivatives Litigation and Regulation.”
There’s no sense of an actual person in those pages – only a scary apparition from the world of the serious and very grown-up.
I still recoil, looking at those bland, comically formal law firm directory pages – just as I wince looking at my old photo in the Sullivan & Cromwell facebook.
In the case of a new client referral, that passport photo comes to life a few days later in my office, in the form of an unhappy person confessing his loathing for his firm, bemoaning the steady stream of abuse, the sterile, alienating culture, crippling hours – the usual lawyer misery.
I wonder how ordinary people can be split in two like that, transformed simultaneously into the miserable, suffering human being sitting in my office, while the outward appearance is meticulously maintained – that official law firm image of a ring wraith from the world of the humorless.
Then I remember how S&C worked its magic on me, embalming me in its parallel dimension of un-fun.
It begins with the physical plant. Like so many big law firms, you enter S&C through an ugly Mies-ian knock-off modernist skyscraper, only to emerge from the elevator in an Ethan Allen showroom. The removal of all color from your world can have a subtle, but powerful effect – and S&C fetishized colorlessness. Beige wall-to-wall carpet drowned all sound. The walls were lined with a featureless beige muslin that further muffled vital signs. And then there were the ubiquitous hunting prints – someone must have raided every antique shop in Connecticut, acquiring en masse a thousand dull watercolors of someone or other “running the hounds.”
The lunchroom conversation was stunningly narcotic, too. If you sat with partners, you had a choice of topics. There were the relative merits of leasing or renting your Jaguar/Land Rover/BMW. There was the eternal furor over Scarsdale property taxes. If you got lucky, you might be privileged with cryptic references to sports events, interspersed with mumbled shop talk.
Seated with the associates, if you were unlucky, you could get trapped in one of those conversations about hours. I spectated at a few of these pissing contests, in which so-and-so bravely admitted he’d billed 30,000 hours that month alone, and such-and-such countered with how that was nothing, he’d billed 50,000 hours that very week, habitually sleeping in his office, eating each and every meal at his desk.
To this day, I have refused to bother calculating how many hours per day a thousand or two thousand or three thousand hours per month or year or whatever it is actually works out to. My sense is that people should either work for someone else from around 9 to around 5 – or they should work for themselves, whenever they want. Anything else is sort of nuts.
How sick and boring did things get at S&C? I remember debating with my boyfriend whether it would be too “risky” for me to wear a blue shirt to work – rather than a more conservative white one. That, of course, to accompany one of my two Brooks Brothers’ suits and a feeble collection of striped ties.
The first step for many of my clients is restoring their personalities from the long, deep sleep of law firm anesthesia. It’s fun to watch.
Suddenly, that woman in the charcoal grey suit shows up in a t-shirt and jeans – and confesses a crush on L.L. Cool J. That permanently spooked-looking guy begins to relax and rhapsodize about his early days at U. Mich, drinking chianti, talking philosophy and playing banjo.
It’s like the door to the crypt slides open, and out emerges…an actual living, breathing person.
If you’re going to work at one of those big law firms, you can at least refuse to drink the Kool-Aid and remember who you are. It took me weeks, after realizing I would be leaving S&C, for warm blood to creep back into my veins. It helped to play a cd of Bach’s Well-Tempered Clavier over and over in my office for a few weeks. There was something about ethereal music that worked like a cross in one of those exorcist movies – the sick and the boring fled in its path.
You might have to find your own brand of garlic to hang over your office door to repel the soul-vampires. But you’ll need something.
Listen to Aunt Ida. Lighten up, break some rules – have a little fun. Otherwise, you could find yourself leading a sick and boring life.
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This piece is part of a series of columns presented by The People’s Therapist in cooperation with AboveTheLaw.com. My thanks to ATL for their help with the creation of this series.
If you enjoy these columns, please check out The People’s Therapist’s new book, Way Worse Than Being A Dentist: The Lawyer’s Quest for Meaning
I also heartily recommend my first book, an introduction to the concepts behind psychotherapy, Life is a Brief Opportunity for Joy
(Both books are also available on bn.com and the Apple iBookstore.)
