Date: Sat, 1 Aug 2015 15:52:53 +0000 (UTC)
From: Beaumonte Bill <oral_guy_2000@yahoo.com>
Subject: Michael's Story Part 7

Michael's Story (part 7)

Cheryl Marie was a lovely girl I met in Cincinnati a number of years ago.
Sadly, her life was cut short when she was hospitalized and died from
pneumonia acquired there.  This story is exactly as she wrote it, except
for a few spelling and grammatical corrections.  I publish this in fond
memory of her – I only wish she had lived to see it published.

––––––––––––––––––––

As I drove home, I reflected upon Michael, and what I knew about him, which
was quite a lot.  Michael and I had shared our love of many areas of
belief, values, and background.

Michael had grown up in Lebanon Ohio, a picturesque but mostly conservative
middle class town a short bit north of Cincinnati.  He had reflected much
of its solid conservative values.  His mother was a traditional "housewife"
and seemingly content and very skilled at that role.  His dad, a successful
production manager for a local manufacturer.  Both regular mainstream
protestant church-goers and community group stalwarts.

Michael was an outstanding student with a strong intellect complimented by
an impeccable work ethic.  He was also an accomplished enough athlete to be
the captain of his football team.

Duke offered a decent scholarship but no real hope of playing the game that
he loved.  Washington University in St. Louis offered both, so a Battling
Bear he became.

He was also eager to experience life in a larger urban setting beyond the
gravitational pull of Lebanon.

He appreciated that Washington U. was a liberal campus in a city dominated
journalistically by the liberal Post-Dispatch.  But those were additional
draws for him.  He enjoyed a good argument of theory and fact and was eager
to test his mettle in a liberal environment with intelligent students and
faculty.

Plus, he enjoyed being a contrarian of sorts. Even growing up in relatively
conservative Lebanon, he had rebelled against the more reactionary elements
and liked defining himself as his own unique, and often iconoclastic,
person.

He was especially contemptuous – some said arrogantly so – of the
fundamentalist religious elements that were part of the Midwestern
environment.  He could not understand how any sentient or intelligent
person could reject the insights and teachings of science when it
conflicted with the literal interpretation of any form of holy writ.
Especially the nonsense of the so-called creationist movement.  Equally so,
when alleged biblical absolutes condemned conduct or sexual actions that he
saw as hurting no one and were deeply held matters of personal expression
or desire.

He likewise bitterly resented any lingering aspects of racism or the like
that even reared its head on the Ohio side of the Mason-Dixon line, as it
did all too often in rural parts of the state.

He was an econ major at Washington U. and managed to travel in many circles
and bridge many worlds – a talent that would serve him well in the
practice of law in his mature years.  He enjoyed playing football and
worked his way into a starting position as linebacker his junior year. A
solid and respected player but not one of the stand-outs.  He was a bit
flabbergasted at how even a smaller program like that at Washington
U. could still attract some amazing athletes.  He enjoyed hanging out with
his football "buds", but did not restrict himself.

Michael was more a scholar-athlete than an athlete-scholar and excelled as
a student.  Hard work combined with a natural aptitude for learning and
synthesis.  He found kindred ideological spirits among a few rebelliously
conservative faculty and students and enjoyed the opportunities to debate
and share thoughts with liberals of all generations, earning – he hoped!
– their respect, if not their agreement.

He found a lot of appeal in the Chicago School of free enterprise, but did
not take it to hard-edged extremes.  He generally believed that free
enterprise with minimal or no regulation was the preferred solution more
often than not.  But he could see that some areas called out for some
degree of oversight and regulation but always with due restraint and
scrutiny as to overly zealous, wooden or irrational regulation.

His Washington U. experience did liberalize him to the extent that he
recognized the need for regulation to protect employment rights for
minorities and women.  Even perhaps for gays, but that movement was barely
recognizable at that time.  Likewise, there was no avoiding the necessity
for environmental regulation.  But always with some sense of rational and
pragmatic restraint.  Pragmatism was a word he used often and believed it
should trump rigid ideology at every turn.

In short he was a moderate Republican.  Much like his father, whom he
admired above just about any living person he knew.

His professors urged him to pursue a Ph.D in economics, but his love of
debate and argument drew him to law school. To Duke he finally went.

Law school was a highly competitive environment, as anyone familiar with
"Paper Chase" knows.  A few courses focused on more grandiose matters of
policy and ideology ... the landmark cases of Constitutional Law or the
fascinating development of product liability law during the 20th Century or
the constitutionalization of defamation law represented by New York Times
v. Sullivan.

Michael enjoyed these occasional forays, but oddly found himself drawn to
the more focused and defined disputes between two private parties that were
the staple of seemingly boring courses such as contracts, property, and the
majority of tort cases (i.e. A injures B by some form of negligent or worse
conduct).  Policy was not altogether absent from these areas but more a
matter of background noise.

He found it fascinating to focus on real factual disputes and how the legal
doctrine or theory intersected with the unique facts of a case to produce a
result.  A result, that in the hands of a fine judge such as Cardozo,
Brandeis, Traynor, or Frankfurter could seem inevitable, at least until a
powerful dissent was also presented.  He enjoyed the specific yet demanding
analysis that these areas of law presented, and found himself drawn to the
commercial and litigious potential of the law.

Through lots of sweat and a natural analytical facility he worked his way
onto the law review and graduated in the top 10% of his class.  This gave
him placement chops and he decided to return to practice in Cincinnati
after a rewarding two years as a judicial clerk.

He thrived in the practice, excelling at litigating contract and commercial
cases of many sorts, but found himself especially drawn to trademark and
copyright litigation. Representing mostly companies seeking to protect
their trademark and copyright interests from a variety of infringers,
ranging from other legit companies to fly-by-night counterfeiters or
resellers who took advantage of bargain prices without caring where a
product came from.

This area of law appealed to him because of its byzantine intricacies known
to the cognoscenti.  Even if not exactly the stuff of good cocktail party
banter, some of the strange personalities on the other side of the case
often were!

He truly enjoyed the practice of law, but he found that it was not enough
to contain all of his intellectual interests, especially his love of
music. Many of his male colleagues, as sharp as they were, didn't share his
devotion to the arts and music (although they could put on a decent enough
show for social purposes).

Sometimes he wondered if his preoccupation with things of such expressive
beauty was somehow part of his feminine side? Oh well ... whatever it was
he was not about to exorcize it. He was true enough to himself to embrace
and rejoice in it. He liked the fact that this made him different, but it
was often lonely to have no one to share it with on his own terms.

As much as Michael, I enjoyed the front lines of trial and deposition work,
but seemed to live for the challenge of legal research and analysis and
writing and bringing all elements of a case, factual and legal, into a
persuasive legal brief or memorandum. And when I was really on top of my
game, a brief might even have a bit of literary style, at least when the
pragmatic Michael did not edit it out.

But I also enjoyed the other areas of intellectual pursuits that Michael
found so much a part of his life, while still enjoying more mundane things
such as a good movie or even a good football or hockey game! I was every
bit as eclectic as Michael. Thus it seemed inevitable that we would form a
special friendship that transcended a productive working relationship.

––––––––––––––––––––
This is the end of what Cheryl Marie wrote.  I wish she had lived to write
more.  Let me hear from you if you would like to read more.  If there is
enough interest I will try to continue the story in a way that honors her
memory.

Feel free to contact me with your comments or requests.  –Bill
(oral_guy_2000@yahoo.com)

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