Fiction Competition Winner: Trudy's Last Ride
| Publication year | 2018 |
| Pages | 0036 |
| Citation | Vol. 23 No. 7 Pg. 0036 |
Trudy's Last Ride
The Editorial Board of the Georgia Bar Journal is proud to present "Trudy's Last Ride," by Jameson L. Gregg of Dahlonega, as the winner of the Journal's 27th Annual Fiction Writing Competition.
BY JAMESON L GREGG
The purposes of the Fiction Writing Competition are to enhance interest in the Journal, to encourage excellence in writing by members of the Bar and to provide an innovative vehicle for the illustration of the life and work of lawyers. As in years past, this year's entries reflected a wide range of topics and literary styles. In accordance with the competition's rules, the Editorial Board selected the winning story through a process of reading each story without knowledge of the author's identity and then scoring each entry. The story with the highest cumulative score was selected as the winner. The Editorial Board congratulates Gregg and all of the other entrants for their participation and excellent writing.
"Mac—come quick," Trudy Mullinax, my secretary, shouted from the lobby of my law office. I had just straightened my tartan bowtie and was preparing to slip into my black judge's robe to officiate a wedding.
I bolted towards the hullabaloo to discover the bride and the groom's mother wrestling on the floor. Trudy and the men were trying to pry them apart. I jumped into the scrum to break up the skirmish when a flying karate chop sent my toupee sailing across the room.
We broke up the melee and sequestered the combatants to separate rooms as they
hissed at one another over their shoulders. "Mac," Trudy whispered to me, "go work on your hair and let me see what I can do." A natural-born mediator, she engaged in shuttle diplomacy during the respite while I re-fastened my rug. (Which, by the way, is waterproof and can be financed and insured.) The disheveled parties finally agreed to proceed. The women scowled at one another through drooling mascara as I conducted the fastest ceremony ever.
MacTavish is the name. Judge W. T. MacTavish. But most folks call me Mac. That episode illustrates the resourcefulness of Trudy Mullinax, the best dern legal secretary in all of Georgia. She juggled balls like a Cirque du Soleil act for my solo law practice; making quantum physics look like child's play.
One of Trudy's ambitions was to depart this Earthly Kingdom in a most outrageous fashion, and friends, allow me to share how she did just that.
We're up here in "God's country" in these north Georgia mountains. Sequoyah County's population is barely 20,000. We are not an affluent bunch and folks up here don't take much starch in their collars, if you know what I mean.
My Jacobite Scottish ancestors settled here in the early 1800s to escape English tyranny during the Highland Clearances. Many of our clan still reside in these hills. I cling to my Scottish heritage, but I'm southern to the bone.
I have never seriously entertained practicing elsewhere. After law school, Atlanta beckoned like a shiny ornament, but I was steadfastly intent on building a small-town, solo practice. Maybe I inherited a certain stubborn individualism from my "half-wild" Scottish ancestors. I have evolved in at least one sense—for ages, our clan rebuked the yoke of law, and now, as an officer of the court, I am duty bound to enforce it.
Deep family connections and minimal competition paved the way for bountiful business prospects, so why go elsewhere?
That was 20 years ago. Looking back, I learned less from cases won than from those lost, and there were a few of the latter in the beginning. Experienced lawyers were besting me on procedures and technicalities, but alas, this being a noble profession, a couple of older squires closed ranks around me and, for the price of lunch, I drew most favorably on their sage counsel.
On a typical day, with Trudy's heretofore proficient organization, I may close a real estate deal in the morning, meet with a divorce client over lunch, argue a criminal hearing that afternoon and coach our daughter's softball team that evening.
Some may deem me a Podunk country lawyer, but I prefer "Renaissance Man." Of course, when a client's needs fall outside my wheelhouse, I readily make referral down the highway to an expert.
The wide variety of work suits me just fine. I could not practice like a former law school colleague who scans the vast Atlanta skyline from his big firm, skyscraper perch. He is the...
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