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July 12, 2023
37 years
On July 12, 1986, around 1:30 AM EST, on 14 F Street N.W., I had my last drink. Probably a beer--likely a Heineken. But no one really knows. I still miss beer. Like right now. By "last drink" I mean my last beer, Bass Ale, Guinness, Jameson, Scotch, Bourbon, vodka, Bombay gin, red wine, hooch or intoxicant of any kind. Where this happened was a wonderfully depraved Irish bar my friends--i.e. cocky litigators, journalists, Hill workers, network news people, and serious degenerates with serious jobs--and I really loved.
It was midway between my house on Capitol Hill and my job on Eye Street. Like all Washington, D.C. bars, it had straight-up trial lawyers, deal lawyers, politicians, writers, students, professors, diplomats, and a novelist or two. But this was no fern bar. It was whispered that the IRA raised money and ran guns through the place. It was common to see people in suits asleep on the floor. The waiters and waitresses had brogues from places like Tralee and Cork. The day bartenders were belligerent, and usually drunk by noon.
Perfect venue for a last drink. Or for any Celtic Romp. Dark, drafty, smoky, bent, horny, Satanic. In the off-limits basement, on some Saturday nights you could catch Eugene McCarthy in poet mode with a few admirers. On others, that basement was empty and dark and unlocked. You told regulars like Whorehouse Mary or that drunk Congressman’s wife to meet you there in 10 minutes. As a goof, we told tourists that Kelly’s was a reasonably-priced "family" restaurant, where everyone sang wholesome songs on weekend nights around midnight, when the entire operation was an alcoholic nightmare for even the people who worked there.
Unlike most Irish bars, Kelly’s rarely had drunken fights. But daily there were odd scenes: like word-slurring diplomats dressed in bathrobes and cowboy hats, and reckless married pols with Irish surnames openly fondling au pairs named Brigit or Maeve. Or an editor of a D.C. newspaper furiously charging in from the summer humidity to "claim" his wife, and seeming to grip a small firearm. No one really noticed him. In 5 minutes something else would happen. Once for hours huge mail order sex dolls filled with helium floated from table to table. Which I remember especially because no one seemed to really notice that, either. One guy without even looking up batted one away when it flew too low. This was our bar. These things happened. Normal.
So the venue I had chosen was spot on. Despite my mission early that morning, the place was still somehow exciting and irreverent. A remarkable slice of Washington. Unheard of. I would miss it. But there was nothing remarkable about why I quit. No huge losses yet (sure, I could see them coming). I had a great job, and was headed toward a partnership. My childhood had been lucky--and fun. I could not have asked for more loving parents, siblings and friends. Nothing to drink about. I just liked it way too much. Born different, I guess. It isolated me, even with people around. That isolation, and knowing that drinking had somehow separated me from the rest of the Universe, was enough. It's a lucky, and unusual, break to have that suddenly hit you. Sure, it's hard to quit doing something you love, and nine out of ten times you're pretty good at--even if it's killing you. You may experience for the first time "exclusion", albeit a somewhat self-imposed one. You're still a boring white collar WASP--but finally in a real minority. You never thought that would happen. You feel left out. But you learn a few things, too.
I still miss beer, almost every day. Yet lots of people, including adventuresome trial lawyers or reporters with one dash of the wrong DNA, do finally give up booze, drugs or whatever else controls their life, so they can tap into and use the gifts they have--and grow. I was lucky. Not to just wake up--but to have the problem in the first place. If you hit it head on, you grow in ways you would never grow if you did not have "it". That is what people can never get. And they shouldn't. So I don't try to explain.
Born different, maybe. Born lucky, too.
Thanks Larry, Fritz, Ev Rose, Valerie, Helen--and Jeremiah Bresnahan.
Original post: July 12, 2012
Posted by JD Hull at 11:59 PM | Comments (0)
The Best of Partner Emeritus: "I own a dog so I can understand how to be patient with associates."
If you work for a peer firm, you will encounter me or someone very much like me. [Y]ou cannot avoid the essence of my character if you aspire to succeed... I or some form of my embodiment will exist to make your existence as uncomfortable and unpleasant as it can be. Welcome to the legal profession you self-entitled nimrods have created.
--Partner Emeritus, commenting at Above The Law, 2009
To the dismay of many, Partner Emeritus, the urbane, well-heeled lawyer, writer, satirist, culture critic, enemy of the militantly mediocre and hands-down Dean Swift of Above the Law's wise if wonderfully deranged Commentariat, has caught this blog's attention. With humility and honor, we today announce that "Best of Partner Emeritus" will be a feature and its own category here at What About Clients/Paris? Probably forever.
Among other subjects, we will spotlight PE's views on dogs, lawyers, brothels, sexual techniques and remedial programs for broken GenY JDs with Tourettes, Sydenham's chorea and/or lifelong spine problems.
We begin simply. We love a short but busy comment PE just made about his dog Simeon and his love for dogs--which for our money are about the best thing on this fourth-rate planet anyway. It follows from yesterday's ATL piece, Prosecutor’s Pooch Spawns Epic Email Bitchfest by ATL's founder, ageless boy wonder and polymath David Lat:
Everyone here on ATL knows I am a dog lover. In the early '90s, a German colleague suggested that I own a dog so I can understand how to be patient with associates. I purchased my first Afghan hound, the late Algernon, in 1995 and I trained him to be a show dog champion. Algernon then sired my current canine companion, Simeon, who was a favorite to win the 2008 Westminster Dog Show before someone sabotaged his chances by slipping contaminated food in his kennel the night before the competition commenced.
This all being said, the AUSA who complains about doing his job on the weekend is in the wrong here. The workplace is not his home and he simply cannot act as if he were home (e.g., take off his mustard stained chinos and walk around in his underwear, etc.). Moreover, what if the dog bites a co-worker? Can the co-worker file a workman's compensation claim or does the lout who brought his dog to the office have separate liability insurance for the dog? As much as I detest government bureaucrats, I have to side with the dragon lady office manager in this dogfight.
Simeon cruising London's Hyde Park?
The Best of Partner Emeritus: Introduction/No. 1
Original post September 15, 2015
Posted by JD Hull at 12:52 AM | Comments (1)