The People's Therapist 
I think you may be generalizing a little bit. Whether the firm is fun (or not) depends very much on the firm, on the department and on the individuals.
I vividly remember when in my old firm (not Big Law, more Medium to Small Law and not in the US) when we bought the head of department a singing goat for his 40th. The goat made music and sang “The lonely goatherd” from the sound of music. The goat stayed in the department and was played at least 20 times a day… It was also brought down for all team meetings (ok a bit sad maybe but I still laugh thinking about it years later).
I don’t remember anyone ever talking about cars or billing but then again no one ever made that much money to go much into these topics…
It may be worth remembering that individual lawyers are part of the fun too and make it a fun place to work (or not). Office work has never been exciting whether you’re a lawyer, banker, accountant, secretary… but if then it’s up to individuals to make it better. Decorate your work space, talk to people about stuff you like and change the conversation when it goes once again towards office politics/dating or money.
At first people may be surprised but then it may change their attitude. It’s worth a try. And if all fails go somewhere else, there are some fun firms around*
*Terms & Conditions apply, may not be appropriate to any corporate finance department anywhere in the world 😉
I applied to law school for the 2010/11 year and didn’t get accepted, and following that decided not to continue the pursuit of a law education. Your blog continues to reaffirm my decision! I think I was going down that track for all the wrong reasons, and I doubt I would have been very fulfilled by a career in law. I think I would have made it work, at least for awhile, but I’ve decided it really isn’t what I want. And if I change my mind in the future, law school will still be there, and I’ll probably be better equipped to handle it. Now I work for a startup, which is exciting and rewarding (and hasn’t left me hundreds of thousands of dollars in debt, always a bonus).
I’m a fellow short-term alum of S&C (1986-90), and everything you say rings precisely trueThe lifestyle seems to satisfy almost no one — neither the asssociates who turn into workaholic zoimbies and then don’t become partners — what was all that work for? — nor most of the chosen few who do make it, and then begin to ask what it is they’ve made. A few (Rodge Cohen, e.g.) become stars and can enjoy the limelight, but for most of the rest, unless they truly like money — in which case they tend to end up at Goldman Sachs anyway — it’s a dead end, with the realization at age 60 or 65 that all that’s left is to head to Florida and play golf.
btw, I did wear blue shirts. Perhaps that’s why it rapidly became clear that I was far off the partner track. That, and too many hours of pro bono.
I think a lot of lawyers are type-A sorts who self-impose some of these problems. The fear comes more from within from without. They wonder whether they can wear a blue shirt for days rather than just wearing the shirt and seeing how it goes. They over-analyze every comment, every look, because their own insecurity convinces them that everyone muts not like them, and they need to find confirmation of those feelings. They become despondent the first time in their life they receive criticism, even when such criticism is couched in terms of “you did this wrong, but don’t worry, we will work with you so that you will do it right going forward.” While law firms certainly are hard working environments, that sort of personality will have troubles in almost any environment in which they are not king of the hill. In my mind, for those people, you aren’t really helping them if you are telling them that being a lawyer sucks. Wouldn’t it be better to help those people deal with their insecurities? Help them address the mis-match between their perception and reality? help them not turn every event into a catastrophe? When people talk to you, they are self-selecting the worst aspects of their lives to discuss–they don’t necessarily volunteer that they enjoy the intelletual challenges of the job, for example. Solving these issues is a lot more compliated than simply telling people that they can’t make it in the law and that they shouldn’t want to do so anyway…
Ha! My parents are artists and thought that the only way to be happy was to do something artistic. I tried very hard to lead that life but I was just was too analytical and boring to either enjoy it or be good at it (I’m much happier when I know where my paycheck is coming from — and that it will be big enough to cover my rent, food, and electricity). Law suits me so much better. But I guess I never had that typical type-A boringness to begin with because of my parents. Which is probably why I never quite fit in at BigLaw.
I recently left BigLaw because I decided it wasn’t for me. (I actually took inspiration from your “Go Climb a Mountain” post). While what you describe rings true in some instances, I would disagree with the generalization that big law firms are soul-sucking vampires.
