During a recent discussion with my husband he looked at me and said, “You are sounding like a lawyer.” Apparently I was actually “winning” the discussion as according to him I twisted and turned words to convince him of my way of thinking. That is a popular misconception among many, but to those that have worked in the legal field, there are three sides to every story, his side, her/his side and the truth.
When I was growing up, my parents, like many others had dreams. My parents’ dream was for me to become a lawyer. A young marriage and young motherhood put those dreams on hold for a while until I decided to go to college to become a paralegal. No, it’s not a lawyer, but the work should be interesting, and the money good.
I was one of the lucky ones in my graduating class. During my internship the law office I was working for offered me a job as an independent contractor. The upside was that meant sometimes I could work from home and still earn a living. The job was a general practice law firm where one minute I could be drafting a divorce decree and the next interviewing someone for a personal injury claim. Life was never dull as a paralegal between legal and factual research, preparing for trials, handling settlements, interviewing clients and witnesses and the worst of all jobs, keeping track of my time.
One night I found myself on the phone with a friend talking about a domestic violence case, in general terms of course due to attorney/client confidentiality and my son overheard “And then he (the soon to be ex-husband) grabbed a knife from the kitchen and started chasing her. Her brother stepped between them and he was stabbed. It is cases like these that really get to me.” My son later asked about the man who stabbed someone and I realized that no matter how hard it was I needed to leave work at work. But sometimes it was so horrific; you needed someone to talk to.
Another evening my job came under attack from my spouse. “How can you deal with all those people?” with the emphasis on those, as if only a certain group experienced legal problems. Another attack came after the death of a friend due to a drunk driver. I was then charged with “How can you work to get someone off that has been charged with drunk driving. What is they were the one who ran off Andy?”
Of course, I’ve heard all the jokes about attorney’s which working in a law firm as a paralegal seemed to many to place me in the same category. Friends could never seem to understand why you couldn’t talk about your work. You needed to keep track of every minute of your time, and I do mean every minute. It had to be written, recorded and billed, even the moment in time that you had a great idea about someone’s case.
But the most challenging thing to me of all was that no one seemed to see the good that our office and my job did. I volunteered with a local non-profit organization and would assist low income families with getting divorced or protection orders from abusive husbands. Child support cases would be assigned to attorney’s through this organization to help single parents provide for their children. Pro bono (unpaid work) including helping teenagers that needed legal assistance, in the family or criminal court system. Far too many law offices, from lawyers and paralegals to staff go unnoticed for their efforts to help others. Hundreds of people were helped each year due to taking cases no one else wanted or no one could pay for by working pro bono or at reduced rates.
Eventually I realized that my dreams were not necessarily the same as my parents and while I enjoyed my job I knew that there was more in the world that I wanted to do. But my work as a paralegal made my next career choice possible as I received an opportunity to complete educational law research at a University, providing me the opportunity to attend school there. Eventually I received my degree in English, enabling me to go on to do those things I really loved.
But the things I learned as a paralegal all stay with me. I do see both sides of many issues. I am more understanding, and not judgmental, of those circumstances that people find themselves in. And, on the rarest of occasions, my experience it even helps me win a disagreement with my husband, without appearing to disagree.
