Do you not see how necessary a world of pains and troubles is to school an intelligence and make it a soul?
-John Keats
After feeding Peg and shooing her out the door, I decided it was time to introduce Jo Jo to the laser pointer cat.
Maybe eight months ago, we ordered a cat toy that sends a random laser dot around the room, giving two housebound kittens something to do. They leapt over one another chasing the red dot around the family room while I worked in the solarium, oblivious to the impossibility of the task of catching the dreaded spot.
At some point the laser cat toy lost its appeal, but I figured it was time to give it another try now that Jo Jo is boarding with us. Also Slane has been in a funk ever since we took him back up here from the farm. He now sits in the window watching cars and birds and other cats pass by, occasionally whimpering before he gives up and crawls into a chair to sleep the day away. Best that he can't reach the liquor cabinet.
But this morning the space was filled with the excitement of the hunt, as the three of them rolled and jumped and scampered across the room, chasing their prey.
Eventually Slane figured out the source of the laser dot, and climbed up on the table to attack the robotic cat with its scarlet, shifting eye.
As I write this he sits up there next to it, looking glum at the loss of another one of life's illusions.
Yesterday a major case of mine settled after nine years of litigation, barely a month before we were to pick a jury and spend a week slugging it out. I was defending, which is usually the case, and we had strong facts and a client the jury would really like. And yet the whole thing had become a vexation to me, mostly for two reasons. First, it was a case I'd inherited, and the file arrived disorganized and never much improved as my revolving door of six paralegals since the hurricane each took a stab at fixing it before having a nervous breakdown or being shown the door for one reason or another. Messy files during trial preparation or at trial itself can be lethal to one's case, causing the loss of a key document or the inability to properly cross-examine a witness.
The second reason I wasn't much looking forward to this one is an old lament for me--handling a big case while chronically short-handed. Three lawyers and an ace paralegal lined up on the other side, all working in sync to keep me constantly on the defensive while I tried to train another paralegal into the job or find another lawyer at the firm to help with the case. I had a handle on the issues, and a plan to successfully bring it across the finish line, but limited ability to execute on that plan. I felt like the third-world MiG-19 pilot arriving at the merge in his sixty-year-old airplane to tangle with a four ship of Eagles. You might be the best fighter pilot on the planet, but you're still going to die.
And no, working remotely didn't make it any easier.
But now that's all in the rearview mirror, and my calendar is jammed with depositions and witness interviews and Zoom hearings in the other sixty-something cases that have been crying for attention for the last year or more. So much for taking advantage of the respite by thinking strategically about life or visiting my ailing folks or getting my teeth cleaned. No rest for the wicked. The beast never sleeps.
This morning's news features the story of our country's finest Olympic gymnast, Simone Biles, taking the bench at the climax of her team's performance in Tokyo, citing mental health reasons. Specifically, she recounted a day in which she missed her nap, was "stressed", and therefore was not "one hundred percent".
Biles's decision comes only a few weeks after tennis star Naomi Osaka withdrew from a major tennis tournament for pretty much the same set of complaints.
The New York Times this morning was almost breathless in its approval of the end of the ethos of stoicism in sports, proclaiming, "perhaps it's a time to celebrate the ushering in of a new era: one in which gold medals take a backseat to mental health."
Thanks again for telling me what to think, NYT.
And what do I think about all this? I try not to reach a snap judgment--those are usually wrong--but I can't help thinking of my revulsion when the rumor started that the military had begun allowing recruits to hold up "Stress Cards" when things got tough. It turned out that was more-or-less an urban legend, but the notion that our country was going soft haunted old guys like me.
Neither Osaka nor Biles perform for the benefit of me personally, or for this country for that matter. Each has to make a decision whether she's up to the task of performing at an elite level on a global stage. And in Biles's case, there's a genuine risk that an off-performance could lead to a crippling injury, or worse.
And yet, I'm not convinced this apparent trend of walking off the stage when you're not feeling your best represents the emergence of a new virtue, or that someone who avails himself or herself of the option is somehow a hero. We all step into the arena at times we're not bringing our best game. I've flown complex air-to-air missions under the fog of depression or the after-effects of one too many the night before. I've stood up in front of a jury or a federal appeals court panel with my heart in my throat, not sure what to say and hoping they wouldn't pick up on the fear I choked back as I began to speak. I've ascended the pulpit when my heart was burdened to the point of being overwhelmed by the acute pain of love and loss.
And those were events in which I'd shown a modicum of ability. Let's not consider my earnest but bumbling and uncoordinated efforts on the football field in high school. Not much of a highlight reel there. Or the time I was the lead guitar player in a school talent show, trying to channel Eddie Van Halen but sounding like a bag of cats being thrown down the stairs as a gym full of classmates tried not to laugh.
We all feel stress, all are distracted by the pile of worries and pains that sometimes threaten to bury us as we go through life. Is the right response to all that to lean into the moment, and perform through our fears, or to acknowledge we're not up to snuff that day and walk away?
Being a lawyer, I can't help but respond with "it depends". In the fighter community it was a hard and fast rule that we were to take ourselves off the schedule if we were distracted by something going on outside the cockpit, like a night in the ER with a sick child or a domestic explosion that sent us to exile on the couch. The idea was that trying to John Wayne our way through all that was a great way to mess up and destroy a $31 million airplane, or worse yet kill ourselves or a squadron mate. This was just training, and not worth the risk. (The boss's attitude is completely different in combat, I can assure you).
So maybe the distinction that matters is whether your subpar performance has the potential to be dangerous, or to cause substantial damage to something that's not yours. If that's the case, a surgeon or a CRNA gets a figurative stress card (although their ethos as a profession would never allow for this sort of simpering--you show up, no matter what); an accountant or a property manager does not. A gymnast performing moves so dangerous that those in the field actively discourage young performers from attempting them, which was the case with Biles, is within her rights to say her mind isn't in it, and she shouldn't perform. A tennis player who's feeling a little blue or stressed out--sorry sister, that's just life.
I realize making these sorts of distinctions is mostly off-limits these days. There's only one appropriate response, we're told--mental health is important, so important in fact that if you're struggling to cope with life, unable to sleep because of your nocturnal demons, feeling inadequate in your profession, maybe it's time to take yourself off the schedule and spend a couple days on the couch eating ice cream and binge watching Netflix. It's all about taking care of yourself, regardless of the effects on those around you who now have to double-up while you search your soul and take a nap.
Okay, I guess I've taken sides in all this after all. I'm just not sure our society can survive an ethic that only obligates us to step into the batter's box when we feel like it.
I would also point out the Simone Biles was also of the group trained by a sexual predator and only she can truly know what effects Larry Nassar's abuse has taken on her and may continue to the rest of her life. Today's athletes also live in a hyper covered world of social media rampant with incels and other scum. Just last week an older man was swatted by teens for his twitter handle and killed by police. It is a different world today with different stresses and pressure. There is no "private" life for many of these athletes. They didnt ask for the MAGA death threats and racist slurs- they just wanted to compete at their best level …