It has become one of my life’s strivings to try to save as many families as possible from a litigated divorce. If you have followed my blog at all you will have gathered that it is my perspective that most couples shouldn’t need a Judge to step in and tell them how to handle the business of their divorce. I have tried to do my small part in letting the world know that contentious fighting through a divorce should be the exception and not the rule by publishing my book Untangling Together: A Healthy Divorce Guide and Workbook. In advocating for mediation I may sometimes sound like I am demonizing all things that take place through the Courthouse. All divorcing couples are certainly not able to sit down outside of Court and reasonably work together to resolve things. There are a lot of important things that must take place at Court. There are a lot of fabulous professionals who handle divorces that need to be litigated. Last night I attended the Norby Awards here in San Diego, which is a recognition and celebration of some of the special professionals who do this hard and important work of helping couples divorce through litigation. In this week’s blog I take a quick peak at this year’s award winners, share a bit about my personal connection to it all, and end with imagining a future where there is a little more kindheartedness in the way divorce is done.
What are the Awards? There are three big awards given each year by the San Diego Family Law Bar Association. The Michael Shea Award, the Judicial Officer of the Year award and the award the night is named after, the Norby Award. The Michael Shea award is given annually to the Family Law Attorney selected for dedicated service to the Family Law Bar and for mentoring young lawyers. The Judicial Officer of the Year is intended to recognize excellence on the Family Law bench. Particular focus is paid to outstanding service to the practice of family law, as well as career achievements. The Norby award is selected by the Family Law bench and recognizes the recipient for demonstrating outstanding and unselfish service to the family law bench and bar. All three of these awards are great honors and the night is a big event for the San Diego family law community.
Who are this year’s Recipients? This year’s winners are; the Michael Shea award winner, Jenna Hackett; the Judicial Officer of the Year recipient, Commissioner Leah Boucek; and the Norby award winner, Jan Maiden. There are a few common threads that run through this year’s recipients, the greatest of them being their incredibly kind-heartedness. That is not a term or compliment I throw around lightly. As family law attorneys we are hired to be zealous advocates for our clients. Advocating in Court can become very contentious where we must build up our case and in so doing, tear down the other side. It is this dynamic which is why I try to help as many couples as possible avoid it. With that said, there is room in being an advocate to also being a collaborator and problem solver. There is also space for being kind and thoughtful to our colleagues, our opposing parties, and to all those working for the Court. These recipients are wonderful examples of successfully finding balance between advocacy and civility. All three of them have developed reputations as staunch advocates, but also problem solvers and friendly, reasonable and kind-hearted opponents. Commisioner Boucek is no longer litigating, but when she was, those same qualities were center to her work, and now that she is on the bench, she coupled no-nonsense with her otherwise compassionate approach. All three of these recipients bring undeniable warmth and kindness to those they come into contact with.
The award’s special meaning to me. A few years back I received the shock of my lifetime receiving the Norby award. That is not an exaggeration. I was not even planning on attending the awards ceremony and my Wife lured me to Tom Ham’s Lighthouse under the guise of cocktails at sunset. I had no idea what she was up to and was left speechless when the award was announced. I felt honored and proud, but also very unworthy of such a thing. Having experienced it, I hope there is absolutely no doubt in the minds of this year’s honorees, as they all are absolutely perfectly the right choice. They are all shining stars in their profession, and are each great examples of how the rest of us should approach this hard and important work of helping couples divorce.
Oh, and Michael Shea. As time passes, there are less and less family law attorneys in San Diego who had the privilege of knowing Michael Shea. He passed away in 2002. He was one of a kind. When I first started in family law back in 1992, I had hung up my shingle with a couple of law school buddies, and there was both a Volunteer Lawyer Program and a Modest Means Program that would provide us with Family Law cases that we could take and learn the profession through the school of hard knocks. The one saving grace is that we were assigned a mentor who was there to talk us off the ledge when things got dicey with our cases. In family law, especially for a green new attorney, things would often feel dicey, and we had our mentor on speed dial. I had a few mentors over my first number of years, but Michael Shea was one of the most prominent. The qualities I described above about a zealous advocate mixed with a compassionate soul is what I think of when I think of him. He was so generous with his time. He understood my need for his guidance and was quick to get back to me as everything in family law feels urgent, at least at first. He knew everything, had an answer for every situation, encouraged me to relax a little bit, and always had something funny to say. He was there to teach me how to practice family law as it should be practiced. He was a pillar of civility. He was respected by all. He was an example of what all of us should strive for in this profession.
A little more kindness. Having moved my practice to all mediation, I don’t have much occasion to be in Court anymore. I wrote a blog about my last visit to the Courthouse, during which I witnessed a very contentious hearing with the attorneys attacking each other as well as the clients. The Judge was asking a simple question of what they wanted him to do. He couldn’t elicit an answer from the attorneys to that simple question. Life gets a little more challenging when we find justification in not being civil, kind and reasonable to one another. Our Country is extremely polarized and it seems like we have moved to being okay with rudeness and disrespect. Hopefully the pendulum will swing back and we will get back to proceeding with civility and kindness, despite our differences. When I was a brand new attorney there were examples like Michael Shea along with others that led by their example of being great advocates along with being kind-hearted colleagues. Jenna Hackett, Jan Maiden and Commisioner Leah Boucek carry that torch and example. There will always be conflict to manage in divorce. We all must advocate for our clients. In doing so we must not forget that we should always be striving to maintain kindness and civility as we press forward with this challenging and important work that we have been called to do.