Cooler

52 degrees this morning.  I'm not going to suggest there is a hint of Fall in the air or that Fall is just around the corner because there is a week left in August.  Still, as I sit outside the Well, across from David Lipscomb, sipping my coffee and watching the David Lipscomb University students walk to their early classes, the cooler air lifts my spirits.  Maybe, just maybe, I have almost made it through another miserably hot late summer in Nashville.  If I can just get to September . . . 

As I was picking up donuts for a mediation first thing this morning, I got a call from a good lawyer friend.  He mediates a lot, as do I, obviously.  An older colleague of ours - and a good friend of mine - had a stroke a couple of weeks ago and I had not heard about, which was strange, as I'm pretty plugged in to the legal community, at least in my area of practice.  On second thought, I get it.  Everyone handles these type of things differently.  All of us, particularly in my field, have healthy egos, some more than others.  No one wants to be seen as weak or damaged, particularly not in line of work, where so much of it is about projecting confidence and reassuring clients at difficult points in their lives that things will be okay.

My friend is an amazing lawyer.  He has been a mentor not just to lawyers who work at his law firm downtown but to people like me.  In fact, he went out of his way, recently, to extend a kindness to me I will never forget.  He helped me out, professionally, at a time when I really needed his help.  He was there for me, professionally, and it meant everything.  I called him and thanked him one day for what he had done for me but I didn't find the time to write him.  I damn sure will now.

Life is fleeting and precious.  Mornings like this are to be savored.  Clear blue sky.  The first of the cool temperatures.  A hot cup of coffee.  College students talking and laughing.  Joe at breakfast with Dr. Daughtrey at MBA and JP with a 5k time trial today at Vaughns Gap.  A day of challenging and intellectually stimulating work ahead.  A law firm to run.  Clients to help.

It all goes by so fast, doesn't it.  

It's a damn short movie.  How'd we ever get here?

James McMurtry ("Just Us Kids")