I was astonished to wake today. The Mayans said we should be dead by now. Instead it is like any other day; a commute in the rain and clients waiting in person, via e mail or telephone.
Then it occurred to me the world as we knew it has already passed. We are in the apocalypse. Change has happened so often and so dramatically it has now become the new norm.
For example, the speed at which our clients expect legal services has been bid up by those in charge of technology. Woe to the lawyer who doesn’t check his e mail or doesn’t have an instant answer, like so much fast food.
The life in Mayberry RFD, if it ever existed, is just gone. Some clients want to believe it is still here and drop by the office as if this is a small southern town where not much happens and what people look forward to most is the other end of the year, the 4th of July parade or perhaps the State Fair. Why don’t we stop by the lawyer’s office and see how our case is going?
Well folks we are not just sitting around the coffee maker telling stories. Instead we work hard each day, afraid of missing something, meeting the demands of private practice as well as we can, remaining as professional as possible without burning out and becoming zombie lawyers merely going through the motions and not thinking creatively. If we are out it is because we need a break, some exercise to clear the mind, and be better lawyers than when we left the office. We have turned off the machine for a while to give it a rest. I am afraid all we have to show you at this moment is this test pattern. Since this piece was published it has been pointed out to me that the end of the world is actually scheduled for Winter Solstice, December 21 2012. Better to be early than blow the statute of limitations on this sort of thing. We shall see how things go in 8 days.
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