I Quit My Job and Wrote a Novel

For nine years, I was a litigation attorney in a large law firm (large for Iowa, anyway). Nine months ago, I quit to do something that will almost assuredly not earn me any significant money. I wrote a novel.

That I came to be a lawyer felt like a slow-motion accident. That I came to write a novel was hasty and purposeful.

The fall semester of my senior year at Wartburg College, I served as a student teacher at a nearby high school and discovered I did not want to be a high school teacher. That was a problem in that I was going to graduate with a double major in history and education. If I was not going to use the education part, what was I going to do with the history part?

I had a minor in religion, but it was not as if I could make a career out of that, especially since I had become a Baptist while attending the Lutheran college.

With one semester remaining to figure it out, I learned law schools accept students with all sorts of undergraduate backgrounds. (I had a law school classmate tell me he majored in theater in undergrad. He seemed more prepared for legal work than me.) My then-fiancé (now wife) was going to be attending graduate school for physical therapy, so I signed up for and took the Law School Admissions Test (LSAT) and applied to the three schools to which she was applying. Two of the three offered me full-ride merit scholarships based on that LSAT score. In retrospect, I am not sure why I did not just play golf for the four years I was in undergrad and then show up for the LSAT.

We ended up at the University of Iowa. I spent three years there doing the things law students do: reading some of the reading assignments, “outlining,” cramming for the finals, clerking for a law firm during summers, writing and editing for a law journal, and buying into the false notion my life in law school was busier than what real life would be. (There are these things called “work” and “children” that throw all prior notions of “busy” out the window. Thankfully, the latter of those, at least, is a fount of joy.)

I initially thought working in a law firm was a nice thing to do during summer break, but was not something I would do as a career. I am not sure when that thought changed. It was probably when I was offered a good amount of money to do work I found myself capable of doing. Also, it was nice not having to search around anymore for a career.

So for the next nine years—five as an associate, four as a partner—I was a civil litigation “trial attorney.” That meant I spent a lot of time organizing and reviewing paper and electronic records, writing briefs and letters in which I accused the opposing side of not understanding the law or the facts, and living in Microsoft Outlook. I spent only a little time actually in a courtroom (nine trials in nine years, in addition to smaller, more regular motion hearings; most clients for whom I worked were risk adverse, preferring settlements to the uncertainties of trial).

There is good, worthwhile work done in law firms by good people. Many of those people are able to balance work and family and other interests. I was unable to do that. I spent my days in the office wondering how I got there and wishing for a client who actually wanted to hire and pay a lawyer and then do what that lawyer recommended. I spent my evenings and weekends working, or—if not working—thinking about working. My wife and kids talked to me; I barely listened and rarely talked back. They found things to do without me. I did the things Christians are supposed to do: I attended each church service, did volunteer work in the church, and invited friends and strangers to the services. But it was unusual for me to do those things while fully focused on them. Most of the time I thought about work. No matter how much I got done, my to-do list only got longer. It consumed my thoughts. Things got worse as I acquired more responsibility, as I worked on bigger cases.

I was so absorbed with who I was and what I had to do as a lawyer that I lacked the ability to think about other possibilities. I knew I had to extract myself to begin to think about anything else. More importantly, I knew if I did not extract myself, I would never be the husband and father God called me to be.

I was thirty-four-years-old. It was late summer. I wrote a one paragraph notice of withdrawal as a partner in my firm. It sat on my computer for months.

There was no one triggering event. But I did feel it was change course then or remain what I was for the rest of my life.

So one weekday morning in mid-November 2012, I printed off that notice of withdrawal and signed it. With my door closed, I then walked around my office for an hour before finally mustering the will to find a member of our firm’s board of directors and hand him the notice.

It took me until mid-February to complete or transition my pending cases. It was a slow process. One day there was just nothing left. I stopped coming in to the office. I stopped thinking of myself as a lawyer.

I had wanted to write a novel since I was in college, maybe high school. I had a problem: I did not write well enough to put down some of the stories that were in my head. Part of the reason for that was I only read good literature when made to by teachers. That meant I did not read good literature enough. Reading good literature is essential to writing well.

A number of things helped me become a better writer. I started reading the Bible more consistently. I watched less television. And I wrote a lot, in law school and then as a lawyer.

So when I “retired” from the practice of law, I decided to write a novel.

I discovered I like the life of a novelist. It was not easy crafting the story, but it wasn’t stressful. I wrote at home a couple of hours a day, sometimes more and sometimes less depending on what else was going on. I had meals with my wife and kids. I talked to them during those meals. I played with my kids at night. I listened to my wife without thinking about work. I mowed my lawn regularly. I paid attention during the sermons at church and was able to perform a lot of tasks to help my church buy a much larger facility. It has been a great spring and summer. I am still not the husband and dad I should be, but things are better. I have not regretted my decision to withdraw from the practice of law.

The time I had to do this was possible because we have always lived below our means. We have a modest home, we have never carried credit card balances, and we have never purchased a new car. Then about three years ago we discovered Dave Ramsey’s book The Total Money Makeover. We became debt free and accumulated some savings. There is a lot of freedom in not owing another man a dime.

More than anything, though, this was possible because my wife is amazing.

As summer closes, the novel is now complete, available in ebook stores and as a paperback on Amazon. It is, of course, about a lawyer, as well as a baseball player and a pastor: the thing I became, the thing I wanted to be as a kid, and the thing I admire the most. Those characters tell the story of how our jobs and our associations can come to define us and about how there is both hope and division in choosing the best path God has for us.

Like any writer, I hope people read it and like it. Also, I hope people buy it. Yes—people buying it would be really nice. But whatever happens, I know two things. One, I have created something. Two, I am not just a lawyer.