Notes from the New Generation

Dear Counsel,

I spend most of my days talking about car accidents. 

Property damage. Injuries. Liability. Insurance limits. Medical bills and records. Personal injury has become a second language to me. And words that often are heavy have just become my daily vocabulary.

We often numb the reality of the case to words like “the wrongful death” or “rear-end collision” maybe intentionally to be able to work with the sometimes tragic facts of a case. Looking at a case with emotions removed allows you to work clearly sometimes.

Until the person in the collision is someone near and dear to you. Recently, my family experienced an unimaginable loss of someone we love in a motorcycle accident. 

Then all of a sudden these “words” don’t just sound ordinary, they’re moments that a family will hold onto forever. Details that some cling to for a memory of someone. 

There’s something so odd about experiencing personally the kind of tragedy you deal with professionally. Part of my brain understood exactly what happened, I knew the questions that were going to be asked after a fatal collision. I knew the process that would follow. I knew the terminology.

But none of that prepared me for what it felt like on the other side. Losing someone I loved. Because the moment I heard what happened, the walls came down. I wasn’t an attorney, I was family.

And he wasn’t just a “motorcycle fatality,” nor was he a claim number ready to be worked on. He was my older cousin who deserved much more life to live than he was allotted. 

Somewhere in the middle of losing him, I can’t help myself but to think of the families I speak to every day.

For us, accidents may be one of hundreds of files on our desk, but for my clients, it may be the worst thing that has ever happened to them in their lives. It’s our job to be their greatest advocates. 

But of course, we knew that. We’re taught to lead our practices with empathy at the forefront, you don’t know what a traumatic experience a client may be going through. However, at the end of the day, being one to experience things with a personal and professional mindset are two very different things.

Mourning doesn’t come with a claim number to compartmentalize it. It’s just a family trying to understand how they are going to live with the fact that someone they love was here one moment and gone the next. A family dealing with an empty seat, wishing things could be different but knowing they cannot. 

Maybe that’s something worth remembering when the job gets busy.

When a client calls multiple times over a question you’ve felt you’ve answered fifty times, or when the family wants an update even though there isn’t one. When the case almost becomes routine because of how often we’ve read the records and almost memorized the facts. This isn’t routine to the client. 

I may spend most of my days talking about car accidents, but my clients don’t. I sit here wishing I had never been given such a personal reminder of it. But, I know I will carry it with me and the way I practice law.

So counselor, this month I come to you with a heavy heart. This one goes out to my cousin, Faiz Gorges. May his memory live on in every life he touched, including mine.

Until next time,

Steph, Esq.