Down to the Hard Road
Almost Legal Humor
by
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Rome July 2006
Yes, it is true, we are headed to the one in Italy, not the one in Georgia. Long flights crammed next to snoring people with their shoes off and belts unfastened cause me to drift into scattered thinking patterns. You now see why I had time to write a book on airplanes.
So say, have you ever thought how much trial work resembles NASCAR racing? Cars, drivers and lawyers all come out shiny and looking good for the opening ceremonies. The parade marshal (bailiff) tells all to start their engines and the chest pounding begins with the roar of start-ups for trial. The real racing gets going, and then someone does something stupid with a witness and bam – the judge throws out the yellow caution.
The attorneys line back up and start racing back to the line. Daring moves and spectacular crashes mark the long repetitive circles around the witnesses, with some race rubbing (as they say, "Oh, hell boys, it’s just trial work") and occasional after race disputes between the participants. The people leaving the courtroom are rumpled and dented as they are loaded back into their car carriers.
I tell you that #3 plaintiff’s lawyer better watch himself or the Nexis/Lexis Points race will be a bit different next term. There will be some paint trading at the next deposition, I am here to tell you. I wake thinking that perhaps a bigger dark suit for me will allow for more sponsors, but oddly I feel as if all the years of bumping and banging in court may leave me leaking fluids at my age.
Just about the time we are leaving, Hollywood puts out a new comedy movie called "Talladega Nights: The Ballad of Ricky Bobby". Akin to his role as Ron Burgundy in "The Anchorman," Will Ferrell plays NASCAR driver Ricky Bobby who has had a breakdown after being challenged by a French Formula Driver on the Nextel Stock Car Circuit and decides to return to his prior job of delivering pizzas and raising his two sons, Walker and Texas Ranger. I am now thinking it is fair use of an idea in the intellectual property field to cast the West Virginia movie "Asbestos Boys" as a story of hard-charging, fender-bending plaintiffs’ attorneys racing across the West Virginia landscape to file mass litigation actions and the resulting pathos of life as they are forced to invest their take and pay taxes. Some say I really do need to think seriously about returning to my day job.
We actually arrive in Rome (Italy) in time for me to stumble into the IADC Board Meeting for a report to our hosts. The meeting is at the Cavalieri Hilton, a lovely and pricey hotel about ten minutes from town, but looking down on the city with a magnificent view.
We attend another great Special Friends’ Dinner, this time with real Italian food. I decide, for no good reason, to paraphrase the immortal Babe Ruth (who allegedly originally said this about beer) in my toast, as follows:
"Sometimes when I reflect on all the wine I drink at these Special Friends’ Dinners, I feel ashamed. Then I look into the glass and think about the workers in the winery and all of their hopes and dreams. If I didn’t drink this wine, they might be out of work and their dreams would be shattered. I think, It is better to drink this wine and let their dreams come true than be selfish and worry about my liver."
A significant number of Americans trace their roots to Italy, and the rest of us love the romance, food and atmosphere that is Italian. We are indeed fortunate to be the guests of the IADC at this special meeting in Rome at a world-class hotel high on a hill above Rome with a view of the beautiful city. Despite our love affair with Italy, it is still the place where Mussolini campaigned on a platform of making the trains run on time. As Rome hits a heat spell of over 100º, American, the taxi drivers go on strike. Our hosts respond beautifully with shuttle buses to the City, but it is still an adventure of HOV buses and underarm deodorant commercials.
Due to the lagging five-year Italian economic period, Prime Minister Prodi issues an executive decree to force medieval-era guilds to expand so the economy can grow. For instance, making aspirins and other over-the-counter items available in places other than pharmacies; eliminating minimum fees charged by lawyers and allowing advertising; and yes, dropping the century-old taxi licensing system to get more and cheaper taxis. Of course in Italy, a wildcat strike of wildly-gesturing taxi men blocks our exit from the airport. As we are leaving, the government cuts a six-month deal with them, and the drivers make up their losses on me with the taxi ride to Leonardo da Vinci-Fiumicino Airport.
Unrest in the Middle East explodes into warfare, and U.S. Ambassador to Italy Ronald Spogli addresses us and explains Italy’s role and how the U.S. State Department in Italy is assisting. We walk through the footsteps of the Caesars (not the Vegas ones) via the Coliseum and the Roman Forum. We have private receptions at two Italian mansions and enjoy a private guided tour of the Vatican museums, the Sistine Chapel, and of the capitol of the Catholic World, St. Peters at the center of Vatican City, the smallest country in the world.
Just to keep everything in perspective, the Italian Supreme Court rules wh
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About the Book
Almost Legal Humor is the way defense trial lawyer Stephen R. Crislip describes his book, Down to the Hard Road. Operating upon the premise that the most difficult lawyers (or people generally) are those born without humor, he reports from the road during a series of lawyer meetings over a specific period. Utilizing the no theme approach of the Seinfeld show and the reporting style of the late Pete McCarthy, who wrote a travel book entitled McCarthy’s Bar based upon McCarthy stopping at every bar in Ireland with his name on it, Crislip humorously wanders along a lovely string of meetings in glorious places with totally random descriptions of locales, people and the silliness of the times, as subjectively viewed by a big boned boy writing from tiny seats on small regional jets.
The author contends his family’s residence in West Virginia for over 218 years gives him full and absolute standing to give his West Virginia viewpoint, including the standard West Virginia directions: “Go down to the hard road until you come to the four lane and follow it to the Robert C. Byrd Freeway”.... which one, you ask, since everything in West Virginia now bears this description.
In the spirit of the adventures taken, the author vows to donate all proceeds over the production costs to a community charity so that everyone who buys or reads the book can feel good about themselves -- even if they lack the humor gene, and even if they pitch the book like a disposable camera.
About the Author
Stephen R. Crislip is a Phi Beta Kappa graduate of West Virginia University where he was a Rhodes Scholar Finalist. He graduated Order of the Coif from the West Virginia College of Law in 1973 and became a defense trial attorney in the State’s oldest, and generally, its largest law firm. After a career of defending individuals and companies in civil matters, he was elected as President of ADTA, one of the four national defense lawyers’ groups and got to travel to lawyer meetings around the world and in the United States, all as reflected in his book.
He practices law in Charleston, West Virginia and is the General Counsel of a law firm founded in 1822 which has offices in four states and also in the District of Columbia. He and his wife Melinda have two sons, one in law and one in medicine. He is also the author of A Modern History of a Law Firm Known as Jackson Kelly and is a chapter author for Tort Law Desk Reference - A Fifty-State Compendium.