The Judge: He makes a ruling on the midlife male’s tough questions
At what point do the little things matter more than the big things?
One of my judge friends told me about one of the lawyers that practiced in his jurisdiction. Solid trial lawyer, he said. High-profile cases. Near photographic memory when it came to legal precedents. Well-respected among his peers. Good all-around.
Turns out, he also had a “thing.” You know how it is when somebody has their “thing”—that calling card that’s emblematic of personality? The guy who always has to sign off every meeting with “Cheerio” because his great-grandparents were British though he’s never stepped in a London pub. Or the co-worker who has to order a round of Sambuca for the office every time you all go out. The bada-bump “everything is a pun” dude.
Back to this lawyer guy. His “thing” was that he always wore an obnoxiously colored pocket square with every suit he had. Neon green. Hot pink. Colors that never really matched his shirt or suit. I asked my friend why he did it.
My friend had no idea, but one time, he just asked the lawyer when they were in chambers.
“Your honor,” he said, “the jury can’t talk about the case from day to day, but they can notice what color square I’m wearing, they can guess, they can make side bets. I become a point of conversation—and whether they know it or not, they start to like me because of it. And maybe—just maybe—that plays a role during deliberations.”
He legitimately thought that the pocket square played a small cosmic piece of whether he won or lost his cases. A fucking handkerchief was the difference between freedom and jail time.
The little things are the big things.
Going to a random Wednesday night game to watch your kid play a sport when you’re not feeling well and when they have a million other games is little. But it’s big.
Buying flowers not because it’s your wife’s birthday but because she had a bad day is little. But it’s big.
Showing the new guy at work how to navigate the stupid new client portal when it’s not your job is little. But it’s big.
How do you retrain yourself to be in tune to life’s small moments when the rest of the world is telling you to dump the little crap and only focus on the big things? It’s like any other form of training–start small, make it a habit, and let the growth happen. You don’t build bubbling-up biceps in one set. You do it after doing the work, rep after rep after rep.
You’re the father who shows up when you do it again and again. You’re the caring husband not with one rose but with a series of symbolic roses that appear in your relationship over and over. You’re an MVP at work not for one great idea, but for being the go-to guy.
We can talk about career success and marriages and the success and health of your children and whatever else is important to you. They’re capital-B big.
But make no mistake: every single one of those priority moments are puzzled together with a thousand small ones.
