President's Column, 17 VTBJ, Spring 2017-#5

• Author: Michael E. Kennedy, Esq., J.

PRESIDENT'S COLUMN

Vol. 43 No. 1 Pg. 5

Vermont Bar Journal

Spring, 2017

Michael E. Kennedy, Esq., J.

Spring.

Renewal. Light. Hope.

Trite? Yes. But perhaps for a reason. And maybe that reason is because Spring brings these feelings.

Spring reinvigorates. For some of us, the rejuvenation manifests in visions of gardens blooming lush and bright. For others, it's the sensory overload of that first impossibly bright day and a walk past the revived bustle of the outdoor cafes & restaurants. For still others, it's the feeling best captured by John Fogerty when he wrote "beat the drum, hold the phone, the sun came out today. We're born again, there's new grass on the field."¹ And that feeling that, at long last, this might be the year in which the Cubs win it all. Oh, wait.

I hope that each of you embraces the season and its cliches.

The profession is hard. As I mentioned in my last column, issues related to addiction and mental health infect our profession. Then there's the grind of finding clients, retaining clients, and getting clients to pay. As the folks at Above The Law have written, the profession is not good for your health.² Some of you might be at a point in your career where you are asking yourself: "Self, how did it get to this?" Others of you have stopped asking; acceptance having set in.

It need not set in. And that's where Spring is instructive.

I'm no scholar and I cringe when "Shakespeare" appears as a category on Jeopardy. But, to paraphrase the Bard, "spring . . . hath put a spirit of youth in every thing."³

That's my challenge to you: inject a spirit of youth into your life. In less lawyerly terms, be a kid again.

Let's be clear: I don't expect to look out my window and see a bunch of middle-aged attorneys skateboarding on the concrete and railings that surround the Costello Courthouse. The key word was spirit. . . "inject a spirit of youth into your life, both professional and personal."

Why did you go to law school? What made you want to become a lawyer?

As an aside, my honest answer is "I don't have any idea." My first year out of UVM I was working at a gas station on Shelburne Road. A high school buddy's father owned it[⁴] and I loved working there. I pumped gas, changed oil, and because everyone needs to buy gas, generally enjoyed the opportunity to chat will people from all walks of life. All the while working a schedule that allowed me to coach the freshman basketball team at South Burlington High School. Life was good.

Until someone (who may or may not have been my father) asked if I was going to change oil my whole life. I took the hint. The polisci degree made law school seem a better idea than business school and, next thing I knew, a decent LSAT score and a recommendation from a lawyer-friend of my mom's, resulted in GW Law extending me an invitation to join the Class of 1993. I accepted, and here we are.

Now, back to my regularly...