Everything I learned about trial, I learned from my kids (well almost)

Today a lawyer friend asked me how I learned to be a crosswalk.

Rewind.

Earlier this year, I "was" a crosswalk during opening statement in a pedestrian versus auto collision case.  A few trials before that, I "was" a Holiday Inn courtesy van in a case involving a pilot who suffered a head injury when he struck a low hanging metal object.

I don't find it odd to "be" an inanimate object.  If it helps out in the telling of a story, then isn't that a good thing...

By now you know I have three girls.  I worked part time until the youngest was in Kindergarten.  So I spent a lot of time at home.   They were always playing and acting things out.  We had a puppet theater.  We had a dress up box.  Make believe was part of our daily activities.

Over the years things have changed but playing, pretending and being dramatic have been constants.  Now, we karaoke.  We make silly movies with my flip recorder.  We almost never take straight photos.  Here is one of a gazillion pictures of funny things we've done.  This is my daughter Alysha and her boyfriend Reid.  They dressed up last October on a non-holiday and walked around town collecting smiles whereever they went.  Why not.

There is no rule that says we must be boring in trial.  We lawyers sometimes take ourselves a bit too seriously.

There is a story involved in any trial.  In order to tell it well, we can go outside the walls of our lawyerishessness.  All we need to know are the techniques we learned as children.   Or from our children.