I worked at Simpson Thacher and Davis Polk, and actually liked the people (both associates and partners) I worked with. I worked across the table against S&C lawyers and found them to be quite pleasant. The work environment wasn’t stifling, but the hours were.
I left BigLaw because I believe there may be other things out there worth pursuing. So I am with you on the point that one should go and try something crazy, provided that one has the luxury.
It was not an easy decision to quit law. I have been writing about the decision process on my blog. I welcome any thoughts you may have.
As a recovering biglaw attorney I really appreciate this post and the others in the series. Although I don’t think I share your anger and animosity towards the profession or practice of biglaw. True, I was absolutely miserable as an attorney and despised dragging myself into the office every morning, or waking up under my desk. However I think some people really enjoy it.
My father always told me that there are two types of people in this life, leaders and followers. While some people look to find their own meaning and define their lives, others are more satisfied letting other people define their lives for them.
As for me, I’m looking forward to every morning now and have a renewed zest for life. Although unemployment does not pay as well as biglaw. I’m just glad I had my nervous breakdown when I was 29 and have time to redefine my life, rather than at 60, wondering where it all went wrong.
Color (both literal and figurative) is so important!
You know the saying, “When in doubt, buy it in black”? What does that imply about people who wear only black? Think about it 🙂
There’s a great profile in this morning’s New York Times that reminded me of you and this post. It’s about Diego Della Valle and the phenomenal success he’s had nurturing his family business (i.e., Tod’s) despite the challenges of doing business in a tough industry sector.
The article is at http://www.nytimes.com/2010/10/10/business/global/10tods.html?ref=business.
Anyway, a couple things jumped out:
1) Mr. Della Valle seems happy. According to the Times, “He acknowledges that he is ‘very lucky because I do what I like–I guide my life.'”
2) He dropped out of law school.
My two cents. Thanks!
DOUG
I also found Bach helpful as a means of warding off the grey sterility of the law, both in law school and as a prelude to changing jobs (I’m still in law, but switched to a public interest / quasi-government agency job where the hours are more normal, and the work is more interesting and meaningful). Recommended: the Goldberg Variations, the Well-Tempered Clavier, Partitas, English Suites.
OMG – wonderful post. I’m having my nervous breakdown now, about 10 years in, but it’s all for the better – many of us who come into law do so to “achieve” and “succeed” and when we realize that we’ve imposed an assumption of happiness and worth on workplace behaviors, and that those things DON’T make us happy or prove our worth, we have some extremely painful readjusting to do. It can be all good.
That John Waters quote is killing me (with laughter) – as a hetero homeowner in a suburb, who works in a law firm, I have to agree that it (law in particular) can be a sick and boring life! I mean, who came up with scrapbooking, neighborhood meetings, pushing triplet strollers while talking on cellphones (for exercise walks?) and election season wars over library-funding lawn signs? People – look at yourselves!
Yes (!) a hundred times over to walking away from a sick and boring life.
I didn’t meet a truly happy lawyer until I started clerking for a judge. I don’t know what’s next after my clerkship, but it feels incredible to know that I’m walking away from private practice for good (and the related sickness/sadness/loneliness/self-doubt, etc., etc., etc.)
Relatedly, I deeply and wholeheartedly disagree with the post above that indicates that lawyers “self-impose” their own emotional demise. I was a reasonably happy, motivated, pretty go-getter when I graduated from law school. Nothing about me changed . . . except that I started drinking the firm’s beige-colored kool-aide.
Best of luck to you, Will, and thanks for the wonderful blog. And, by the way, I say fuck blue shirts– try pink and yellow and red and green.
My god, you are never even a little impartial. You’re generalizing so much it’s hard to even conceive how incredibly damaged your view is. There are tons of lawyers out there going to their BigLaw firms and loving every second of it because of the politeness of the partners and the interesting work they do. There are tons lawyers out there who do incredibly rewarding pro bono work through their firms they couldn’t do otherwise, at least at such a level, without firm resources.
Just because you failed doesn’t mean everyone who succeeds in the same circumstances must have a sucky life.
“Restoring their personalities?” Ugh.
And you just keep on generalizing when you talk about the range of conversation topics. It depends on the firm. Also, it’s possible that your personality didn’t invite stimulating conversation.